In 2019...

(I need to do this, I've done it nearly every year! At least starting in 2010, I think)

Here's the 2019 preview post.

So, in 2019...

... the year started and began with all or some of us in the Caribbean! We'd never been there and now we went twice in one year! I visited Tulum in early January and then again in mid to late December.

... we celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary several times! I bought 3 different cakes for photo ops. I haven't yet shared photos of that on social media (only on our Holiday card

... I went to Brazil TWICE!! The second time wasn't that exciting, but the first trip in July was short and really great.

... my oldest son got his driver's license (best thing ever!) and had his first girlfriend, but she ended the relationship 5 months in to my great disappointment and his heartbreak. Sigh...

... I taught my dream class (a language class about music from my country) using the 5K grant I'd received, and we all had an absolute blast, it was awesome!
... We went on our first cruise, spent a wonderful week in FL again with my husband's family, and K & I went on a lovely week-long all inclusive resort (first time!) trip to Riviera Maya, Mexico, to celebrate our anniversary!

...I applied for "promotion" in my job even though I'm not tenure-track. I wasn't at all nervous or apprehensive about that, but my colleague is. Especially because he thinks s/he spent way too much effort on this and why can't they make a decision already. Yes, that is the reason. Very like this person.

As for what I wrote in the preview post, my ADHD continues to be super bothersome and I should find a therapist, but I'm hanging in there.

Summer Road Trip of a Lifetime (and maybe... How Social Media is Ruining my Life and... the World? ;-)

I suspect that my smart phone (I was a late adopter and only got a smart phone in 2012, 6 years ago) and social media (Facebook and now Instagram -- the new "micro-blogging" and photo sharing site) have ruined my life. Sigh... I spend too much time scrolling through its bait-y feeds and though I follow very few people on Instagram, it's still distracting because of the stupid stories. I REFUSE to look at stories on FB. I still miss blogging and reading blogs immensely and I haven't completely lost the habit of "writing blog posts in my head" -- [relatively] old habits die hard! -- but I feel like I am slowly losing my ability to concentrate on longer texts and tasks. It doesn't help that I have ADHD. I am also being influenced by the images I see and people share (more on that later).

OK, I promise that this annoying introduction will connect to my main topic, our AMAZING, Dream-Come-True trip of this summer...

We DROVE from the Mid-Atlantic region of the U.S. where we live all the way to the Canadian Rockies and even a bit of the Pacific Northwest and it was GLORIOUS!!

Yes, it was an insanely long drive of 4 days there and 4 days back, but we took our time and it worked well. It was also slightly stressful to sleep almost every night at a new hotel and plan, shop for, and prepare ALL OUR MEALS (except for breakfast at all but 4 mornings of the trip) on the go. We ate out exactly ONCE during the whole trip -- on the last day driving back. I took my wonderful pressure cooker (Power XL if you don't want to click) and a small hot pot and we had three ice-packs and a small cooler. ALL hotels had fridges, some of them full-sized ones.

A quick summary of the trip if you're curious, I added links to the official National Park sites:

Day 1 - 7/30 (Mon): 8h+ drive to Michigan. We slept at a friend's house and my parents at a hotel (mistakenly reserved by my son)
Day 2 - 7/31 (Tue): 8h+ Drive to Minneapolis (accidentally did a bathroom stop at Wisconsin Dells!) where we had an amazing Home2Suites across the street from a natural grocery store. We went to check out the Mall of America in the evening.
Day 3 - 8/1 (Wed): 7h+ from Minneapolis to Winnipeg, Canada. We saw the city a bit, purchased our National Park Pass, and rain ponchos at a Dollarama store before heading to the hotel. We didn't like downtown Winnipeg very much.
Day 4 - 8/2 (Thu): 10h+ drive from Winnipeg to Medicine Hat (Alberta). We hurried along because the hotel had indoor water slides and we enjoyed that (I cooked soup).
Day 5 - 8/3 (Fri): 4+ hour drive to Banff, AB, passing through the North of Calgary and seeing it in the distance. We stopped in Banff and were delighted by the turquoise water of the river and the gorgeous Cascades of Time Garden. It began to rain (hence the ponchos) and, because of the rain, which emptied the parking lots, we managed to quickly see Lake Louise (definitely "the Mona Lisa of Lakes" -- SUPER CROWDED, it's almost disappointing ;-), Moraine Lake (an AMAZING blue even in the rain), and, after some annoying traffic and the end of rain, Emerald Lake in Yoho National Park (British Columbia). We were staying in Golden, BC.
Day 6 - 8/4 (Sat): Rain was in the forecast for the Banff area, so we drove through the Canadian Glacier National Park and visited Revelstoke National Park, where we saw the beautiful Columbia river from above and enjoyed beautiful alpine wildflowers! It was partly cloudy at times, but not cold! The only thing we didn't like was the vicious mosquitoes at the parking lot at the summit where we had our lunch. (stayed in Golden, BC a second night)
Day 7 - 8/5 (Sun): Today was sunny with some clouds and we drove through Yoho & Banff National Parks all the way to Jasper National Park and beyond, about 6h driving, with many stops. Amazing day of "adventures" & incredible views: canoeing at Emerald Lake (cheapest spot, gorgeous lake), seeing Takakkaw Falls (both in Yoho NP), seeing a freight train go through both of the spiral tunnels!! Hiking up to see the incredible Peyto Lake. Marveling at the mountains and glaciers along the Icefields Parkway North and seeing a black bear next to the road! Stopping to see the Columbia Icefields and its great visitor center. And then... driving all the way to McBride, British Columbia (seeing two majestic elk eating calmly by the roadside) where we spent two nights in an apartment at the North Lodge Motel. The farthest Northwest we went on the trip!

Day 8 - 8/6 (Mon): Lots of driving because McBride is TWO HOURS from Jasper. We did the round trip and hiked the beautiful Maligne Canyon, drove to see Medicine lake (and unfortunately didn't drive down to Maligne Lake, so we didn't have a chance to see moose -- they are around Medicine and Maligne lakes). We had lunch next to the Maligne River and were going to go up on the AirTram in Jasper, but they closed due to the weather -- very disappointing! It was a beautiful and sunny day, but it was probably windy. So we went to downtown Jasper instead, where we had ice-cream, and went grocery shopping. On the drive back we stopped to see the majestic Mount Robson, the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies. This was the last sunny and crisp day of the trip.

Day 9 - 8/7 (Tue): Long drive back South (nearly 300 miles), and it was sunny, but unfortunately very hazy. South on the Icefield Parkway we stopped at Athabasca Falls and enjoyed walking through it's canyon and going down to the river, we saw Sunwapta Falls and had lunch there, then, we stopped at the Athabasca Glacier (Columbia Icefields), walked all the way to the glacier (even though  it's forbidden, everyone does it), and walked a little bit on top of it -- but we didn't go very far like lots of other people. Then we stopped at Peyto lake (a bit hazy and it was 6:30 pm) to see it again at a different time of day and we enjoyed taking tons of photos of the gorgeous blue Bow Lake with lots of sunshine. We arrived at the most luxurious (and expensive!) accommodation of the whole trip at the Mystic Springs Chalets and Hot Pools in Canmore. We went to the pool and also had to go grocery shopping. It was very very smoky in Banff and Canmore due to the Wardle fire in Kootenay National park. :-(

Day 10 - 8/8 (Wed): Today we went back to the lakes in the Banff area, but we couldn't get an early start and the parking lots were closed, so we had to park at the overflow area and pay for a shuttle to Moraine Lake. It was SO WORTH IT!!! The bluest lake, incredible photos, can't even describe it. Then we had lunch at the parking area (all picnic tables are in the sun, so we used a large rock for table and tree trunk stumps to sit on). After lunch, we were able to find parking to visit the über-crowded Lake Louise. There were two brides taking photos there! Last, but not least, we hiked the Johnston Canyon where I was wretchedly disappointed that the "hidden cave" and huge boulder and waterfall (link to image search), the "most photographed spot in Alberta" is now off limits. See, social media ruining my life. I REALLY wanted to see and photograph that place!! The ostensive reason is protecting birds, and I do believe the birds were probably bothered by the foot traffic in that hilly wooded area, but the canyon is SO MASSIVELY VISITED that I believe unless they closed it completely, it wouldn't help the birds much. But who am I to say/judge? My husband tried to console me saying that I care for the environment, but I was devastated. 

Day 11 - 8/9 (Thu): Last visit to Banff National Park area: we visited the lovely Cave and Basin National Historical Site which is where the very first Canadian National Park originated to protect the hot springs from prospective bidders. Then we drove to Calgary where we stayed at the excellently located Homewood Suites downtown and went to have dinner with friends at Blaze Pizza (we hardly ate because we had eaten at the hotel!).
Day 12 - 8/10 (Fri): Today we drove from Calgary to Glacier National Park in the U.S. and we met up with friends again! We met them at Logan Pass and then hiked with them for about an hour in the scary Highline trail. We headed to our hotel in Kalispell where we went grocery shopping (at Costco!) and then I cooked dinner for our friends, since we were staying at Homewood Suites again. 
Day 13 - 8/11 (Sat): Today we visited Glacier National Park again with our friends before they had to leave to go back to Missoula. In the morning our youngest son took the challenge and jumped off a cliff into the frigid waters of this swimming hole! Then, after a picnic, lunch we hiked to the Hidden Lake in Logan Pass and saw many mountain goats (and snow)! Then we drove four hours to our hotel in Helena where we arrived pretty late (10 pm).
Day 14 - 8/12 (Sun): Today we drove for 8h+ from Helena, MT to Mount Rushmore and we stayed for the evening presentation and lighting, it was nice! We stayed in a Best Western in Hill City that looked very "Western" indeed! ;-)
Day 15 - 8/13 (Mon): Today we drove through Badlands National Park on our way to Omaha, NE. There was a moment we were 90 mph on I-90 and it was 99F! I really liked Badlands, I wish we'd spent more time there, but we needed to get to Nebraska.

Day 16 - 8/14 (Tue): Took a detour to visit a denominational College in Lincoln, NE and quickly visited Saint Louis, MI in the late afternoon/ evening. It was lots of fun to take the tram to the top of the Gateway Arch. We literally forgot our hunger and tiredness in the brand new museum under the arch, FANTASTIC! 
Day 17 - 8/15 (Wed): Drove back home, longest day, over 13 hours, but we had a good lunch at Olive Garden. ;-)

This was long and took me a lot of time to write, but it was fun to remember it all!

Back to the social media issue. I believe that people have more money and that's why they travel more, but I also think that the ability to see photos of your friends in beautiful places, such as the Canadian Rockies lakes and vistas, makes people want to go there too, so I think that the huge crowds we saw -- everyone trying to take the most perfect pictures, even risking limb to do so (there was this girl who fell in the water in Moraine lake trying to reach the rocks and several people were trying to balance on logs and rocks to take photos). Of course we were busy taking photos too and I spent A LOT of time selecting the perfect 10 photos of each day and writing a short descriptive text to post on Instagram. I posted way more photos to Facebook (later), but used the same texts.

Yeah... is this all very bad? Not all of it, I'm sure. I have to go now, I have to practice a song with a group of women to sing tomorrow!

Too Many Things (before kicking the bucket or... hitting the boots ;-)

Last Friday & last night, I was over-tired and, consequently, not very inspired to write here, but I always have way too many things to say. I never run out of words, it seems, or ideas, and, a lot of the time, energy! ;-) It's positively exhausting to be me, I assure you!

That's not the subject of this post, though! I want to reflect about the fact that there are way too many things I want to do in life, but I don't like to call it a "bucket list." In fact, I only learned/heard of the term "bucket list" a couple of years ago, probably in a blog post title, and I had to look it up! You know, when I learned that it was the list of things you want to do before you "kick the bucket" and was reminded of that expression I had a good laugh!

It's just that "chutar o balde" (kick the bucket) in Portuguese means something completely different! It means to "give up" or to stop forcing things and just to let them happen naturally (see here if you know some Portuguese). The equivalent metaphor for dying in Portuguese is, instead, "bater as botas" (hit the boots or, even, in a sense "kick" them). Yeah, languages are lots of fun, no?

I thought of this very commonly blogged about subject because today I found one more thing to put in my list and remembered another one, since they are in the same state of Brazil.

Inhotim (wikipedia entry), a place with an interesting name, apparently derived from Mr. Timothy (a British man who administered the mining company located there), or "Senhor Tim" which transformed into Sinhô Tim, and then Inhotim. It is located in the state of Minas Gerais and it contains a contemporary art museum within a nature reserve and botanical gardens. Apparently it is the largest open air art museum and permanent installation(s) in the world! I really want to go there someday!

Here's a video in which your artists visit Inhotim:

And here's a slide show:
But even more than this fascinating museum, I want to visit the town of Dimantina, in Minas Gerais, where one of my favorite books, Diário de Helena Morley (or The Diary of Helena Morley) was written. It is a well preserved 18-19th century mining town in Brazil.

The "Big Dream" ;-) (a Sabbatical in Europe)

I had to spill all the beans in the title because, well, if all you see are my blog post titles, at least you'll know what my greatest dream (for now) is! ;-)

You know, the thought of not having a career, a job/jobs is pretty freeing, actually. But I know I will need to figure out something to continue helping to support my family.

While that doesn't get decided/settled (will it ever?), why don't I take to dreaming? Half-an-hour of research about traveling in Europe reminded me of my "big dream" and gave me a small epiphany: maybe not having a job could help in this dream? Or the contrary? K and I have often talked that having an actual job I could request a semester of unpaid leave from would be the most important condition to actually act on our dream. And maybe that's true. Sigh... :-(

So, the dream is simple. When K got his current job at first he was told that they were no longer doing sabbaticals, but then things changed and there are actually sabbaticals to be had -- after he gets tenure (which hopefully will be in the Summer of 2016). And the dream would be for him to find an institution in Europe to do research during the sabbatical semester -- preferably in France, Switzerland or England (to make it easier for the boys in school).

The dream would be to go in the Spring so he could also do research in the summer and then we could travel around. If we were to go to France, particularly the greater Paris region or to England, I think I could also get a teaching job (language, literature) for one semester. I mean, anywhere close to a big university would give me a chance to do something too.

Anyway... it would be challenging for the kids (who would be 13-14 and 16-17), but it would be a once-in-a-lifetime experience!

I'll let you know if any of this ever transpires. In any case, it's several years into the future.

Dreaming doesn't hurt, does it?

(big sigh... not whiny, but the "smiling"/content kind of sigh :-)

The Amazing Summer 2015 Middle-East/Europe Trip Tickets Were Bought OR ("Good" Debt??)

Buying international travel tickets is costly and, therefore, horribly scary & stressful! (at least for me!) Right now I'm burying my head on the sand, ostrich-style, not thinking about all that debt on my credit card that we'll have to figure out how to pay! The problem is that we still have some debt from buying the car this summer, yikes! Is there such a thing as "good" debt? If yes, these qualify, I think! ;-)

We don't travel until mid-July next year, but bought the tickets two nights ago because tickets need to be purchased well in advance for these kinds of trips. Especially for such a crazy itinerary as ours! We fly into Cairo (via Frankfurt), tour through Cairo, Sinai Peninsula, Jordan and Israel with a group; fly from Tel-Aviv to Zurich, spend 14 days in Europe; fly back to the U.S.

I'm excited! The Middle-East trip will be with family: parents-in-laws, my parents, one of the brothers-in-law ("K2") and his wife & sons, my mother-in-law's sister and at least two of her three sons and their wives, maybe a few more relatives, and, to complete the group, some close and not-so-close friends. My sons will be baptized by their grandfathers (both pastors) in the Jordan River -- Kelvin's bright idea! -- and I think that's going to be very emotional and meaningful (my nephews may be baptized too, but I don't know).

Then our family and my parents and I will spend some time in Europe together. We haven't decided the itinerary yet, but I'm already super panicky that 14 days is ABSOLUTELY nothing & too little time! Good thing I spent 27 wonderfully packed days in Europe in 2000 backpacking, camping, and "Eurail-passing" with my husband, so we did see LOTS, most everything (museums, churches, monuments, sights) in these eight cities: Paris, Barcelona, Florence, Rome, Venice, Munich, Berlin, & Amsterdam.

The boys have an agenda, and it has ONE (cute!) item: they want to visit the Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg, Germany, which is the largest model railway display in the world! So we have no choice, we have to go to Hamburg! ;-) And it's kind of "out of the way," but we'll do it for them (they also want to do the "behind the scenes" tour -- but we have to book one in English in advance, I don't know if that will work, but coming from so far away, it may be worth it!). K was saying we should then go to Denmark, but I think that maybe not, only if we had more time. My parents already know Denmark. They know most of Europe, actually, since they lived there for 3 years(1969-1972) and traveled around for 4 months at the end of their time there.

I don't really have any "agenda" except to visit my birth-place (Geneva) with my parents and to go to the Alps (wherever Rick Steves, our travel guru extraordinaire, says to go). We will be able to spend a few nights "camped" in K's aunt (actually his mom's cousin) in Basel, Switzerland, so that will be helpful -- we can leave suitcases there, for example.

Yeah, I'm excited! And I will probably blog much more about his trip in between now and July. And, hopefully I'll blog a lot of the trip as well!

Have you been to Europe? Or the Middle-East? Do you like traveling abroad? I love it, I'd do it all the time if I could!

Singing Performing Group - "Dream Stuff" I

I don't think I this dream will ever come true and I had actually forgotten I had it.

I sang in choirs for most of my life prior to coming to the U.S. 17 years ago and I just loooooove to sing in a group. I feel sad that I haven't been doing it for years (except for a 3 year period in Philly when we had a group at church). Sigh...

My crazy dream, though, was/is to be part of a singing/performing group, not a church choir or religious singing group. And this group would not only sing great vocal arrangements together, but perform in the sense of doing some comical sketches while singing or dressing funny/funky during the performances. And, of course, I would rather sing Brazilian music and not predictable showtunes & stuff.

I remembered this dream just now when I was listening to this great vocal arrangement of Estrela, Estrela (Star, Star), by Victor Ramil, one of my (recently) favorite songs -- I would just LOVE to sing that. The arrangement was made for Gal Costa (one of my favorite Brazilian singers) back in 1981 (or around that time):



Oh, there's a name for what I'd like to be part of, "coro cênico," in Portuguese (something like performing choir)

There was a group in Brazil that was awesome, they had the crazy name "Garganta Profunda" (Deep Throat). Here they are a looooong time ago back in 1987 performing the Beatles' Eleanor Rigby (there are very few live videos of them, most on youtube only have the vocals

Well, even I am getting surprised at the "stuff" I'm finding within! ;-)

"Dream Stuff"

I'm not a "dreamy" person. At least not anymore, because pretty much everything I dreamed about when I was a dreamy and overly introspective teen came true...

... I found a wonderful guy to share my life with (and I met him just at the right moment!).

... I traveled to the U.S. and saw and did so many things I wanted to see and be able to do (back in 1993 with K & his family).

... I moved to another country to have an experience abroad (we all know I'm still here after 17 years).

... I learned French and spent over a month in my birth-place.

... I traveled to almost every place I wanted to visit in Europe (except for Giverny & the Loire Castles & Carcasonne & some other locations).

and.... the "dream of dreams:" I had two babies of my very own.

And lots of things I didn't ever dream about (but maybe hoped would happen) happened: I earned a Ph.D. (sigh...). we own a house (and have owned 3 others), we have jobs, etc.

Of course I have "wishes," but wishes aren't exactly dreams, are they? So today in class, while my students worked on their exams and I kind of "daydreamed," a student mentioned something about a Brazilian children's book and it came to me...

...This idea that I do have things that I love, that maybe I do have dreams, both feasible and crazy "dreamy" dreams. So I decided I'm going to make a conscious effort to at least "name" this "dream stuff" (or these "dream things" as I had originally titled the post) in my life.

So... another "series" of posts will be coming soon.

P.S. I had to use "stuff" in the title because of Shakespeare's famous Tempest quote:

(. . . ) .We are such stuff
As dreams are made on;

On *Being* Dreams Come True

I am beginning a new "series" of posts about dreams (not the sleeping kind) and I think this may be a good place to start. 

My sons live with the full awareness that they are dreams come true.

Yesterday, after we got home from an incredibly busy afternoon & evening (more on that later on another post about piano!) I scooped up my youngest son, sat him on my lap and asked him, not exactly expecting a response:

"Do you know what I dreamed of the most in my life?"

He immediately answered, "Children!"

"Yes! You're right!" I responded.

I was not surprised that he knew the answer, though I think that was the first time I'd asked that question directly.

I tell them every day that they were (and are) so incredibly wanted and desired and that they are my greatest gifts and treasures. And I can only hope that all children everywhere can be desired and wanted too because I know that this is not always the case and I'm heartbroken at the thought. :(

I am doing my part with the two I was given.