Surviving Winter

Jane and I decided to end 2008 on a perfect note...by spending it with three of our grandchildren (the other two were in Florida with their parents). We went to the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum to watch the butterflies. It was wonderfully warm and tropical inside. The perfect antidote to the below freezing temperatures outside. The grandkids loved watching the butterflies and playing in the water features... and the adults had lots of fun watching the kids. It was the perfect end to a fantastic year!

A Sad Commentary

This morning I began reading the New York Times online and saw there that Israel continues bombing Gaza for the fourth day. Gaza is presently without power and Israel has expanded its bombing to include Gaza's civic institutions. Israel's latest targets included the Islamic University, the Interior Ministry, and the Presidential guesthouse.

Israel states that its goal is to "break the will of the Palestinians" and it further states that the bombing is just "the first stage of its all out war with the Palestinians" and that "there is no room for a cease fire". To date the Palestinians have killed 4 Israelis with their rockets. The Israelis have killed over 300 Palestinians and created untold suffering. Who are the real Terrorists?

All this would be bad enough but the real tragedy is that in an effort to gain some understanding of the roots and history of this present tragedy I went to search the NYT for other articles. I thought a good place to start might be the "Most Searched" feature of the NYT to see what other readers had been searching about this conflict.

When I looked at the Tag Cloud for the last 7 days Israel, Gaza, and Olmert weren't even on the list. Madoff was No.1. I think that's the real tragedy... either that or I'm just an oddball who has his priorities all screwed up. What do you think?

Christmas in Joliet 2008

The girls and their families came to Joliet to Celebrate Christmas, and for Jane and me that's the best present of all. All of the grandchildren are at the perfect age. Sully was really into the presents this year and was thrilled to help everyone open theirs. Olivia and Charlie enjoyed the wrapping paper more than the presents. Of course the most exciting news is that Matt and Rebecca are expecting a baby in July! Here are some of my favorite pictures in no particular order. Enjoy!

Christmas Fun

Charlie Bear came to Joliet to visit Poppa and Gramma last Sunday and Monday. All of us including big brother Sully and Mom and Dad had great fun just hanging out and staying inside where it was nice and warm despite below zero wind chill temperatures. Charlie though, had the most fun. He is absolutely fascinated by the decorations and lights on our Christmas tree. Here's a picture taken just after he managed to pluck an ornament. He's so pleased with himself! Jane and I just love playing with him. He's all giggles and smiles.

Ice-storm Haiku

On my patio

summer furniture sits

covered with ice.

Santa Hat

Every year about two weeks or so before Christmas I wear my Santa hat. It's really the one bit of silliness I indulge in every year. I should do that kind of thing more often. It's a great hat though. It fits well. I think it looks good and its warm. I love that everyone seems to love it. My dad and all his friends at Essington place really get a kick out of it and everyone I meet from coworkers at the PDA to the greeters and cashiers at Wall Mart seem to like it. Wearing the hat is definitely going to be a part of my Christmas tradition for years to come.

Paper Journal Archive: Mashup

Most of my paper journals have been kept in unlined, bound artist's sketchbooks. I've always found this a convenient size to cary around and sketch or draw in. With a couple of the journals I experimented with decorating the covers with a collage (mashup) of anything I found interesting. These journals are my favorite ones.

Wikkipedia defines a mashup as a file containing any or all of text, graphics, audio, video and animation drawn from pre-existing sources, to create a new derivative work. In other words what used to be known as a collage. I believe that now in the 21st century when we have access to almost any content and the ability to recombine it in any form that collages (mashups) are truly the artform of the 21st century. Try one; you might enjoy it.

Our Christmas Tree

Our Christmas tree is nothing special, but every year Jane and I look forward to decorating and setting it up sometime after Thanksgiving. For us it’s a trip down memory lane through the whole history of our marriage. Most of the many ornaments on the tree were made or given to us by our children, family, or friends. Others Jane and I bought together as a remembrance of some special occasion or trip.

As Jane carefully unpacks and places each ornament we retell its particular story. Decorating the tree usually takes all day, but its a time Jane and I treasure every year.

The Best 18 Minutes You'll Ever Spend

Do yourself a favor; find18 minutes just for yourself and go to the TED website. TED stands for Technology Entertainment Design. It started out in 1984 as a conference bringing together people from those three worlds.

The annual conference brings together the worlds most fascinating thinkers and doers who are challenged to give the talks of their lives (in 18 minutes). The site makes the best talks and performances from TED available to the public for free.

Once there choose one of their video talks, sit down, and enjoy. I guarantee you'll become addicted. Franz Lantings: A lyrical view of life on Earth and Blaise Aguera y Arcas demos Photosynth are good ones to start with. Check it out I'm sure you'll be glad you did.

Snowbound: A Winter Idyl

Today if I were still teaching High School I would have taken a break from whatever lesson I had planned and read to my classes Snowbound: A Winter Idyl by the poet John Greenleaf Whittier. The poem describes an approaching snowstorm and its aftermath and a turn of the century farm family's response to it. The poem is filled with beautiful language and imagery and celebrates a way of life that even in the late 1800's Whittier knew was vanishing.

The students would have been on edge as soon as they arrived at school waiting to be dismissed early and resentful that they were even in school at all. But by the time I had gotten a few stanzas into the poem they would usually be listening attentively.

We would end the class with a discussion of the ways people respond to an approaching snowstorm today. My students would always come up with a rich and varied catalogue of images and stories of past snowstorms in their lives and how they and their families and friends reacted. We would follow up the discussion with an assignment to create a modern version of Whittier's poem in prose or verse. These assignments resulted in some of the best work I saw all year. One of the true joys of being an English teacher and something I'll always remember.

Christmas Dinner with Dad

Sunday Jane and I had dinner with Dad and his friend Marion at Essington Place (where he lives). Dad's 84 and he's been living in Joliet for 3 years . He moved here after having some health problems which made it necessary to live closer to me. Although its been a bit of an adjustment for both of us, on balance its been a good thing. One of the benefits is being able to just enjoy some of the small everyday experiences life provides like this dinner. In addition Jane and I have made many friends at Essington place both among the residents and their families. The experience of having Dad living close by so he can be part of our lives has given Jane and I a new and deeper appreciation of the importance of family

Paper Journal Archive: Munchkin Napping

Here's a sketch I did of Munchkin. I never thought I'd own a dog. For years I resisted my daughters' pleas to get one. For some reason still unclear to me I bought a Maltese puppy for Jane after all the girls moved out of the house. Well Munchkin became "my" dog and a beloved, though somewhat manic member of our family. No one was more surprised at how closely we bonded. Munchkin is no longer with us and Jane and I have no desire to replace him with another dog, but he's deeply missed.

Peek-A-Boo

Rebecca and Olivia drove to Joliet for a visit today. Every time we see Olivia, no matter when we saw her last, she always seems to have invented some new way of exploring and experienceing her new world. She has been playing Peek-A-Boo for a while. But today when I lay down on the living room floor to play, O discovered Peek-A-Boo under the coffee table. I'm glad I was there to discover it with her. Playing with Olivia, I always see the world with new eyes!

A Fellow Traveler

I love spending time with my grandson, Trevor (9). He's a thinker and he's got a lot to say about his thoughts. He's curious about anything related to science, nature, or the out of doors. He's most at home outside... like his Grandpa Kerrins.

When Trev and I get to hang out we spend the whole day talking and figuring out how the universe works, sometimes stopping to fuel the conversation with Tacos and rootbeer. Plenty of hot sauce please! In Trev I've truly found a fellow traveler and kindred spirit

Paper Journal Archive: Being Early

This entry was done in 1997 when I went to Naperville with Rebecca early one morning to get the Christmas ham. Of course I wanted to be early and Bec was not shy about ribbing me about being an old fogey. But to me being early is a way to get more time out of life. I go everywhere with a notebook to write in or a book to read and find that this way I have time to be where I really am and enjoy the moment.

Bec and I found a bagle shop and had some breakfast and good conversation. I remember the occasion like it was yesterday...even where we sat. This drawing of the clock on the wall is a reminder of a perfect day spent with my youngest daughter.

Going "All Digital"

One of my goals is to go "All Digital". I guess when I get there I can truly label my years A.D. Something I'm definitely going to look into is using a service called Scan My Photos (see the link in the Favorite Sites box on my blog). I read about the site in an article by David Pogue in the New York Times Technology section.

Scan My Photos will take 1000 of your photos any size from 3"x3" to 11"x14", scan them the same day they receive them, and return the photos and a DVD to you for $50.00! They won't organize the photos in any way or even orient them for you, but they will be on a disk where you can store them in a safety deposit box, make copies to give your children, and of course use in any photo editing program. I highly recommend Picassa which is absolutely free. If you use a sophisticated program like Adobe Photoshop. you can even get the program to do some sorting for you because it can recognize faces in your photos.

When you send in the photos you have to sort them by size and you can orient them at that time. Scan My Photos will scan them exactly the way they get them with a super expensive, super high quality, super fast Kodak scanner. Obviously and preliminary work you do will help later because they are scanned just the way they are received. Anyway, sounds like a great idea to me. It's my first New Year's resolution: 36 years of photos are going "All Digital"!

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How This Began

I was inspired to create this blog by the efforts of my three daughters Laura, Sarah, and Rebecca who blog mainly about my grandchildren (my favorite of many interests). As they nudged me into following their blogs I became more and more fascinated. Not only were they creating more time for me to spend with my grandchildren, but I was being given a special and intimate view of their families lives and what these lives meant to my daughters. Often they were revealing much more than they knew.

It also began to dawn on me that I was witnessing history in the making, and that this historical record would be available to me (and to their children!) in its entirety from any computer (and soon probably any cellphone) forever . What a tremendous legacy!

And so I decided I'd like to add to the record of our family too. Perhaps by sharing something of myself. Perhaps my children and grandchildren and (may I be so bold, my great-grandchildren) and my friends too might enjoy learning a bit about what it's like to be me and to inhabit my world. Hope all of you enjoy. Thank you to Laura, Sarah, and Rebecca, my daughters... and next to Jane my three best friends in the whole world!

If you enjoyed this post, leave a comment about why you started your blog.