Low Country (Don't worry: this is NOT a post about my mood of late. ...That was an attempt at humor; it may have failed.)

Last year, instead of having a big "to-do" about our ::coughcough:: "not insignificant number that I am not disclosing here" ::coughcough:: college reunion, my college suite mates and I decided to go on a trip. We ended up heading down to South Carolina, where a family member has a home that we were able to use. We had a great time hanging out, watching the Olympics, going to the beach, and site seeing in Charleston and Georgetown (home of the Gullah museum - fascinating!).




In case you haven't noticed my Good Reads list on the blog (it's over there on the right), I am sort of "mad about" fiction set in the Low Country of South Carolina (as in "mad about the boy", not as in "angry at you for the Civil War") and between the works of Karen White, Pat Conroy, and Fannie Flagg (although she doesn't specifically write about the Low Country), I have developed a strong affection for the area. (Don't worry, London, this isn't a competition; you're still my favourite.)




Just give me some sweet tea, she-crab soup, and air conditioning, and I am good to go. (Not kidding about the air conditioning. We visited the first week of August, and it was hot. Really hot. Like the OCEAN felt like bathwater hot. I actually got badly dehydrated after a walking tour of Charleston - my fault entirely. But I still had a great time!) These are some of my favorite snaps of that visit.




I highly recommend visiting Charleston if you have a chance. Probably not in high summer, but if that is what works for you, it is still a really cool place to visit!

A Day Around Savannah

"Georgia, Georgia,
The whole day through
Just an old sweet song
Keeps Georgia on my mind"*







"He's leaving,
On that midnight train to Georgia,
And he's goin' back
To a simpler place and time.
And I'll be with him
On that midnight train to Georgia,
I'd rather live in his world
Than live without him in mine."**





*lyrics from "Georgia on My Mind"
**lyrics from "Midnight Train to Georgia"

The Holy City*

The things that I like about Charleston: the sense of history comfortably mingled with the present day (much like Boston); the architecture (especially the side porches that run the length of the houses-on each story!); the delicious food & great restaurants (try Tristan's - you won't regret it - $5 cocktails!); the friendliness of the people (we met a lovely woman in the Market making/selling sweetgrass baskets that Friday night); and the walkability of the city. I was sad when it was time to say goodbye.











* Charleston is nicknamed "the Holy City" because the skyline (which is otherwise pretty low - no skyscrapers here) is peppered with the steeples of the many churches within its limits.

Down in the Selby Gardens*

It has been really hot here on the Gulf Coast the last few weeks, far too hot to be at the beach during the middle of the day. (I know: boo hoo, poor me.) So one day last week, I went to visit the Marie Selby Botanical Gardens, which was definitely a lot cooler place to be, both literally and metaphorically. (Bad pun, sorry! I am out of practice with blogging.)

Their website describes the gardens as "an open-air and under-glass museum of thousands of colorful and exotics plants. Many of these plants have been collected from the wild on more than 200 scientific expeditions to tropical rain forests by Selby Gardens research staff." This doesn't do the place justice - it is orchid heaven!! There is a whole green house full of orchids, and then there is an outdoor rain forest of sorts with a waterfall and orchids growing up in the nooks of the trees! It was really something. Here are some of my photos so that you can get a look.








Part of the gardens is a designated butterfly garden. (The plantings there are chosen specifically to attract butterflies.) There were a several of them flying around very quickly, which made it difficult to get a good photograph of them feeding on the flowers.


We did get to see this male Monarch butterfly that had *just* come out of its chrysalis. One of the volunteers helped the little guy by putting it on this bush so that he could dry out his wings.(Very shortly thereafter, he had his first amorous adventure with another male butterfly. And they say it isn't natural...) ;-)


*Another bad pun, sorry fans of Irish traditional music!

"Turn and face the strain"*

The first Friday of this month was my last day in my office of the past 11.5 years, and I moved out of my home of 12.5 years a week later. It was a pretty emotional time, truth be told, and I wasn't sleeping well and coudn't really eat that much either. I thought it would be easier to leave as I wasn't very happy, but there were still a lot of goodbye tears shed that last week. Fortunately, I was able to leave on a fairly "up" note at work. And even though those last two weeks had a frantic feeling to them, I was happy that I had "ripped the Band Aid off" and wasn't drawing things out over an extended period of time. I had really great movers who packed me up and moved me out, leaving me to do a final broom sweep before leaving "home" for the last time. There was something eerie about how empty the place was. The only other time it had ever been that empty was the day that I moved in. (I made sure that I left the unit a lot cleaner than I found it that first day!)

I took this final photo and said goodbye to my condo, thanking it for all the fun times I had there and wishing it luck with its new owners, and walked out the door. Now I am on vacation and trying to find some "inner bliss" before starting the next chapter in my life. So far, so good: I have started sleeping better, eating healthier, and even getting some much needed exercise! (I have also gotten back my ability to stay focused on one thing a time, gotten two books read, and started taking photographs again.)


* lyrics from "Changes" by David Bowie

"I've been a wild rover for many a year And I spent all my money on whiskey & beer..."*

This time last year, I was touring around Ireland with Sister K. It was definitely a trip of a lifetime, and it was completely worth the early morning calls and hotel changes to see so much of the country in only ten days.
I have been thinking about that trip because 1. JR & RH are heading out today for their own trip to Ireland, and 2. the weather in Boston is doing a fairly accurate impersonation of the weather we had when we were in Dublin. (That is to say, it has been on the cold side and raining on and off for the last two days.) I am a little jealous that they are getting to visit Ireland again, but I need to start thinking about my next big trip. Scotland, anyone? (I'd love to get Sister K to come with me, but we'd have to sort her out with the accent first!)


Photographs by Sister K (actually it is one panoramic photo by her, that I cropped into two photos)


* "And it's no, nay, never, No nay never no more,
    Will I play the wild rover No never no more."   The Wild Rover

"I'm not hungry anymore; isn't it glorious?"*

When I was a kid, my mom would recommend that my siblings and I watch certain films (usually old films), and we wouldn't watch them because we were stubborn and contrary. (And KIDS!) But invariably one of us would be sick and end up a captive audience to mom's film suggestions, and that one sibling would LOVE the movie. Then we'd all end up watching it and would ALSO love it so much that we'd watch it ALL THE TIME. (I don't know how my mom stopped herself from saying "I told you so" but she did...for the most part.)

One of those films that mom thought we would all benefit from watching is Charade. Now if you've never seen the film Charade, what is wrong with you!?! I would suggest that you go to Netflix and put it at the very top of your queue because it is WONDERFULLY GOOD. These are some of the reasons it is so good: Audrey Hepburn, Cary Grant, mystery, stolen money, murder, imposters, romance, and suspense, set in Paris, with a score by Henry Mancini. (Those are all very good things as far as I am concerned.)

If you have seen the film, you know that stamps play a part in the story. When our family went on vacation to Paris back in 2000, one of the things that delighted us as we were walking around the city was spying a storefront with the front window filled with stamps at the Place de la Madeleine. The shop was closed so we couldn't go in, but instead we three sisters had our photo taken in front of it with these huge grins on our faces. A Frenchman passed by us and, shaking his head, muttered, "Americans". After he was out of earshot, we all started to laugh. We really didn't care because of our love for Charade and because we knew it was really silly anyhow.

And, if you can't do silly things while you are on vacation, you need to take better vacations!


*Old Audrey Hepburn films make life better, don't you think? They always put me in a good mood.

"All around the Cathedral, the saints and apostles look down as she sells her wares."*

Great article and video up at The Telegraph about the completion of the 15 year renovation project at St. Paul's Cathedral, London.

I have had a bit of a weird history with St. Paul's: it took me multiple trips to London to actually visit the building. This was not from a lacking of desire or attempts! The first time I went to London in 2000 with my family, we couldn't get into St. Paul's because there were private events that week for the Queen Mum's 100th birthday.

I made my second attempt during my visit in February of 2003, but JR and I couldn't go in because it was too close to Vespers. (Permanent note to self: don't plan on doing sightseeing at a church on a Sunday.) That trip, we got stuck in London an additional day because a blizzard in the Northeast canceled our return flight, but we visited too late in the day and had only an hour to sight see before the building closed. We got to hear choir boys rehearse, but I didn't have enough time in the crypt, and the interior renovations prohibited us from seeing much of the Nave. We did make it up to the Whispering Gallery, but my fear of heights prevented me from going any higher up.

Third trip was the charm. When Je Glide and I went to London in 2008, I finally got a proper visit to St. Paul's. (Although we were at first told by the police that we couldn't go in because there was some kind of scare there. I felt CURSED! We went to lunch, and when we came back, we finally got inside. I was ECSTATIC!) The interior renovation was completed, and the building looked AMAZING. While Je Glide climbed up into the Dome, I crawled around in the crypt and explored the ground floor of the church, seeing the effigies of Donne and Lawrence and the tombs of Wellington and Nelson. We met up again to look at the American Memorial Chapel, dedicated to the memories of the American service men and women based in Britain who died in WWII. While we were in the Chapel, a bell sounded, and everyone there was invited to join in saying the Lord's Prayer for peace. It was very moving, and I remember thinking to myself that maybe I was meant to wait to see the Cathedral until it was restored to its proper glory.

St. Paul's Cathedral is definitely a MUST SEE during a visit to London: for its architecture, its history, and the sacredness of its space. (Just be sure to check the website ahead of time to make sure that you are well within visiting hours!)


* "Feed the Birds" from Mary Poppins

"Seven years passed, I stopped going to Paradiso Perduto, I stopped painting. I put aside the fantasy and the wealthy..."*

Last week, I was on vacation on the Gulf Coast of Florida. My family has been vacationing in Sarasota for the last 25+ years, but this year marked my first visit to John Ringling's (of Ringling Bros. circus fame) fabulous winter home, Cà d’Zan.

Built in the Venetian Gothic style in 1924-25, Cà d’Zan (which means "House of John" in the Venetian dialect) is both a relic and a reminder of a time when American opulence was at its pinnacle, and the wealthy tried to outdo each other by recreating the splendor of European palaces in American settings. Sitting right at the edge of Sarasota Bay and certainly as stately as any of the "summer cottages" in Newport, RI, Cà d’Zan is considered to be the "last of the Gilded Age mansions."

The house went through an extensive restoration within the last ten years, and it is simply splendid. The grounds include Mable Ringling's rose garden (the most outstanding American public rose garden of 2006), the "Secret Garden", and some fascinating banyan trees. Also on the property is the John & Mabel Ringling Museum of Art and the Circus Museums. You could easily spend the whole day there.







*If Cà d’Zan looks familiar to you, perhaps you recognize it from the Hawke/Paltrow version of Great Expectations. It was Anne Bancroft's house in the film!! (Quote is from the movie...)