Hello all. There’s a Swedish saying, travel is good but home is best,
and returning from Europe to our Maine house and garden bears that out.
We’re harvesting squash, potatoes, chard, leeks, tomatoes and more,
madly cooking and freezing much of it, the perennials are still doing
their thing, and in this my favorite month there are sweet transitions
and start ups of classes, meetings, Richard’s rehearsals–and today
enjoying “Six,” a raucous all female pop musical based on Henry VIII’s
wives. American Rep in Cambridge each year offers a preview of a play
that is to go to Broadway (this one in February) and such consistently
win Tonys. And before going to the Loeb Theatre, lunch and catch-up with
Libby Callard Olson, in Nahant each summer and otherwise traveling
widely from Baltimore to visit family. She shared the experience of son
Peter and his family living on mainland China, where they get no news!
So, it’s all good here. But the thing is, our travel took us to a home
anyway, back to our spiritual home, Stockholm, and it was, as always,
deeply satisfying. Surely many of you have the experience of returning
to a place where you have lived or often visit: no longer you have the
need to be tourist or seek out the touted restaurants, instead the
luxury of savoring great meals in neighborhood pubs, alive with the
chatter of happy Swedes, or discovering a small unusual museum tucked
away somewhere, or the serendipity of happening to pass by a magnificent
church where a noontime organ concert is just starting…Of course no
place is perfect and during our stay, there were two daylight fatal
shootings of women in southern Malmo and north of Stockholm, both drug
gang-related and sadly connected with the large influx of migrants
welcomed into the country.
Hope none of you were really affected by Dorian; here it was incredibly
calm though conditions on our Goochs Beach attracted a huge number of
surfers this morning.
Enjoy each day, Elsa Anderson van Bergen, 9/7/19
and from Dottie, 9/8/19:
Thank you so much for a beautiful reading experience, Elsa! My travels echo yours. Returning to Rockport MA is like settling into a familiar chair. The difference is, unlike my life here in Tampa, Rockport is not rich with people and activities that enliven my days. So after I have walked the familiar streets, breathed the salty air, glutted myself on lobster rolls and scallops I am ready to come home.
Right now, though, Dorian has made the weather truly unwelcoming. Although we avoided hurricane winds and flooding, it sucked extremely hot and humid air into our part of Florida. No rain and temperatures in the 90s for another week or so. Of course I will take this version of Dorian rather than what others have faced. I am so, so sad that our nation is not offering the help we could easily give while our president sniggles and snaggles over a weather report.
Love to all, Dottie Smith Mann
