Seas the day

Braeden and Emma in the Long Island Sound...fifteen years ago.

Live in the sunshine

Swim in the sea

Drink the wild air

Emerson

Tuesday we spent visiting some of our old favorites on the Long Island Sound. 

One day, long ago, we watched Santa come into town on a tugboat sitting on this dock in Mystic with our little bald baby boy.

Here's the same dock (and the same baby).

Stonington is a picturesque little place that we love.

Finally, we went to Misquamicut State Beach in Rhode Island.

It is so very pretty there.

It was also sort of breezy and cold.

The thing is, I didn't give birth to anyone that can see a body of water and not want to get into it.  I blame their father.

It always goes something like this.

1) They want to swim.

2) I say no.  It's cold.

3) They really want to swim.  Plus they have swimsuits (because they always do).

4) I point out we have no towels.  The sand will be a mess.  Besides, it's cold.

5) They still want to swim.

6) Adam says he thinks it would be all right.  (of course he does)

7) I give up.

8) The maniacs swim and Adam takes care of all the sand and mess.  He pulls out t shirts as makeshift towels and carefully wipes sand off of feet before they get in the car. 

You have no idea how many times this exact scenario has played out.  It's a good thing we have Adam because I'm not much fun.

So swimming it was.

Emma was still changing while I took some pictures of the boys.  At first they ran in and out of the waves, getting up their courage.

Then their shirts came off and they got serious.

Then they did some sort of ritual to increase their nerve?

I can't explain it.

Seriously.  Can't.  Explain.

 Then their native water loving, sons of Adam nature took over.

Emma joined but is slightly less crazy than her brothers.

Braeden's skin was bright red from the frigid water.

So they swam.  I watched for awhile and then I got too cold and went to the car.  My children were swimming in the North Atlantic and it was too cold on the beach to watch.

I don't know.

The ocean is good for the soul though.  It's good to get your vitamin sea.

The sentimental part of the journey

We went to New Haven and to Hamden.  Cue the cascading memories.  We began in Hamden which made sense geographically if not historically (we lived there last, right before we left Connecticut).  Braeden remembered the apartment building and was shocked that it wasn't bigger, because he remembers it being enormous.  I pointed out the fire station half a block away where I took his co-op preschool class (which consisted of our little friend group) for a field trip.

Davis, Adam and Braeden (Braeden's friends had his dad's name...)

I pointed out the library where we went to story time via me pushing the double stroller.  Those were good times.

We drove toward New Haven and stopped at the Eli Whitney Water Park which used to be a highlight in Braeden's life.

He marveled at the waterworks toys which he vaguely remembered.

I could be wrong but I don't think the tree branches brushed the top of his head back then...

I had him throw a rock in the water for old time's sake because it used to be his favorite way to pass an afternoon. (I know, you can be glad I'm not your mom making you throw commemorative rocks into bodies of water.)

As for Emma, (the little Connecticut Yankee that was born in the Constitution State but didn't remember it a bit), she felt like her soul had returned home.  She loved Connecticut.  She tramped off into the woods by herself. (I told her, "Don't get Lyme Disease!" because I like to give helpful advice to my kids.)

Our next stop was our apartment building on Prospect Street.  We showed Braeden the window that had been his bedroom.  This was one way Braeden and I used to like to pass the time.  There was a lot of world going on outside the window.

Also, this happened inside that apartment:

And about a million other happy things.  How could we not love the place?

We stopped by the church building where we used to meet.  It's been renovated and rather than just the two bottom floors, the entire building is now used by the church.  I almost got teary when we were there but I was very brave and held it in.  Inside that building I made lifelong friends.  I was buoyed by a community that held me up when I was sick and far from home.  Emma was blessed there.  It was a good place; kind of the centerpiece of our lives for awhile there.

Here's a picture I dug up of some cherubs at the church for a Halloween party:

Taylor, Adam, Davis and Braeden

Our next stop was East Rock.  Braeden completely remembered it because he loved going there.  We went there at sunrise in our pajamas one Easter morning:

We used to go often to survey the city, count church steeples, gaze out at the Long Island Sound.  It was one of our Places.

It was lunchtime so we did what you have to do in New Haven and had apizza.  It's probably one of the best things that's ever happened to me.

We went to Pepe's. Because Pepe's.  We ordered three large pies.  The waitress looked a little taken back but didn't say a word.  Here's the crown jewel (in my opinion), the Margherita:

We also got the clam (because you have to):

And a pepperoni (because Mark):

It was an emotional experience for some of us:

It's that good.

Adam asked Emma how she thought it compared to Elliott Bay, which was the far and away winner in our pizza challenge a few summers ago.

Emma said, "This kicks the crap out of Elliott Bay."

Spoken like a true New Haven native.

Here are Adam and the boys watching the amazing brick oven where the magic happens.

And here's Frank Pepe himself.  I want that picture in my own house.  I think I love that guy.

From there we went on an official Yale tour which I had never done.  Emma was completely enamored by it and thinks she'd like to go to Yale.

I told her not to make college decisions based on architecture.

Adam said, "I'm sure you could get in."

I said, "Maybe for graduate school." (What have I done showing my daughter Yale University which as it happens is on the other side of the country?!?)

The architecture is pretty amazing though...

Braeden had a less ambitious takeaway from the tour.  He said, "When we toured BYU, I thought, 'I want to go here!' Touring Yale, I think, 'So, this is where the smart kids go...'"  That's my boy.

A highlight of the tour was the Sterling Library which was always one of Adam's favorite haunts for studying:

He liked showing them where he used to drink deeply from all that Yale knowledge.

Here's Mark, rubbing the statue of Theodore Dwight Woolsey for luck.  His toe is discolored because of the tradition but I don't know, maybe he doesn't mind? 

We swung by the New Haven Cemetery briefly.  This gate always seems very forbidding and grim to me.  I mean, the dead shall be raised, but this seems like a threat somehow.

Our last stop was the Yale Bowl.  We love telling our kids the story of the time we went to the Yale/Harvard football game there.  It was quite the culture shock.  People were wearing furs and tweed and tailgating on tables with linens and fancy dishes.  There were limos everywhere.  We felt sheepish in our sweatshirts and jeans.

I took a selfie with the bulldog statue:

He had a very earnest and wise face.

Thank you New Haven.  Thanks for the memories, the good education (for both Adam, the graduate student and me, the young mother), thanks for the friends.

Thanks for Pepe's.

And home

We're back.  There is nothing as sublime as my own bed.  Last night, when Adam crawled into bed next to me, he asked, "How are we going to be world travelers if we like this bed so much?"

I suggested hiring strong men to follow us around with our bed on their backs.  It's a thought.

You'll have to pardon me the next several days while I record our trip for my digital scrapbook that is my blog.  It was perfect (with a few bumps along the way).  It was sentimental and beautiful and full of history and fun.

The first day:  we flew into the Newark airport.  Braeden used to love to ride the train at the Newark airport.  The whole trip, we kept telling Braeden what he used to do and what he used to love and he remembered some of it.  Emma was enamored by everything and felt like she'd returned to her ancestral home and as for Mark, he was very patient with us expounding about the days when he hadn't been born yet.

Here's their first glimpse of Manhattan:

Yeah, Emma's holding her Pooh Bear.  Her friend bought it for her on their Disneyland trip and that's as much of an explanation as I can give you.

As my dad would say, "How are you going to keep them on the farm once they've seen the lights of the big city?"

I don't love NYC.  I never have.  I also have never really given it much of a chance.  To me, it is just crowded and dingy and smelly.  And stressful.  I know lots of people love it and that's great because with that many people living there, it would be sad for them if they felt about it like I do.

We decided to take a quick drive through before heading to Connecticut. Here's a peek at the skyline as we drove in.

And then a whole lot of this happened:

Once inside the city, the chaos really hit:

Adam, who was an indispensable hero the entire time, drove us around like a champ.  We purposefully got a smaller rental car for just such experiences.  It was a wild ride.  At one point we turned down a one way street to see a green semi truck (owned by the city) barreling toward us, going the wrong way.  Adam quickly veered off the road into a tiny spot and we all breathed the shaky relief of people who had cheated death.  A few minutes later, we were nearly taken out by the same truck!  The rest of the trip we kept an eagle eye out for a green semi truck with some unexplainable grudge aimed at us.

Adam stopped to let the kids and me walk through Central Park.  He drove around to meet us on the other side.  I didn't want to walk through Central Park, I didn't want to let my kids go alone and I certainly didn't want to drive.  I decided walking through the park was the best option.

Here's a shot of the kids outside the park with the Plaza Hotel in the background:

They are, from left to right, Happy, Happy and slightly Stressed.  Because he knows how to drive, Braeden appreciated the driving, the way lane lines are suggestions and taxi drivers are straight up crazy.

Like everywhere else, the park was crowded and dingy and smelly.  (I should work for NYC tourism...)

Here's a quick picture I took while we walked.

We got as much local flavor and as many near death experiences as we could handle and then we hit the road for New England.  As a parting look, here's the Manhattan Temple:

Travel time

...which is different than time travel.

give me chalk markers and I can't seem to help myself

We've hit the road (and maxed out my artistic ability).

I'll tell you all about it next week.

Notice under my current chalkboard message you can see remnants of the last.  I thought I could.

Mark writes a senator

Mark had some homework for his Citizenship in the Nation merit badge for scouts.  He had a question for me and I had an epiphany moment where I remembered that I had Braeden in the house.  I released him from weeding and other slave labor duties and instructed him to go help Mark.

Braeden was thrilled and felt like he'd gotten away with something.

I was thrilled and felt like I'd gotten away with something.

Braeden delved deep because that kind of thing is Braeden's Thing.  They were listening to famous political speeches and discussing nuances and at one point, Braeden called upstairs to me, "Mark is doing some real high level thinking here."

Oh good.

Then Mark needed to write a letter.  He decided to write Orrin Hatch, because like Mark knowingly told me, he is the President pro tempore.  This is the effect Braeden has on people.  They start knowing who the President pro tempore is.

They discussed reasons for the letter.  Mark wanted to encourage Orrin Hatch to nuke ISIS.  (That is Mark in a nutshell.) Braeden, who is a pacifist that won't kill a spider, quickly talked him out of that idea.  Mark's final idea was to ask Orrin Hatch's opinion on the newly elected Prime Minister of the UK.

Mark went to type the letter and he asked Braeden, "Should this be a business letter?"

(Because, you see, Mark is a student of the Grandma Dahl School of Typing.)

Mark typed his letter, I went to a meeting and when Adam got home, he helped with final formatting (it had to be perfect) and Mark even wanted to print the envelope like Grandma had shown him.  They got it all done tidily (they measured where exactly to put the stamp) and Mark couldn't wait another minute so he walked it down the street to the mailbox.

I hope whichever aide of Orrin Hatch's opens that letter realizes the earnestness and solemnity that went into it by a twelve year old boy.

Mark talks to the radio

When Mark and I are doing errands, we surf Sirius XM like it's our job.  He can control the dial but I hold ultimate veto power.

It's a pretty good system.

The other day, we were listening to 70s on 7.  Credence Clearwater Revival was singing "Have You Ever Seen the Rain."

Mark listened for awhile and then said, to the radio, "Bruh, I've lived in Seattle.  So yeah, once or twice."