September Spin

So far September had been a blur around here. Labor Day has come and gone and with it the tourists, but our personal tourists have been here in the past week.

Last weekend we hosted Nancy and Matt for a visit to attend my father-in-law's memorial service. Now that we live half a continent away we seldom see them. We saw at least every other week when we lived in Oklahoma and it has left a big hole in Shana's life not to visit with them often. I am in contact on Facebook, but there is no substitute for a comfortable chat with someone who has known you since you were a child, as everyone who lives far from family has reason to know. Being surrounded by her visiting step family Shana was especially glad to have her own family here for the weekend.

I had occasion to visit with a lot of Bruce's relatives who I had never met. It was interesting to see them and hear their memories of him as a young man. There are family mannerisms that surprised me, even in his nephews. It was good to talk with his friends too, and hear their stories of shared experiences. He had several close friends in Menahaunt who will miss him.

As soon as our family guests left my best friend in Oklahoma City and her partner came to stay for a few days. I say "stay", but their visit was all go-go-go! I wanted them to have a good time and to see as much of my new home as possible - I called it the "sampler tour" of Massachusetts.  Lucky for us the weather favored us, and Shana and I were able to take time off to spend with our guests. We really only had a short spell of rainy weather, and that during our dinner in Boston. We visited Sandwich with its charming downtown and  its beautiful boardwalk for our first day, then the astoundingly beautiful Cape Cod National Seashore the next. Because our tourist season is pretty much over the beaches were not at all crowded. Thursday found us doing a whirlwind tour of Provincetown including a stop at Buddha and Beads, which I have been dying to visit, and Friday in Boston for a bit of the Freedom Trail and dinner on the North end. I took them around the places I love and some things I had not found time to visit yet, but for me I think the best time was every morning having coffee with Sharon Jean. I have good friends here, but I miss my friends from Oklahoma City. A dinner and breakfast once a year does not really take the place of all those hours riding along together on our bikes in the country.

I has excited to be able to follow part of the Freedom Trail on this visit. I've often wanted to do it, but our trips into town are so few, and city attractions so numerous that we never made time for it. We were all very disappointed to find that the Old Corner Book Store on the Freedom Walk has been replaced by a Chipotle, but fortunately we were able to locate another used book store very nearby. Shana had to forcibly remove me from the premises.

I did some shopping while our guests were here, too. With the excuse of shopping with my friends I found the perfect object for the empty wall in our living room, a little pottery dish for our kitchen sink SOS pad, and 5 FIVE books, four from second hand stores and one a Freedom Trail Guidebook. That makes this week just about perfect.

I'll be loading up a bunch of pictures to Flickr later today.