A' Blinkin' in Illinois

When I Was a Camp Follower

2009-11-07T20:27:00.000-08:00

As a young husband and father in my 30s, I turned to Jesus and became a Christian. For many years, one of the biggest encouragements I had was the music of artist Steve Camp. Well-known for his strong views that Christian musicians are called to make direct, uncompromising music that confronts the world with the message of the Scriptures, Camp was like an older brother to me, even though we never met.

From the sympathetic reflection of He's All You Need through the criticism of Living in Laodicea to the strident rhythm of Taking Heaven by Storm, Camp provided the soundtrack for a victorious Christian life. His most resonant song, He Covers Me, was later made into a video with scenes from New York City on 9/11 (where his brother, Danny, was one of the rescuers) and was broadcast around the world.

Born to Christian parents in Wheaton (Illinois), Camp accepted the Lord at the age of five. In college, he received intense working knowledge of Scripture and theology, mastering the Greek language, and becoming convinced of the truth of Orthodox historical Reformed theology in the tradition of John Owen.

Camp's singing career began when he played acoustic guitar and sang backups on Scott Wesley Brown's 1977 album, I'm Not Religious, I Just Love The Lord, one year before he went on his own. Subsequent close bonds with legendary Christian singer/songwriter Larry Norman and the late Keith Green helped Camp define his direction as an uncompromising Christian artist.

Camp's popularity now continues mostly in his Christian writing addressing current trends and matters of Reformed Theology. He started Audience One Ministries and a blog covering Christian music, biblical study, reformation, and revival.

The Stars Are Bright, Deep in the Heart of Illinois History...

2009-06-06T21:03:00.000-07:00

There's no cell phone reception for almost anyone at Fort de Chartres, but that's okay with us. We are enjoying the full moon, quiet, and bright stars over the American Bottoms south of Columbia in Randolph County. This weekend is the 39th annual Rendezvous, an opportunity to recreate life in the 1750s (or 1780s, or 1820s) in what would some day be Illinois.

Fort de Chartres is the last of three eighteenth-century forts by that name erected near the Mississippi River by France's colonial government. From 1720 to 1763, French administration of the Illinois area was centered at the forts, built successively over a 40-year period on or near the same site. The stone fort, built in the 1750s and abandoned in 1771, has been partially reconstructed to provide a glimpse of life under the French regime by the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency.

Rendezvous is a re-creation of the traditional French fur trapper’s holiday of the Eighteenth Century and is one of the oldest and largest events of its kind in the United States. Thanks to an invitation from our friends Jim & Carol Agne, we were able to enjoy buckskinners, militiamen, artisans, and entertainers as they celebrated how our forefathers lived life in the shadows of the great fortress known as Fort de Chartres.

This year was a particular joy since former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich had closed the fortress site in 2008--only to have new Governor Pat Quinn yield to the requests of thousands of Illinois citizens (and the dictates of common sense) and restore the historic site to operation. The weather was perfect this year--not too hot and not too cold--and we enjoyed our visit...maybe we will bring our grandkids next year...

The Song That Started It All (Maybe)

2009-04-02T19:37:00.000-07:00

The first settlers of Monroe County, Illinois were pioneers from the territories of Virginia, Maryland and Delaware who arrived about 1783, but their settlements were scattered following bloody skirmishes with the natives. The settlers who came into this area between 1793 and1795 probably reasoned that this area was a favorable place to settle as the nearly 700-feet high rise between the Bottoms and the bluffs made the plateau safe from floods, protected from storms by a rise of hills on the north and east, and abundant with clear spring water.

The origin of the name "Columbia" for this place has been the subject of much discussion and conjecture among local residents. The name Columbia came into popularity at the close of the American Revolution with the sentiment that Columbus, the discoverer of America, should be memorialized. The first time the name Columbia appeared in legislation was the legislature act of the State of New York, giving the name to the Columbia University on May 1st, 1784.

During the American Revolution, a military chaplain named Timothy Dwight composed a song entitled "Columbia, Columbia to Glory Arise" which idealized the new republic as the symbol of liberty and patriotism:

Columbia! Columbia! to glory arise,
The queen of the world, and the child of the skies,
Thy genius commands thee, with raptures behold,
While ages on ages thy splendors unfold:
Thy reign is the last and the noblest of time,
Most fruitful thy soil, most inviting thy clime;
Let crimes of the east ne'er encrimson thy name,
Be freedom, and science, and virtue thy fame.

Columbia subsequently became a popular name. Since the early settlers of this area had fought in the Revolution, it is possible they heard the song and decided it was a patriotic and appropriate name for the town they founded: Columbia, Illinois.

A Memory in Only Six Words

2009-03-21T13:21:00.000-07:00

I've been doing a lot of work recently with Twitter, a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing? Twitter message postings--called "tweets" in the jargon of the site--are limited to 140 characters.

As a former English major, of course, it hasn't taken me long to draw a comparison between "tweets" and haiku, a poetic form from Japanese culture. Haiku requires an author to "paint" a mental image in the reader's mind with only seventeen (17) syllables over just three (3) lines of poetry.

Shortly after I posted my observation on Facebook, my friend Morf Morford directed me to another venue for those of us who, inexplicably perhaps, long to test ourselves in the verbal arts: six-word memoirs. Hailed by some as "American haiku," six-word memoirs sprung from efforts of SMITH Magazine, which began asking readers for their short life stories in 2006.

I'm taking the challenge, and my results will be posted on Facebook. As we left this morning to visit some estate sales with my middle daughter and her husband, I posted: "Antiques, knick knacks, bargains--Estate Sale"!

Short of the Finish Line

2009-03-14T19:46:00.000-07:00

My old friend Dave Hughes told me he had seen Gerry Lindgren at an event in Spokane a few years ago, and I was surprised.

Gerald ("Gerry") Paul Lindgren (born March 9, 1946) is widely recognized as having been the best high school long distance runner in the United States at the time, and perhaps the best ever. In 1964, in his senior year at John Rogers High School, Gerry ran 5000 meters in 13 minutes and 44 seconds, setting a U.S. high school record for the distance that would remain unbroken for 40 years, until Galen Rupp ran 13:37.91 on July 30, 2004. Among his other records he established that year was his time of 8:40.0 in an indoor 2-mile race that shattered the previous U.S. national high school mark. Over forty years later this remains the fastest U.S. schoolboy 2-mile time ever run indoors (and the third fastest time indoors or outdoors).

On July 25, 1964, Gerry outran two seasoned Russian runners, Leonid Ivanov and Anatoly Dutov, to win the 10,000 meter event in the US-USSR Track Meet in Los Angeles. In the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, he finished ninth in the 10,000 meters behind gold medalist Billy Mills after having sprained an ankle during training. Gerry had previously beaten Mills in the Olympic Trials that year. Mills later said that a healthy Gerry would have won gold. Four years later, Gerry tried to make the 1968 Olympic team but finished 5th in the 10,000 meters and 4th in the 5,000 meters in the Olympic Trials at Echo Summit, just missing the team at both distances. Gerry also competed against Mills in the 1965 AAU Nationals meet, where they raced the 6 mile. Mills won with a diving lean, while both were timed in 27:11.6, a new World Record shared by Mills and Gerry.

Gerry attended Washington State University in Pullman, where he majored in political science and minored in Russian language. While at Washington State, Gerry won 11 NCAA Championships (his only loss at an NCAA championship was to Jim Ryun in the 1968 indoor 2-mile race.) He was one of only two people to ever defeat Steve Prefontaine in an NCAA Championship. (Gerry won the 1969 NCAA Cross Country Championship in which 1968 NCAA champion Mike Ryan finished second and Prefontaine third.) He competed sporadically after graduating from college but without any notable success.

I met Gerry in 1970 when he was back at Rogers working as a motivational speaker. He had a strong influence upon my friends and I at that time. In the summer of 1970, both he and I took part in a fun run that was the precursor to the Lilac Bloomsday Run. We idolized him as an athlete and a person, but he was always distant and somewhat moody.

Later, Gerry moved to the Seattle area where he started a chain of sports stores called The Stinky Foot. In 1980, to his family's utter shock, he left a note in his home kitchen saying "get a divorce, sell the business" and abandoned his wife and children.

Today, Gerry lives in Honolulu, where he continues to run regularly and is active in the Hawaii running community. He coached the University of Hawaii's women's track and field team 2005-2007. He still has no contact with the family he deserted.

I remain fond of Gerry to this day, but sad to observe that--despite his outstanding athletic achievements--his race seems to have fallen short of the finish line.

A (Virtual) Trip Through Spain

2009-02-15T09:56:00.000-08:00

My wife, Anne, and I love travel, especially international travel. Our income being what it is, much of the travel we do is only in our dreams...

Today Anne handed me an article from the Lindenwood Legacy, their student publication, in which Andrew Tessmer describes his whirlwind trip with other students across the Iberian Peninsula and across the Mediterranean to Morocco. She asked me to plan an itinerary for us using his trip as a template.

The trip begins in Madrid. The capital of Spain since 1562, Madrid is located at the geographic center of the Iberian Peninsula. Because of its central location and high altitude, its climate is characterized by warm dry summers and cool winters. Madrid is a city of great monuments and cultural attractions, including a medieval center dating back to the Habsburg Empire and the Prado Museum, but Madrid is also a lively metropolis of nearly 3 million people, offering many pubs, cafes, discotheques and nightclubs open late into the night.

Next, the trip takes us to the Alcázar, a castle near Segovia. Originally a fortress, the Alcázar has also been a royal palace, the site of Philip II's wedding to his fourth wife, Anne of Austria, and more recently a military academy. In the upper part of the city, the oldest foundations have been identified as Roman. At the top of its look-out tower, visitors can see far across the entire peninsula.

From ancient residence to modern means of transportation, the trip now takes place via the Talgo, a high-speed train. At speeds up to 200 mph, the trip reaches the Costa del Sol on the Mediterranean. Our trip lingers in the town of Malaga, which has more to offer than just seaside and sunshine! It was founded by the Phoenicians, and was of great importance in the Moorish epoch, and so highly interesting historical remains are left in the town itself as well as in the surrounding province.

Next, the trip we imagine boards a high-speed ferry from Algeciras to Ceuta in North Africa via Acciona Trasmediterránea. The fast ferry takes approximately 40 minutes to make the crossing.

Ceuta is an enclave in mainland Morocco, administered by the Cádiz Province. It is one of two remaining fragments of long-established Spanish presence in North Africa.

Sounds like a fascinating, pleasant trip. Maybe one day we will make it in reality!

A Sweet Read About the Cold War

2009-01-29T17:27:00.000-08:00

As may be evident from earlier posts, I love narrative history, and I read part or all of as many as 100 books each year. So it's saying something to reveal that my favorite book of all those I read in 2008 was The Candy Bombers.

Three years after the end of World War II, the American occupation of Germany was failing. The Germans were becoming less--not more--attracted to democracy. Communism was on the march, overthrowing one government after another. Faith in America was at a low ebb. Then, intent on furthering its domination of Europe, the Soviet Union cut off all land and sea access to West Berlin, prepared to starve one of the largest cities in the world into submission unless the Americans abandoned it. Soviet forces hugely outnumbered those of the Allies.

The choices before the western allies seemed to be limited to just three:

Abandon the city to the Russians;
Allow the Berliners (our recent enemies) to starve; or
Start World War III.

Andrei Cherny’s book is a gripping, suspenseful story about how the United States struggled to help the citizens of West Berlin survive Soviet tyranny. Cherny succeeds in making the harrowing days of 1948-49 in Berlin come alive through an exhaustive, often absorbing and lucid account.

For those who were born subsequent the end of the Cold War, it may be hard to appreciate that the period was every bit as tense as the days after 9/11. In response to terror, Harry Truman, Gail Halvorsen and the other characters in this book defined how a great nation could act as a benevolent world power standing up for freedom. Cherny has produced a book that lives up to what many consider to have been the American moment in history.

This book should be required reading for every American citizen.

Graham Crackers & Flight

2009-01-10T08:53:00.000-08:00

As a boy in the early 1960s, my Saturday morning routine was to get up, fill a bowl with graham crackers (crumbled, naturally) covered with milk, then sit down in front of the television set to watch the kids' shows.

My all-time favorite show was Fireball XL-5. Set in the year 2063, this series charted the interplanetary adventures of a spacecraft and its crew: handsome pilot Steve Zodiac, glamorous space doctor Venus, a math genius and a robot. It was filmed using a "new" process called "Supermarionation"--which was a faux scientific name for using puppets. While this may seem a little silly today, in the 1960s (at least for a kid) it made for a gripping program--so much so that I did not remember (until reviewing the show recently on YouTube) that it was filmed in black & white.

My flights of fancy were not limited to space. Another favorite show of the time was Sky King, the adventures of Arizona rancher and aircraft pilot Schuyler "Sky" King. Although it had strong cowboy elements, King always captured criminals and even spies or found lost hikers using his plane.

Looking back, I would add the following footnotes to my Saturday morning experience:

I'll bet my parents were very glad that I made my own "breakfast" and kept quiet for a couple extra hours on Saturday morning;

Fireball XL-5 was made in 1962 by the husband and wife team of Gerry and Sylvia Anderson, who later used real people in the production of arguably one of the best sci-fi shows of all time: Space 1999;

Sky King apparently was based on a real-life person: Jack Cones, the Flying Constable of Twenty nine Palms during the 1930s.

2009-01-04T11:04:00.000-08:00

Welcome to 2009--especially since most of us had such a miserable 2008! Like most everyone else, I have spent the past few days reviewing the old and reflecting on what's ahead, resulting in the following few resolutions:

Stay the Course

This blog has been rather badly neglected for some time now, and I intend to keep it more current in the coming year. I need to take more to heart the rubric I've been sharing with all of the local business owners and managers I advise: "Stay the course!" 2008 has been a shake-up in all our lives, but especially in mine, and I intend to develop more consistency in good habits--from using the WaterPik to charting our finances to praying--in 2009

For Auld Lang Syne, My Friends

We have quite a few good friends we've made over the years, many of whom (especially now) live in other parts of the country. I'm making it a commitment this year to get back in touch and/or keep in touch throughout 2009. I've already been using LinkedIn partially to this purpose, and I have recently opened a Facebook account to that end, as well.

Go Now!...Beyond The Moody Blues

2008-07-11T14:34:00.001-07:00

Back in the early 1970s, when I and others of my generation were just beginning to create the concept of "the soundtrack of our lives," several groups stood out: the Beatles, of course, and the Rolling Stones, Grand Funk Railroad and...The Moody Blues.

The Moody Blues were an English band originally from Birmingham, England. Founding members Michael Pinder and Ray Thomas initiated a rhythm and blues-based sound in 1964 along with Graeme Edge and others, and were later joined by John Lodge and Justin Hayward as they inspired and evolved a progressive rock style. Their second single, "Go Now" (released in 1964), really launched their career, being promoted on TV with one of the first purpose-made promotional films in the pop era, eventually hitting number one in the United Kingdom and in the United States where it reached the top ten. Among their innovations was a fusion with classical music, most notably in their seminal album Days of Future Passed (1967 ).

The group's lyrics were pretentious, their music mediocre, and their production so poor that they were often joking referred to as "The Muddy Blues," but many of us really connected with them. Why? I think today that the key factor was their ability to evoke melancholy--a generally gloomy outlook characterized by low levels of enthusiasm and eagerness for activity.

Surprisingly, many of my generation, while facing the beginning of their lives, faced it with despondency, fear and cynicism. I've gotten a brighter perspective since then. Let me share how one friend expresses the transition that he, like me, underwent over several years:

There is a devious sadness to the world in which we live – a sadness that comes to find us in the night, when we're all alone under the canopy of a million stars. Something within us knows that we ought to be better--that our love ought to burn brighter and shine more fiercely--that our passion and conviction for life ought to be strong, and lead us through that nagging temptation to settle for the ordinary and mundane. Something within us knows that life was always meant to be lived to the full. And this something, when it comes to find us, convicts us of all the cheap and
common things we often settle for. This feeling, in my mind, is the definition of melancholy.

I don't play the Moody Blues much any more. I think that I can do better now than melancholy--so can you!

Another British Invasion

2008-06-27T13:26:00.000-07:00

The folk rock group Fotheringay was formed in 1970 by singer Sandy Denny upon her departure from Fairport Convention. The band drew its name from Fotheringay Castle, where Mary Queen of Scots was imprisoned in England.

Two former members of Eclection, Trevor Lucas and Gerry Conway, and two former members of Poet and the One Man Band, Jerry Donahue and Pat Donaldson (bass), completed the line-up responsible for the quintet's only album. This folk-based set included several Denny originals, notably "Nothing More", "The Sea" and "The Pond and The Stream", as well as my absolute favorite versions of Gordon Lightfoot's "The Way I Feel" and Bob Dylan's "Too Much of Nothing". The album failed to match commercial expectations and pressures on Denny to undertake a solo career—she was voted Britain's number one singer in Melody Maker's 1970 poll—increased. Fotheringay disbanded in 1971 during sessions for a projected second set.

My wife accidently broke my album during the early days of our marriage and I mourned it for years. One day a few years ago, I mentioned this sadness to my kids and they suggested I look for the album on eBay. I found it! I bought it for $25 from an English vendor and it wasn't until it had actually arrived that I realized...I had no way to play it!

My mother bought me a CD player/turntable for Christmas in 2006, which allowed me to enjoy those great tunes again...I'll never forget the song "Too Much of Nothing" with its lyrics that could be torn out of today's headlines:

Now, too much of nothing

Can make a man feel ill at ease.

One man's temper might rise

While another man's temper might freeze.

In the day of confession

We cannot mock a soul.

Oh, when there's too much of nothing,

No one has control.

Another (Steve) Miller Moment...

2008-06-25T10:51:00.001-07:00

My first two years in college (1971-1973) were in Spokane, which is just a few miles west of the Idaho border. Since the drinking age in the Potato State is only 18 (it's 21 in Washington), weekends would find young people traveling east to bars that dotted the state line. My favorite watering hole was the El Patio, a run-down (but cheap) venue that had one endearing feature--a long-term run by the Steve Miller Band.

Steve Miller moved to the burgeoning San Francisco scene in the mid-1960s and formed the Steve Miller Band. Miller and James Cook, bassist Lonnie Turner and drummer Tim Davis backed Chuck Berry at a 1967 gig at the Fillmore West that was released as a live album. Guitarist Boz Scaggs joined the band soon after, and the group performed at the Monterey Pop Festival in June.

Hits during this period and into the early 1970s included "Baby's Calling Me Home", "Key To The Highway", "Livin' In The USA", "Space Cowboy", and the track "My Dark Hour" which featured Paul McCartney (aka Paul Ramon) on bass. Steve was originally from the Ketchum, Idaho area and seems to have returned here to recuperate following an automobile crash.

The band hit the jackpot in 1973 with The Joker--their sound was slick and bouncy, and the title track became a number one single; the album was certified platinum (more than one million sales). Three years later, the Steve Miller Band returned with the album Fly Like An Eagle, which featured the hits: "Take The Money and Run", "Fly Like an Eagle" and "Rock 'N Me". Needless to say, they no longer played the El Patio.

Little did I know that my later life would take me "from Phoenix, Arizona/All the way to Tacoma" (like the song), or that I would look back on my nights in the crowd on the state line with nostalgia...

It Was Such a Beautiful Day

2008-06-16T07:31:00.001-07:00

It's a Beautiful Day was a band formed in San Francisco in 1967, a unique blend of rock, jazz, folk, classical and world beat styles.

The band was the brainchild of violinist and vocalist David LaFlamme. Other members were his wife Linda (keyboards), Pattie Santos (vocals), Hal Wagenet (guitar), Mitchell Holman (bass) and Val Fuentes (drums). Although they were one of the earliest and most important San Francisco bands to emerge from the Summer of Love, It’s a Beautiful Day never quite achieved the success of their contemporaries such as The Grateful Dead and Santana, with whom they had connections.

The band's debut album, It's a Beautiful Day, released in 1969, featured the tracks "White Bird", "Hot Summer Day", "Time Is" and "Bombay Calling".

I still have the album in near mint condition as well as a poster from the band's performance at Gonzaga University in the mid-1970s.

"Those Were the Days..."

2008-06-12T08:12:00.001-07:00

The tune for this 1968 hit single was running through my head a few weeks ago, and a knick knack I happened to spy in Cracker Barrel this afternoon attributed the song to Gene Raskin, who transformed the traditional Russian folk melody into an international blockbuster for Welsh vocalist Mary Hopkin.

During the early 1960s Raskin and his wife played Greenwich Village folk clubs under the name Gene & Francesca, releasing an album in 1962 which included "Those Were the Days," a tune of either Russian or Ukrainian origins traditionally known as "Dorogoj Dlinnoyu" and dating back to the turn of the 20th century. In 1966, while Gene & Francesca were headlining London's Blue Lamp Club, Paul McCartney caught their act and two years later, while assembling material for his protégé Hopkin's Apple Records debut, he suggested she record "Those Were the Days."

The resulting single topped the British pop charts for six weeks in the autumn of 1968; Hopkin subsequently sold eight million copies worldwide, with the song becoming Apple's biggest hit outside of the Beatles' own recordings.

If you were alive in 1968, then you probably remember--indeed, cannot forget--this song.

Wheat and Tares

2008-04-29T19:18:00.000-07:00

It all grows up together in Southwestern Illinois--the myriad crops that have sprung from the fertile soil for decades and, more recently, residential subdivisions and commercial centers...more coming up each year.

Metro East isn't the kind of region we knew back in Western Washington--large cities with much smaller suburbs blossoming in ever-widening rings--but rather it's a smattering of small cities, villages, and farmland dotted across 1700 miles. Lot size is much larger, too--none of those postage stamp sized lots for our neighbors here. Maybe they have more time for yard work since their commute is generally so much shorter...

Geography Lesson

2008-04-26T21:45:00.001-07:00

When we moved here earlier this year I told most people that we were moving to St. Louis; that's true in that we're in the Missouri city's metro area--one that covers two states. This part of the area is known locally as the Metro East, and it has some distinct characteristics beyond being under the legal jurisdiction of the State of Illinois.

Metro East encompasses five Illinois counties in the St. Louis Metropolitan Statistical Area. In 2000, there were 599,845 people living in this designated area, scattered across a variety of cities and small towns, typically called "villages" here. The area's largest city is Belleville, but other large population centers include Edwardsville, Collinsville, Alton and Columbia.

What strikes us most as newcomers here from the Pacific Northwest is the development pattern. While many individual buildings date back to the early 1800s and many cities were incorporated 150 or more years ago, Metro East remained largely rural until just the past couple decades. A quick look at any aerial view--which shows St. Louis heavily developed and Metro East primarily still farmland--begs the question of why development took so long to jump the Mississippi.

But jump it has, and today the communities of Metro East continue to grow at a rapid pace.

Movie Review: Abe Lincoln in Illinois

2008-04-25T19:40:00.000-07:00

You won't find it at Blockbuster--though it might be at some public libraries--but I'll never forget this film. Abe Lincoln in Illinois was a classic in its time, but I remember it for a reason that's even more compelling for me.

I was a child of ten and a sixth grader the November day when President Kennedy was shot. As terrible and unsettling a tragedy in its time as the 9/11 incident, the assassination rocked our world to its foundations. I remember walking home for lunch with my friend Billy Bilnoski (now a cardiologist) and that, when he ran out of his house to tell me the news, I completely refused to believe him. It wasn't until I got home and saw broadcaster Walter Cronkite on the television in the middle of the day and my mother staring blankly at the screen--lunch unmade--that I realized Billy had been telling the truth.

Good little citizens that we were, Billy and I went back to school that afternoon. My teacher refused to teach, and she spent most of her time with her head on her desk, sobbing. Some of the kids joined her in crying, and some of us just milled around aimlessly, but we were all in a state of stunned confusion.

That weekend there was no regular programming on television--it was as if the adults who worked in broadcasting were too upset to do their jobs, like my teacher and my mother had been. Coverage continued around the clock of every minute aspect of the tragedy--which is why most of the country was watching when Kennedy's assassin was, in turn, assassinated.

Sometime in the course of that long weekend, one of the networks aired Abe Lincoln in Illinois in its entirety--and entirely commercial-free. It was on very late at night, but I remember staying up to watch the whole movie and gaining a sense of security from the story about this great statesman who, like President Kennedy, had had his promising life cut short. That viewing of the film was the seed for my life-long admiration for the Logsplitter.

Now I am living in the Land of Lincoln, and I plan to visit some of the sites here that memorialize his life and legacy. It's only fitting, I think, that I recall the cinematic inspiration of my youth and use it--albeit somewhat twisted--to craft the title of this blog.

A' Blinkin' and A' Bloggin'

2008-04-25T19:12:00.000-07:00

It's not supposed to work this way.

According to everyday opinion shaped by national media, there's a slow leak in the Midwest letting people out, and they're heading to the coasts. Almost the first thing everyone we've met here asks is why we've moved here--as if to suggest that there's must be some scandal back in the Northwest that we are fleeing. Nobody moves from the Puget Sound to the Metro East...that's common wisdom, although the truth is very different.

Well, we are doing just that--myself and my wife Anne, two daughters and a new son-in-law have all moved to join our oldest daughter, her husband and our two grandchildren. And togetherness isn't the only benefit we're finding here.

More in future posts...