Month: September 2023

After spending another evening in Meridian, Mississippi on the back end of our long journey we had one last stop to make before returning home. We deviated from the fastest route to Houston in order to get to New Orleans, the city that stole our hearts on our honeymoon. We were close enough to our anniversary to think of it as an early celebration so we stayed in the Hotel Monteleone just as we did so many years ago when we were two kids who had little idea of the amazing lives ahead of us. To my husband’s chagrin the place that he had so carefully chosen for our honeymoon was under construction back in that day, but this time it was gleaming. From the valet parking to every aspect of hospitality it proved to be the grand lady of New Orleans. I literally felt like royalty in the hands of the world class staff. 

Our room was pristine and quite lovely. I found myself want to take the whole setting back home with me because it was so perfectly adapted to our decorating tastes. If I had been taken there blindfolded I would never have guessed that there were other occupants around me. There was nary a sound and in spite of the record heat, we were as cool as cucumbers. Even the soap from England that was beautifully displayed in the luxurious bathroom. 

We only had Friday evening, all day Saturday, and Sunday morning to see the sights which is exactly how how honeymoon had been. In the long ago we were college students after all and had to get back to our classes by Monday morning. This time I had students waiting for me in the new school year and Mike wanted to resume caring for his father as soon as possible Nonetheless, we knew that we would be able to have an enjoyable trip down memory lane in a very short time because we had done so before.

Since we arrived at lunchtime we scurried across the French Quarter to get a muffuletta. Central Grocery was damaged during a hurricane and is still in the process of being remodeled, but the sandwiches were available at various locations across the city. We found one close to the original site and took our delicacy to a shaded bench near the river where a nice breeze kept us somewhat cool. While we ate we listened to the music from a band playing in one of the cafes. As usual the delicacy was as good as usual. When we were young and thin we each ate a whole sandwich. This time we purchased half of a sandwich and each ate one half of that. The big ones are the size of a fairly large salad plate. I can’t imagine anymore how anyone is able to consume anything that big.

Next we walked into the nearby shops. Mostly we explored them as an excuse to get out of the heat which was soaring into the hundreds. Along the way I found a couple of Christmas ornaments for our travel tree which is festooned each year with memories from all of our trips. I gaze at it each season and smile as I realize how many wonderful journeys we have shared. 

It is our tradition to purchase pralines from Aunt Sally’s as well. I am a traditionalist who insists on getting the original ones that we bought on our honeymoon. They are crunchy and oh so delicious just like those muffulettas. Once again we had to change our habit of buying a box of twelve to choosing only six instead. That would give us two each if we shared with Mike’s father.

After walking off our lunch we visited Cafe du Monde for coffee and beignet. Nobody makes the scrumptious puffs of powder sugar coated fried dough as well as they do and the coffee is to die for even on a warm day. Somehow under the covered patio with the big ceiling fans it was cool and comfortable even in the searing heat. While we were munching on our beignet and sipping our coffee a young man serenaded us with his guitar. He was quite talented as most of the street performers are.

We checked out a few more shops and made our visit to St. Louis Cathedral. While we were there a priest was singing and saying prayers with a group of young boys. It is such a beautiful place that brings a sense of calm to my soul. Somehow it has survived so many conflicts, tragedies, wars and hurricanes and still stands as a precious jewel at the center of New Orleans.

I always, always visit one of my all time favorite bookstores in an alleyway on one side of the cathedral. Faulkner House Books is small but filled with titles from authors who once walked the streets of New Orleans and loved the city as much as I do. I never fail to find a special book when I am there and this time was no exception. I discovered a fabulous compendium of stories from Eudora Welty that I knew I had to add to my library. Later that evening at the hotel I became instantly enchanted with the very first story. 

On our way back to the Monteleone we wandered down Royal Street visiting antique stores and shops filled with lovely art and clothing. One that caught our eye sold the most beautiful hats worthy of a visit with the king of England or an afternoon at the Kentucky Derby. Each chapeau is custom fitted and made to enhance the wearer. I did not dare ask how much they cost, but I admired them from afar. Later we purchased some coffee and a couple of mugs from one of the shops farther down the street and stopped in to see the antique guns and swords in another store that has been on Royal Street seemingly forever. 

Back at the hotel we stopped into the Carousel Bar and enjoyed some wine while delighting in people watching. There were young girls wearing fascinators and a group that appeared to be enjoying a reunion of sorts. Everyone seemed to be having as much fun as we were and I really did not want to leave because we had an excellent seat from which to watch the passing parade. 

Nonetheless it was soon time for dinner so we decided to try Acme Oysters for the very first time. We’ve visited New Orleans more times than I can count, sometimes just the two of us and other times with our daughters and grandchildren. We had passed by Acme many times but had never gone inside. It is yet another place that is part of the New Orleans mystique and lines to get a table form early. We were lucky to secure a spot right away where we munched on gumbo, oysters, and shrimp.

After dinner it was still light outside so we walked a couple of blocks down Bourbon Street just to say we had done so. We both agreed that it has gone down from what it was when artists like Pete Fountain and Louis Armstrong performed there. Now it has become a kind of scar on the French Quarter with its cheap bars and junky tourist stores. It seems to be mostly a raucous place for young folks hoping to get drunk on machine made cocktails served in silly plastic containers. Now most of the true musical artists have gone to Frenchman St to perform. Only Preservation Hall and Pat O’Brien’s remain as they have always been. 

We love New Orleans for its history and cuisine. We have outgrown the adventurous spirits of our youth. There was nothing on Bourbon Street that tempted us to stay. In fact, we were drawn back to our hotel where we spent the evening relaxing in our room and listening to music from around the world on Mike’s laptop while I devoured stories from my Eudora Welty book. We had a big day ahead of us for Saturday.  

Our journey to Monticello took us from Wilmington through a slice of Baltimore, Maryland and then through Washington DC where we saw the Washington Monument in the distance. I would have liked to stop but I have been there many times and we had to keep moving to meet the deadlines we had set for our trip. I had to just imagine the “feels” that I always get whenever I see the Lincoln Memorial or the Vietnam Wall. 

Soon we were back in Virginia driving through some of the most scenic areas in the United States. Along the route we saw many signs pointing to national park areas where Civil War battles had been fought. Since Mike reads historical books as a hobby he entertained me with stories of each conflict as we moved deeper and deeper into terrain that undoubtedly had changed little from the time that Thomas Jefferson lived there. 

Jefferson often claimed that he was most proud of being the author of the Declaration of Independence, writing the Virginia laws protecting the freedom of religious choice, and founding the University of Virginia. His time as President of the United States and in the political world was more of an onerous responsibility than a joyful experience for him and had no doubtedly delayed the completion of his beloved home. 

Monticello is perched on a hill that allowed Jefferson to view the mountains in the distance. It’s familiar domed roof is featured on the nickel. It was a busy place where Jefferson lived with his daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren along with over a hundred slaves, including many from the Hemmings family, as well as free craftsmen. It was the place where he read philosophy and studied science and engineering. In fact he spent so much time thinking and learning that his business enterprises never seemed to provide enough income to keep him out of debt. Producing funds was a necessity that he never mastered or enjoyed.

Jefferson had inherited five thousand acres from his father who died owing money to countless creditors. Thomas would do little better than his father. With his tastes for books, art and the accoutrements of a gentleman he was almost always in debt. His wife died young and only two of the children he sired with with her lived to adulthood. Daughter, Martha Randolph was the only child to survive past her twenties. Jefferson fathered more children with Sally Hemmings but never referred to them as his own. He did however free his progeny upon his death, fulfilling a promise that he made to Sally when the two of them were living in Paris. Because slavery was illegal in France, Sally was technically free while she was there and could have walked away without repercussions. Instead she brokered the freedom of her children and returned to Monticello with Jefferson. 

Monticello is impressive by any standards. Jefferson used the entry hall to showcase items that he felt would educate his many visitors. It holds a seven day clock that he designed to keep track not only of the hours but also the days of the week. Unfortunately when he attempted to set it up the mechanism he discovered that there was only room for six days from the ceiling to the floor so he had to cut a hole and use the basement to register Sundays. 

The room is filled with animal hides, maps, fossils and other interesting objects but there is no sweeping staircase leading to the upper rooms because Jefferson thought such decor was tacky. It is a quirky fun area that has so many wonderful things to see. 

The next room was Jefferson’s library. He was an avid collector and had acquired over two thousand tomes when he decided to donate them to the Library of Congress. Unfortunately his gifts to our nation were ultimately destroyed by a fire.  After giving the country with his prize collection Jefferson began purchasing volumes again and eventually had over two thousand volumes upon his death. Some of those originals are showcased at Monticello to this day.

Next came a room where Jefferson met with his guests for serious conversations. It is a delightfully sunny space with wonderful furnishings and paintings of Jefferson’s favorite philosophers like Isaac Newton and John Locke. He was a student of the enlightenment and patterned much of his thinking on the ideas of such men. Many of the ideas  he included in the Declaration of Independence reflected his belief in the rights of all men, a revolutionary thought at the time. Sadly his freedoms only included white men who owned land, making Jefferson an interesting enigma. It is difficult to reconcile his ownership of humans with his brilliant thinking, and yet such was the case. If only we might talk with him now to learn what he thinks of the evolution of the democratic republic that he helped to create.

Next to Jefferson’s salon was his bedroom. He created a cubby hole for sleeping inside an alcove and It was there that he  died on July 4, fifty years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. By the time of his death he had become great friends with his once opponent, John Adams. The two men corresponded frequently and made peace with one another over their differences of opinion that had once made them enemies. Ironically they died within hours of each other on the same day. 

The bedroom leads to the dining room where Jefferson often entertained both locals and those who travelled to see him. Off to the side is a steep stairway to the second floor. and one from the kitchen which was in another building to prevent fires from breaking out in the main house. 

Thomas Jefferson owed almost two hundred thousand dollars to creditors when he died. His daughter who was his heir had to sell all of the slaves save for five that he had freed in his will. The house also had be sold to pay off the many debtors, including his son-in-law who had baled Jefferson out many times. A couple of years after Jefferson’s death the home was purchased by the Levy family and kept in good repair until it was finally donated as a national historic treasure in the nineteen twenties. Interestingly Mr. Levy, a Jew, had wanted to keep the house as it was in Jefferson’s time to honor the man whose legislation had insured religious freedom for people of all faiths including Mr. Levy and his family. 

Jefferson is buried on the grounds of Monticello. Today those who preserve his memory also tackle with the reality of his enslavement of humans. It seems to some to be the ultimate hypocrisy to speak of the unalienable rites to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness while justifying the reality that Jefferson denied so many those rights. It will forever be a mar on his intellect and reputation that is difficult to accept given that many of the signers of the Declaration were already confirmed abolitionists and even advocated for women as well.  

The right to freedoms in our nation has evolved enough that the tour now includes a stop at a contemplative garden to honor those who lived alongside Jefferson as slaves. Much study is being done to bring their voices to life as part of the tour as well. The journey to freedom and democracy for all continues in the United States as we strive to live up to those words indelibly written into the experiment in democracy unlike anything the world had seen. Fortunately we have been able to face our wrongs with honesty and make changes that had to be made. Perhaps one day we may even get closer and closer to perfection as we grapple with the reality that we are not yet there.

I suppose that there is nothing quite as dreary as a long drive back home after a picture perfect vacation spent in Maine. When the time came to leave our nest in Brunswick and say goodbye to our granddaughter we felt a reluctance to put the little slice of heaven that we had so enjoyed into our rearview mirror. Sadly reality was calling and we knew it was time to go.

It was raining rather heavily as we began to retrace the miles that had brought us. We sped along through Maine, then New Hampshire and a bit of Massachusetts. At a stop in New York state we were serenaded by a man with a surprisingly good voice and a very kind heart. He wished us godspeed and we set out for one more drive across the George Washington Bridge, a challenge in any kind of weather even for people like us who handle Houston traffic like professional Nascar drivers. Luckily we once more made it into New Jersey without incident even if the process of doing so was nerve wracking. 

From an area near the Newark airport we had a glorious final glimpse of the massive New York City skyline. It was a beautiful sight by any standards. I had to laugh because the owner of an art shop in Portland had told us that in spite of all the wonderful paintings that he had for sale, it was a pen and ink print of the Big Apple’s skyline that was the most popular. I totally understood why that was so and wished that I too had purchased one of the prints that so reminded me of what we saw as we moved along the highway.

We had gone many miles for many hours so we stopped a a Service Center along the New Jersey Turnpike that was as good as the Buccee’s that we have in Texas (and now in many other parts of the South). The bathrooms were huge and impeccably clean. The food options were numerous. We chose Prêt and enjoyed lovely ham and cheese sandwiches on croissants. It was just what we needed to push on with our journey, We were feeling refreshed and ready to complete the last leg of the day.

As we drove along it occurred to me that we were close to Princeton University, so in the spirit of visiting as many centers of higher education as possible we briefly detoured just to walk around the campus for a time. It was as beautiful and awe inspiring as I had imagined. It reminded me of an American version of Cambridge. I recalled reading in Michelle Obama’s autobiography that  her first reaction upon arriving at the campus as a freshman was stark terror. She wondered how it was possible that she had ended up there and felt an urge to bolt but knew that she had to push herself to demonstrate her mettle. Of course she was more than worthy and successful. The road to her amazing life was well on its way.

I have a cousin who once played football for Princeton. He is a tall strong handsome fellow who as a young man we lovingly called Superman/Clark Kent because he was both powerful and humble at one and the same time. I was glad to finally see where he had gone to college and felt even more admiration for him than I already had. 

Because of our deviation from the original travel plan we ended up heading back to Delaware by way of Philadelphia. There was no time to stop there, but I had visited before and smiled at the thought of the Benjamin Franklin Museum, Betsy Ross’s house, the stairs that Rocky used to train for his fight, and Independence Hall. It is a great city with so much American history that it takes days to see it all. I truly believe that every single American should visit there and read about our Founders who launched the dream of a new kind of government of the people and for the people almost two hundred fifty years ago. 

Those brave and intelligent men stunned a world order that did not believe that their experiment would be lasting, and yet here we are. I thought of the warnings they gave us about preserving our nation and realized that our government is not just a given. We have to work hard as citizens to ensure that it continues. Right now we are in an unusual place but also one that those brilliant men feared might one day come. It will be up to us to be sure that we do not let their dream die.

From Philadelphia it was a short hop to Delaware where we once again spent the night. I hate to admit that nothing about Wilmington spoke to me, but I was still glad to see it and add it to my list of cities that I have visited if only briefly. I realized as I counted Delaware it among my states that I have now seen every one of the fifty save for Idaho, Iowa, Oregon, Alaska and Hawaii. I suppose that my next journey needs to be in a westward direction through Iowa, Idaho and Oregon where I might also pick up Alaska with a cruise. Then I’ll only need to find a way to get to Hawaii and my state collection will be complete, a goal that my father was close to realizing before his untimely death. It would be up to me to secure his dream with a couple of extra places that were not part of our union back in nineteen fifty seven.

For the time being, our plan was to spend most of the following day seeing more of Virginia and traveling to Monticello to visit the home that it took Thomas Jefferson more that forty years to build. I suppose that he was a bit too busy doing other things to put it together quickly or maybe he was like my maternal grandfather who put together his home room by room until he had what he wanted. Whatever the reason, I was quite excited about finally viewing a place that had interested me for many years. 

Because they say that one picture says more than a thousand words forthwith are some scenes from Maine that may explain why I love it so much.

I selected only a few from dozens of photos that I have of Maine. I now understand why Stephen King loves it there. It is little wonder that the Bush family meets regularly at Kennebunkport. Maine is a wonder, a lovely state jutting out into the Atlantic Ocean with miles and miles of coastline. It is a train ride away from Boston or a half day drive to New York City. With all of the heat and frustrations of climate change it was an oasis in the middle of August and all of the towns are well prepared for winters. In my mind it is a wonderful place to visit, attend a world class college or settle down with living. If you have never been there I urge you to make a plan to do so. It is a wonder just waiting for you to come. The people are friendly and the food is delicious. Give it a try.

We wanted to visit Portland while we were in Maine in spite of our daughter’s comment that it was not worth the effort. Instead after enjoying another yummy meal at Wild Oats we drove south and soon were walking through the downtown area and beginning to think that the critique had been somewhat accurate. There really was not much to see there so we travelled down to the the port which was buzzing with activity and way too many tourists for our tastes. It was great to see but we had become accustomed to the slow pace of Brunswick, Topsham, Freeport and other enchanting areas and somehow did not find all of the commotion to be enticing. 

We decided to instead to head over the the Portland Head Lighthouse. It was also filled with curious travelers, but the fantastic views of the ocean made the crowds more bearable. We walked around a bit and took several photos before heading over to Falmouth where Mike’s favorite professor and mentor, Dr. S. Henry Monsen, had once lived. It was a beautiful area boasting lovely homes and stunning seaside views. It was also the location of Town Landing Market where we had once enjoyed incredibly delicious crab rolls with our friends, Egon and Marita. 

The place had hardly changed and the tastiness of the crab roll was as delicious as ever. There had been a short rainfall just before we arrived but we still found an outside table protected under an overhang. We enjoyed our luscious meal in a quiet and serene atmosphere watching the people who walked or drove by. It was an idyllic scene that made me want to enquire about homes for sale in the area. 

I remembered how relaxing the evenings with Dr. Monsen had been in our previous visits when we sat outside sipping on wine and listening to Hank entertain us with his outlooks on the world. I thought of how wonderful it would be to spend just one more hour with him for old times sake. Instead we simply drove around on a tour of the little town and then headed back to Brunswick satisfied with our brief visit to days gone by, 

We agreed to meet our granddaughter a bit later than usual on our final day in Maine. She had some business to keep her busy during the morning so we instead drove to the area where we had seen an old cemetery. We have a tendency to walk around in such places to get an idea of the history of the area. This one was particularly interesting because it was in a field next to a still active church that was established in the early eighteen hundreds. Many of the folks resting for eternity there had been born before the American Revolution. Their stories engraved on weathered headstones spoke of faith and hardships. The saddest among them were those dedicated to women who died from complications in childbirth and those of babies who lived for only weeks or months before succumbing. It was quite humbling to think of how difficult the times must have been.

On this adventure we also encountered a cattle pound created out of local stones during the seventeen hundreds. The circular enclosure was used to round up stray animals that were wandering about the town. It was secured by a locked gate so that nobody would be able to help themselves to the livestock without first proving ownership and then paying fines and fees for the care and feeding of the creatures. 

A little farther down the road we saw a delightful sight. Colorful quilts were hanging on a clothesline marked with a sign that they were for sale. We only stopped long enough o take a photo of the lovely creations even though I wanted to know more about the person who had created them. I suppose that Mike was holding his breath lest I suggest finding out how much they cost and then insist on buying one. 

We picked up our granddaughter around lunchtime and headed to Harpswell again where we indulged in more seafood at The Dolphin, a restaurant with yet another amazing view of the ocean. We sat outside at a wooden table taking in the glories of the area. The scene was breathtaking and the food was outstanding. My order of haddock came with a complimentary blueberry muffin that put every other one I have eaten to shame. It was so wonderful there that I was reluctant to leave. I again found myself imagining what it would be like to live in Maine full time, but I’m not so sure I would take to the winter weather. 

Our time in Maine was coming to an end. We helped our granddaughter run a few more errands before we were scheduled to leave. A visit to Target and a late dinner at Panera Bread closed the chapter on our visit. We had hoped to try a Colombian restaurant called Maiz but unfortunately most of the locally owned places were closed on Monday. We would have to return one day to fulfill that experience. Perhaps we will be back when the time comes for her to graduate from college. I’m more than ready to put that date on my calendar and make reservations for another beautiful visit to Maine. 

One more night at our quaint motel and a good night’s rest readied us for the two thousand mile journey back home. In spite of loving my everyday life in Texas I was not yet ready to say goodbye to Maine.