Chicago and Elk Grove for Theresa's 50th High School Reunion!

Elk Grove Village and Chicago, 26-29 September 2024

About a year ago I learned that we would indeed have a 50th high school reunion for my high school, Elk Grove HS. Since I missed the 40th, I definitely wanted to attend this. My best friend Kim and I made plans to arrive a day early and spend time together. One of the group of women I am friendly with, Sally Ricks, was the overall coordinator, and friends Linda Latone and Bev Jarosch were on the planning committee, so I knew it would be fun. I planned to stay with Jan Nickelson, Kim's sister-in-law, which would be nice to be in a home and not in a hotel.

• Thursday the 26th: I flew to Chicago on the 26th, and my flight was delated for some reason for 3 hours. This meant I arrived in the dark, but I found my way to the car rental and drove to Jan's house, about two blocks from where I lived in high school. It was nice to arrive at a home, and Kim and Jan had some pizza from local favorite Lou Malnotti's waiting for me.

• Friday the 27th: One of kim's dear friends form college had become a Deacon in the Catholic church after his wife passed away, so she wanted to attend the 8:00am Mass to hear his homily. We managed to make it there on time and it was a nice service. Afterwards we stopped at the Jewel, the grocery store we grew up with, to get some breakfast items. After breakfast and coffee, we headed to see Kim's cousin Nicholas, who lived on the North Side of Chicago with his wife and two children. Their house was relatively new and we had a nice tour and chat with them. Everyone was so nice, and it was fun seeing a new neighborhood where I had never been.

Then we were off to the Art Institute of Chicago, one of Kim's and my favorite places. We found a place to park in the underground lot, and entered on Michigan Avenue - it seemed mostly the same as the last time I was here 20+ years ago. We toured the Greek and Roman Galleries, saw the Stock Exchange room, and then went for lunch, which was in a lovely outdoor enclosed area. Then off to see the Impressionists! This is one of the great collections, and we enjoyed every minute, every picture both familiar and new. We spent many an hour here in high school on field trips, so it was fun to come back.

I told Kim I wanted to take photos of the places my family lived, so we were off to the Near North and Far Northwest Side.  First stop was 323 W. Menominee, where I had a tiny apartment after graduating from college once I had my first real job. Then to 2012 N. Howe where I lived before leaving for California. I could not find the building I lived in briefly on Lincoln Park West between those two places, maybe it was gone. The next stop was the place my grandparents lived in, where my father was raised, and where we visited many times as kids, Armitage and Drake, at 2025 N Drake. It was always a working class neighborhood where my grandparents had lived since the early 1920s, had declined during the white flight to the suburbs, and was pretty rough for a while, but seemed to be coming back. It was a shock to see my grandparents' six-flat with the whole rear wooden porches torn off, the roof and all the windows gone. A developer had a sign up about the new project, so I guess this was a good indication of a better future. The passing of an era... the building was probably 150 years old. Then we went to 3429 W. Shakespeare where my parents lived when they were first married and when Larry was born in 1953, nine months after they got married, only a few blocks away. Then to 4110 W. Oakdale, where I was born in 1956. This is the site where the infamous racist landlord neighbor took place... the bigoted landlord was upset that Dad had a Black guy in his law school study group in the backyard, told them to get out, and Dad told him that they would not live with a racist and they left a few days later; the Black student ended up as a federal judge.  My Mom and Dad moved quickly to a new apartment, in the 2600 block of Neva Avenue in 1957. Then in 1958 they bought their first home using the GI bill, at 5545 N. Canfield, a single-family home with a yard.  We then drove back to Elk Grove to get ready for the first big gathering.

The evening was a casual one at the Coach's Corner Sports Bar. We had the very crowded side room, and folks were either at tables or standing or walking around. Kim and I had had pizza before as we thought ordering food would be complicated, so we just walked around to connect with people. It was great fun to see folks - thanks goodness we all had nametags, as there were honestly people I would never have recognized, and some I would have for sure. It was amazing how the years melted away. I especially enjoyed re-connecting with Rich Hutchinson, a terrific oboist who is now a sociology professor with similar political views I recently connected with on facebook.  We left about 9:30pm as Kim was getting tired, though I know some folks stayed much later.

• Saturday the 28th:  This morning we drove to the St. Joseph Cemetery in Rover Grove where my grandparents are buried. I cleaned up the grave and took photos ... no one has been here for many years. Then we did a bit of a drive around Elk Grove and took photos. After Canfield in Chicago, we then moved to 641 Clearmont Drive in 1960, where I started kindergarten at Clearmont Elementary in the fall of 1961, and then went to Queen of the Rosary School for 1st-4th grade, when my whole family was asked to leave the school (we were too rambunctious). We lived briefly at the Washington Square apartments after the fire in our house in 1963. Then I went to Grove Jr. High, and we moved to 1316 Cumberland Circle East when I was a sophomore in high school. We took some photos of the high school front and back, so spread out and large compared to city schools, we had 2,400 students in our school.

A highlight of the trip was having a lunch at 52 Seasons with the women I had known since 6th grade - Bev, Jan, Kim, Linda, Bernice, Jan, and Carla. We remembered good times and talked about our current lives. I feel so fortunate to have known these accomplished and wonderful women for almost 60 years!

After lunch, we went back to Jan's and chatted for a while, and got ready for the big reunion event at Real Time Sports Bar & Grill, also in Elk Grove close to where Jan lived. This was a cash bar and buffet diner. It was great to see some folks who had not attended the night before, and they had a slide show of photos folks had sent which was fun. It was so nice to re-connect with even more classmates. Bev Jarosch had her family bakery do an incredible cake which was both delicious and beautiful in green and gold, the school colors. As I helped to pass out slices of cake, so many people were thrilled to have a Jarosch cake again! We left about 10:00pm, though I learned the next morning that some folks closed it down at 1:03am!

• Sunday the 29th: Another early morning for 8:30am Mass with Kim, and I learned that indeed I cannot quite kneel on my artificial knee. I did sneak in a piece of Jarosch cake I brought back for breakfast. Then we went to Elly's, a local breakfast place, where we met with some of the same women and Sally, the reunion coordinator, and two guys who were on the committee. We had a lovely lunch and caught up, easier to do in a small group than with 100 people at a larger event. Then I headed off to O'Hare, returned the car, and caught my flight (on time!) to SFO. Barney was waiting for me and we had a slow drive home. It was good to get back, and I was filled with wonderful memories of the trip.

Lovely London, 24 June 2024

 Lovely London, 24 June 2024

Unfortunately, I became ill overnight, with what turned out to be Covid, thought at the timeI thought it was just a cold. So, Barney headed off for the excursion to Southwark and the Mayflower tavern. Meanwhile, I relaxed in the room, read a lot, sniffled and coughed along so I would not spread it around. At one point I went up to the top level lounge as everyone was gone into London, and just enjoyed looking out at the city. It was 84º which is really quite warm for London, so even from a distance I could see that folks were hot and tired. 

Barney returned and gave me an update on the excursion which was nice. He saw the replica of the Mayflower and went to the tavern for lunch, which was old and felt very authentic. They  visited the site of the original Globe theater and the site of the new Globe theater as well.

We had dinner in the room and packed for our very early - 6:00am! departure. Although our flight was later in the morning, they take people in groups and we were with an earlier group, though some folks had to depart at 4:00am!  The bus ride to the airport took aout an hour and we drove through some interesting neighborhoods, and past Buckingham Palace where tourists were already lining up. Everything went smoothly at Heathrow, and we had a ncie flight back. It felt good to get home on BART, though I must admit I missed the limited decision-making required on this trip and how much was done for us (cooking, cleaning, navigating, getting into places) , so different than most of our very independent travel. And Norway was stunning ... we'll be back.

Exciting Edinburgh, 23 June 2024

 Up bright and early for a full day in Edinburgh … I kept wanting to pronounce it “Edin-burg” not “Edin-burough”. We were anchored out in the Newtown area, so will take the tender into shore. Our guide on the bus was really interesting, and started by mentioning that that Newtown isn’t all that new, it started in 1767, but when your history goes back thousands of years, 200 years is new. About 25% of the students in Edinburgh go to private schools, many founded in the 18th century, including one called Fettes College (actually for 8-18-year-olds). The actor Sean Connery had an early job delivering milk to the prestigious College, so upon learning this, author Ian Fleming managed to work attending Fettes College into James Bond’s fictional background. The second half of the 18th century saw a huge upswing in Scottish creativity, inventors, scientists, writers, and engineers flourished, and we went by sone of the homes (such as Robert Louis Stevenson’s). The lovely 4-story buildings around the place where the shuttle bus would pick us up were built by an architect named Morry, came from a family of lighthouse builders which built about 200 of them throughout Scotland. The guide also pointed out a status of James Clerk Maxwell, whose four equations describe the relationship of optics, electricity and magnetism which led to discoveries such as the phone and mobile communications and GPS; he first asked who had heard of Maxwell, and only Barney replied. As we drove past a huge public park near the Scottish Parliament, we went through the neighborhood of Greyfriars, where is located the cafe where J.K. Rowling wrote the first Harry Potter book, and took some of the name of characters (like Tom Riddle) from the gravestones in the nearby Greyfriars graveyard. On Candlemakers Row nearby, there was also a statue of Bobby the Skye Terrier, so distraught at the death of his master that he spent the next 14 years of his life guarding the grave, taken are of by locals who admired his dedication, and he became known as Greyfriars Bobby. Our bus soon dropped us by the Edinburgh Castle which sat high atop a volcanic mount dominating the city. Tickets for the day were sold out, but that was OK as we had planned to go to the National Museum of Scotland.

We walked down the Royal Mile, filled with shops selling Scottish wool sweaters, kilts, and anything plaid. I resisted the temptation to buy yet another sweater, so we enjoyed the walk on a lovely warm day (about 70 degrees) to the Museum. The Museum was quite large, with a five-story addition to the Victorian central Grand Gallery devoted to thousands of years of Scottish history. There were also galleries devoted to science and technology (the first rotational steam engine, Dolly the Sheep and more), artifacts from all over the world including Egypt, design and fashion, and the natural sciences (dinosaurs of course). We decided to focus on Scottish history, as this is something unique to this area that we’d not seen before. We began with the  earliest people, dating from 8,000BCE with remains from burials, sacrifices, and worship. Four really interesting galleries showed how people lived, ate, drank, made what they needed from stone, leather, and wood, interacted with other peoples, and more. The famous Lewis Chess set was there, along with the Hilton of Cadboll Stone with its fanciful Pictish creatures, hunting scenes, and early Christian iconography. There were many tall stones filled with Pictish animal carvings and interwoven plants and animals similar to Celtic artworks, many of which were incredibly geometric, and these spanned the pre-Christian and early Christian eras, and also reflected many Viking influences. The Roman occupation of Scotland was also presented, showing their weapons, the silver they used to bribe local chieftains, and information about the wall Hadrian built to keep out the barbarians. After a quick lunch, we continued upstairs to the gallery, describing the kingdom of the Scots from 1099-late 1600s, with all its battles, political and religious intrigues, advances in technology and art, weapons, stunning jewelry, a beautifully carved harp, and of course William Wallace and Robert the Bruce, and more. On the way out we stopped by the animatronic Millennium Clock, which had been commissioned from a group of artists for January 2000, which described some of the horrors of war and distant of the 20th century in hope that the 21st century would be better.

We then had a long, 45- minute walk to the shuttle bus pickup, which took us down Prince Street, which unlike the Royal Mile that was filled with tourist items, had more of the everyday clothing, electronics, groceries, pharmacy items. It was more of a place where locals shop, rather like the rue d’Alesia in the 14th in Paris where we went shopping with Catherine and Anne. Back to the port and then the tender back to the ship. We read for a while and I updated the blog, and we had dinner at the Italian restaurant, and my seafood risotto was excellent.

Organized Orkney Islands, 22 June 2024

We arrived n Kirkwall, the capital of the Orkney Islands, about 7:00am, and this is the first place where we will have to take a tender to the shore. There is only one excursion offered here this trip, to see the stones of the Ring of Brodgar (about 2,500 years old) and the village of Stromness, with plenty of time in the town of Kirkwall.

Our guide for the tour was a very informative older woman … all our guides on Shetland and now here are older, well past retirement age, and one mentioned that he loved doing this as a second career after he retired. All were natives and certainly loved their native islands. The population of the Orkney Islands is about 22,000, with 70,000 cattle and 100,000 sheep. More than 200 cruise ships call here annually, most during the summer months as we have. Our guide described the local distilleries, the ice cream shops which use the cream from the many dairy cows. Salmon farming is big here, as is open water fishing, and of course sheep and cattle, interestingly no one mentions goats. The island has benefitted from the North Sea oil to fund road and infrastructure improvements, and everyone now uses heat pumps for heating, and there are large wind turbines everywhere.

During WWII, this was a major center for the British military, with more than 60,000 military passes issued during the war, apparently all of the airplane hangars and housing they built during the war are long gone. The British Home Fleet was headquarters here at Scapa Flow (which from the Old Norse Skalpafloi, which means bay of the long isthmus)  in WWI and WWII. There is a memorial to the HMS Royal Oak, which was sunk by a U Boat and more than 800 died. The Scapa Flow was also the site of the first time a plane landed on a moving ship, in 1917, a precursor to the kind of warfare seen in WWII. At the end of WWI in late 2018, the German fleet was interned in Scapa Flow to await the Armistice in June 1919, guarded by the British Navy. Because they thought the British would seize the ships, or that if the Treaty of Versailles was not signed the war would resume, the Germans armies decided to scuttle the fleet. There were 74 ships in the harbor, 52 ships were sunk in 5 hours, and 22 were grounded or beached. The sunken ships are now a popular spot for divers. 

We continued on to the Ring of Brodgar, an UNESCO site with one of the best-preserved circular stone ring from the early Bronze Age. It was a beautiful site, with the 36 relatively thin stones in a huge circle, often with angled tops that were deliberately cut off for some reason. How they did this is a bit of a mystery, and there is no clear archaeological evidence of whether this was used for elisions or political reasons or something else. It was about the same size as Stonehenge, 100 meters (300 feet) across, though the stones are thinner and smaller. Surrounded by a ditch of about 10 feet in diameter, it involved about 4,700 cubed metric tons of rock having been moved. The site was fairly quiet, the first place we heard lots of birds singing, and it was bursting with spring wildflowers. The site was surrounded by several mounds, which apparently do not house burials according to preliminary exploration, which is unusual. We were able to walk around the entire outside of the ring, and the photos as it was silhouetted against a varied clouds were beautiful. The nearby Ness of Brodgar, an inhabited area in the Neolithic age, has been under excavation for the past 20 years, with thousands of artifacts recovered. We also went to the nearby Stone sof Stevens, fewer in number but equally mysterious. Nearby two sheep were in the area inside the fence, and one kneeled on her front legs to better get to the grass, something I had never seen (though my experience watching sheep eat is indeed very limited).

We drove back to the town, picked up a map, and went off to explore. We found a store which was a bit like the Rockridge Market Hall under one roof, and bought some whiskey samplers and oatcakes which I like - they cost about 1/4 what they do in the states. We asked the young woman who checked us out for recommendations for lunch, she she noted a place called the Archive, in the old library, a few blocks away. We went there and had a nice lunch of cauliflower soup and 1/2 sandwich, it seemed like the hipster place in town from the other folks who were there. Fortified, we walked around the town and the many shops  (oh the sweaters!) and went to the the famous St. Magnus Cathedral. I have been wanting to sing there ever since we decided to take this trip, so I was prepared with lyrics and sheet music for the Hymn to St Magnus. We explored the church which dates from 1137 in Romanesque style, with tombs of noted people dating back 600 years. There were folks setting up for a big concert that night as part of the St. Magnus International Festival, and all of the performances were happening after we left the island, but it meant that there was a good bit of noise going on so I figured I could sing without disturbing anyone. I went to the northeast corner by the altar, waited until most of the people had left the area, and started to sing, which Barney recorded. I could see folks listening, so I stopped after one verse. Barney indicated I should go on, so I waited again for folks to clear and sang verses 2 and 3, using a fairly quiet voice, but I could tell that people stopped talking. I was so glad to have the chance to do this, and several people told me how beautiful it was and asked what the music was. Really a dream fulfilled for me!

As we left the Cathedral, we saw a group of young mean tying another man to a stone monument out front with plastic wrap, and they were all coated with oil or something similar …it seemed like a bachelor party activity. After fully wrapping him and dumping more beer and whisky on his head, they left, yelling and beating their truck with a stick. An interesting ritual indeed. Back to the ship on the tender, and some time to catch up on my blog and do some work emails. Tonight we have dinner in the Chef’s Table whihc appears to be a pan-Asian menu.

Stormy Shetland Islands, 21 June 2024

The seas calmed more overnight so we could actually sleep without being jolted awake every few minutes. It felt good to wake up and not be exhausted. I realize that yesterday had me more than a bit unsettled, as I had never been through a storm on the open seas. Everyone was staggering around as if they were drunk, holding on to handrails or chair backs or each other. Now things are settled as we head into Lerwick (which means muddy bay in Old Norse) Shetland Islands in Scotland, pulling into the dock about 7am. We have a quick breakfast in the room and head down for the UK Immigration check of passports, which went very quickly, and then back up to ready for our 8:30 departure.

This morning we went south on this, the main island, to visit an ancient archaeological site called Jarlshof (a modern name). En route, we learned about the Shetland Islands, 16 inhabited islands out of 200, with a total population of 23,000. There are virtually no trees here, all of them having been harvested millennia ago, and for some reason never reforested. Barney immediately wondered why Alaska does not export across the northern passage to here, though it seems that importing from Norway would be easier. Most houses of the pre-modern era are of unmortared stone, including prehistoric sites, and of course fences everywhere. Along the way we saw remains of some broths, the stone towers which may have housed chieftains and also served as fortresses, there are 120 of these in the Shetlands. Later we barely made out through heavy mist the Mousa Broch, on an island in the distance, it is 90 feet tall.  Our guide told us that their native language here is a mix of Old Norse, Scots, Dutch, and German, and for many years it was suppressed, but there is now an effort to teach it and have children learn to read and speak it. En route to the Jarlshof site, we literally crossed the runway of the airport here (there is a crossing gate to stop traffic as needed). There is another small airstrip on the island of Foula, where only 28 people live, they take care of the grassy airstrip themselves. 

Jarlshof was an impressive site, with the remains of a 15th century Laird’s house surrounded by prehistoric, Iron Age, and Bronze Age stone buildings, from wheelhouses built like the spokes of a wheel to Norse longhouses of stone. we were able to walk through the various remains, with their tiny open windows and small doors. It was very windy, though our guide said it was not too “fresh” today, she said that the islands are quit windy with a top recorded wind speed of 197 mph! This is way above the top hurricane level, so it must have really been rough. To and from Jarlshof we saw lots of sheep with lambs, some cows and quite a few Shetland ponies … we will see more this afternoon.

A quick lunch (we tried the Pool Grill and Barney really liked the burger, I had Salad Niçoise), and we were off for more sights up north on the main island. The afternoon involved more of a drive, with travel through the scenic Tingwall Valley (lots of peat areas) and past some of the lochs, with a stop at an overlook to see Scalloway Castle in the distance, the former capital of the Shetland Islands. The biggest moment was of course the visit to the Shetland ponies. A woman who is a breeder and enthusiastic had a paddock of ponies who we could admire and even pet.She noted that they are very long-lived, they frequently live to more than 35 years, and she had one that lived to be 45, which is incredibly old for a horse. There was a fairly young foal of a few months, a beautiful dark grey (with almost a touch of blue), who let me pet his nose. Most of the ponies were grazing, really ripping at the already-short grass with their teeth, so I picked some grass from outside the paddock and offered it to the foal and he took it from me … quite exciting. The ponies are certainly cuteness embodied. Most of the women were extremely engaged, oohing and aching, while most of the men looked on from the side. The Shetland Islands are certainly beautiful, with rolling green hills, small villages, and the sea everywhere. After returning to the ship, we watched the departure which involved a tight turn, then to dinner (I had a delicious lamb shank, Barney had a very nice steak). We took a nice brisk walk after dinner, it was a bit windy but still nice, and read before retiring.

On the Norwegian Sea, Day 2, 20 June 2024

 We woke up early, intending to work out again, but the fitness center was closed. The weather had worsened again during the night, with winds alone up to 40mph, and they understandably did not want people unstable on treadmills or holding free weights as things became more rocky. We had to hold on to chairs and other furniture to move around the room. There were now more tasteful Scandinavian leather pouches holding seasickness bags on the stairway and in the elevators as well. As we went down to breakfast I had to use my cane for the first time since the flight from home, as the danger of falling was quite real. The servers were being very careful, only filling water glasses and coffee cups half-full. After breakfast we got some nice video of the waves breaking over the ship, and the captain came on the audio, announcing that all outdoor deck areas were closed until the storm passed. We caught up on a few more video lectures, and noticed that the sliding glass door to the veranda was also locked, perhaps something they could do automatically, ship-wide.  

We then went back to the 7th floor bow Explorers Lounge and got some even more dramatic video with spray shooting over the deck and onto the windows. Just after I wrote that, a huge wave came up and there was a concussion sound, and one of the glass panels along the stairway to the upper lounge shattered, a few glass shards hit the floor nearby, and part of the handrail fell as well. A crew quickly showed up to assess the damage, close off the area, and they started to wrap the shattered glass panel in some sort of plastic to secure it. The intensity of the storm continued for another 4 hours, as we had open-faced sandwiches and read for a while in two very comfortable chairs. Every so often the thump and shudder of a trough could be felt followed by the impact of the next wave and enormous amounts of spray that went all the way down the side of the ship for about 100 feet.

We enjoyed another wonderful art and archaeology lecture on Scotland, and I need to look at which museum to go to in Edinburgh. In the evening there was a Viking BBQ, which unfortunately did not mean barbecued reindeer or moose but American-style grilled meats and corn n the cob. We encountered some of the folks we’ve met on the trip, which was nice. Afterwards we dove back into our books, and the seas calmed a tiny bit. By the time we went to bed early, it was about 50% better than at midday, just as the captain had predicted.

On the Norwegian Sea, 19 June 2024

 We arose early and did a workout in the fitness center, feeling very virtuous afterwards. Though we missed her live lecture on art and archaeology of the Shetlands and Orkneys, we saw Dr. Celia Berghoffer afterwards and had a nice chat about various museums we had seen on this trip. We went to the Blue Nose Society event, where quite a few brave folks went into an ice-filled hot tub next to the pool, some even going all the way under ice, and after making it out, received a blue nose of frosting, an Arctic Circle ritual. Then back to our room to read for a bit, as the weather became a bit rougher, and a light lunch. We put on our down jackets (which we had never worn in Norway), gloves, and hats, and went up to the 9th and 8th decks for a very brisk and windy walk. We continued down to the 7th deck and circled outside three times, and found that folks inside still eating lunch waved to us, as were being nearly blown over. There was of course much more wind at the bow than the stern, and between the forward speed of 15 knots and the wind speed of 20 knots, the total was about 35 knots or 40mph. After the walk, we watched the art and archaeology talk and did more reading. The weather continued to worsen and furniture in the outdoor areas was packed up and the areas were closed … they certainly did not want anyone going overboard in this weather! 

We had an early reservation at Manfredi’s, one of the fancier restaurants. My seared sea bass was delicious  though Barney’ pork piccata was only OK … overall not as good as the Restaurant for the other dinners we’d had there. Back to the room for a few more video lectures, on the history of Scandinavia and it’s kingdoms and the history of the Shetlands and Orkneys. The weather continued to worse and the captain again reminded folks to use the handrails. A bit more reading and early to bed so we can get up early and work out again.