Tonight's picture was taken in May of 2007, at Dutch Wonderland, in Lancaster, PA. You maybe asking yourself, why is Vicki posting a photo of a roller coaster?!!! Well first off, Mattie and Peter were sitting in it! They were behind the man in red. Peter was wearing a white t-shirt on the right and had his arm around Mattie. I think why this photo still intrigues me is that I can't get over how Mattie loved roller coasters. They scare me to death, I don't even like looking at them. I couldn't believe he wanted to try it at only age 5! That was Mattie's first roller coaster and it was from that ride, that it inspired him to try other ones! Fortunately Peter went with Mattie on these rides and while they were riding, I was photographing. We all had our designated roles and I was glad mine was on solid ground, and luckily so, otherwise we wouldn't have this photograph today.
Quote of the day: It takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, and a day to love them, but it takes an entire lifetime to forget them. ~ Unknown
Since Peter has worked for his current company, traveling has been part of his job description! Actually now that I think about it Peter has been traveling all of his professional career! In fact, when Peter worked as a consultant he did a lot of domestic travel! I remember prior to Mattie being born Peter practically lived in Tampa and commuted back to DC on the weekends. However, I would have to say Peter being gone from home back then did not seem as difficult as it does now. I know he feels the same when I go away. When Mattie died, it changed the dynamics in our lives and just the whole order of our universe. Nothing seems exactly stable anymore and it certainly doesn't seem stable if we are not together. Ironically!
Today Peter went to Oklahoma on business. In fact, his travel schedule this summer is a bit hectic, but fortunately it is all domestic travel unlike many of his past trips overseas. While Peter is now safely in Oklahoma, I went to my last class of Zumba until August. Then after Zumba, I met up with my friend Tina for lunch. While having lunch, we sat outside and I literally ran into two people I knew. I am continually stunned by what a small place Alexandria City, VA is, and yet it really isn't geographically small at all! One of the individuals I met was a former student of mine who I hadn't seen for years!
Later today, I came home and as usual I was glued to my computer. This evening, Peter called me from Oklahoma and told me about his client dinner and the infamous and innocent client question which he usually gets...... I think it is ironic how this question is used to make small talk and start conversations..... "do you have any children?" Peter always handles this questions quite well with the response.... "it is a long story." Peter elaborated with this group tonight since the client in question works on maternal and child health issues and most likely would gravitate to our Foundation issues. Which Peter was correct about! As Peter discussed Mattie and our Foundation, this apparently opened up the dialogue at the table to people's experiences with childhood cancer. I am not sure such a conversation would have occurred then or at any other time if it weren't for Peter bringing up Mattie. I have a feeling people learned something about each other tonight that they wouldn't have necessarily known about their colleagues previously! But to me cancer is that kind of topic. Once you bring it up and you give people permission to dialogue about it the rest seems to naturally occur.
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