Friday, October 7, 2011

Friday, October 7, 2011

Tonight's picture was taken in April of 2005. As you can see, Mattie had one of his sets of train tracks out and had TAPED them to the hard wood floor. Before having Mattie in my life, the idea of having tape on my floors wasn't a notion I would have considered much less allowed. However, raising an active and curious boy forced me to think outside the box and what I found was when I did the possibilities for fun, exploration, and learning were endless. I find it ironic that I was the trained educator, and yet one of my greatest teachers was decades younger and less experienced than me..... Mattie! You should also note in this picture the sippy cup. Some kids have a security blanket, a stuffed animal, or a toy that they are attached to. Mattie's source of comfort came from his sippy cup and the cup had to be filled with milk. It did not matter where we went, this cup came with us, and naturally because it was milk, along came a cooler.


Quote of the day: Do not surrender your grief so quickly, Let it cut more deeply, Let it ferment and season you, As few human or divine ingredients can. ~ Hafiz of Persia


As promised, the question of the day is....................................................
Have you voted for Tricia (Mattie's nurse) today?
(Remember you can vote ONCE every 24 hours!!!)

For more information about the Johnson and Johnson Amazing Nurse Contest, please read my September 28, 2011 blog posting. Your daily vote is important and will bring Tricia closer to becoming a finalist.

Click on this link to vote for Patricia Grusholt: http://wildfireapp.com/website/6/contests/157336/voteable_entries


Today was an amazingly LONG day of car travel. Peter and I left Washington, DC at 7:45am and arrived in Truro (located in the upper part of Cape Cod) at 5:30pm. In our nine hour commute, we only stopped once for about 10 minutes! We traversed NINE states (Washington, DC; Maryland; Delaware; New Jersey; New York; Rhode Island; Connecticut; and Massachusetts!), saw deer along the side of the highways, saw hawks, and one eagle.

The last time I visited the Cape, I was in single digits. So it has been a while, and I must admit, I have never been to Truro. Peter spent many summers as a kid camping in Truro. So thankfully he is familiar with this territory. When he urged me to leave early from DC today, I heeded his advice. Fortunately I listened to him because I would not want to check into the house we won from Mattie's preschool auction in the dark. Truro is beautiful but untouched and therefore doesn't have street lights and has trees for as far as the eye can see. Honestly I am not sure how Peter even found the house because the street (if you want to call it that!) was not sign posted. At one point it looked like he was going up a dirt road, which I assumed was someone's private driveway. It turned out that the driveway was actually the road. For me the analogy is the story of the city mouse being asked to live like a country mouse. I have lived in a big city for most of my adult life and therefore this town is a major adjustment for me. Peter is a very resourceful person and together we are finding a way to make this work. When I bid on this house at the auction, I was motivated to do this for two reasons. The first was obviously I wanted to support Mattie's preschool (a school that was super supportive of us through Mattie's cancer battle) and second, I wanted Peter to have a chance to go back to the Cape, to a place he always told me so much about.

Along our journey, I snapped several pictures. This is a picture taken from the NJ Turnpike of New York City. As we approached NYC, I emailed my lifetime friend, Karen, and told her we were going to honk as our way of saying hello to her.

I can't remember the last time I crossed over the George Washington Bridge. I must have been a child when I did. Peter asked me which bridge I wanted to traverse, George or Martha Washington, and I picked George, so that I could have a better view.

As we entered Massachusetts, we passed several cranberry bogs. They were beautiful and beginning to turn their lovely red color.

This is one of the streets near the house where we are staying in Truro. I wanted you to see this to get a feeling for the terrain!

This is the house we are staying in. It is very rustic looking both inside and outside. The one captivating part of the property is the backyard and its view!

From the backyard we can see the Cape Cod Bay, which was a glorious sight after nine hours of driving in the car.

I end tonight's posting with a view of a spectacular sunset over Cape Cod Bay. When we step out of the house at night, it is pitch black and you can see stars for as far as the eye can see. Living in the city, I do not think I have ever heard such silence, but if you want to connect with nature, Truro is the place to be.