In which too little - and too much - comes too late

I left Topeka Kansas over eleven years ago. We left for a number of reasons, not the least being the attraction of Colorado's environment and standard of living. It certainly didn't hurt that we were moving away from what may be the most embarrassing home town in the US.

We're pretty liberal people, and we have a simple live-and-let-live philosophy. We have friends of all sorts. We tend to value people for their skills and attitudes, and reject discrimination on the basis of people's beliefs, sexuality, skin color, and etc. We also tend to reject people who do discriminate. Thus leaving the Westboro Baptist Church behind was something of a relief.

The church and it's autocrat, the very un-Reverend Fred Phelps, have played a role in the fabric of Topeka for years. A civil rights lawyer who was later disbarred, Fred has taken up a cause against gays (not to mention Catholics and Jews) in more recent years. In the ten or so years I lived in Topeka, we became accustomed to - but not complacent about - the daily protests staged by Fred and his toadies. The lurid signs were supported by church members as young as grade-school age. Lurid, yes, and graphic. "God Hates Fags" is really one of the milder epithets. They underscored the written message with obscenities screamed at passers by. For years, daily faxes were transmitted to anyone with a fax number, filled with hate speech and even more lurid and borderline-obscene images.

He thanked God for AIDS.

Fred and thralls appeared daily at 8th and McVicar and on Sundays at Gage Park. He picketed businesses, he picketed performance at the Performing Arts Center, he picketed churches that preached a message of tolerance. He picketed gay pride events, and prominent political gatherings. He even picketed Billy Graham. And he picketed the funerals of gays, suspected gays, and gay sympathizers.

Rude, lewd behavior aside, picketing a funeral is about the lowest of the low. An appalling level of schadenfreude was exhibited at the funeral for Matthew Shepard, and the celebration just increased from there.

Yes, Fred got some attention for his bad behavior. Occasionally, he even made national news. Topeka natives cringed and denied residing anywhere near Topeka, or flatly denounced his actions and philosophy, fearful that owning up to Topeka would paint themselves with Fred's broad brush. It was with utter relief then that we left.

Too bad that's not the end of the story.

About a year and a half ago, I was working in Columbia, SC with clients. Columbia is of course the home of Fort Jackson US Army Base. As such, there is a lot of support for soldiers and their families; the TV station had a wall of pictures of service members who were currently stationed in the Middle East. As soldiers returned to the base in body bags, Fred took up a new crusade. He started picketing the funerals of soldiers, claiming that the soldiers' deaths are a sign of God punishing America for tolerating homosexuality.

This is very bad behavior, Fred. Bad enough that the American public is outraged enough to initiate a number of new laws prohibiting Fred's brand of behavior at funerals. About a dozen states have passed such laws to date and Congress has addressed the Fred issue by outlawing protests at military funerals at federal cemeteries.

These laws, while laudable, are too little too late. Where was the outrage when Fred picketed the funerals of gays? Are dead gays less pitiable than dead soldiers? Do their families suffer less? Are soldiers more honorable for their line of work killing (or supporting the people who are killing) people? Are gays less human because they love in a different way than most of the population? Do they deserve a horrible death because of who they love? What about children or straight adults - including the vast numbers of Africans - who die from AIDS? What about their orphaned children? How can a civilized society be indifferent toward Fred's behavior towards gays, but sternly condemn his behavior toward the victims of a misguided war?

Perhaps one can glean Fred's true mission from an article in USA Today a couple of weeks ago, in which he chortled gleefully over all the attention he's getting. It seems like he gets a lot of attention. Frequently on my travels he pops up on the local news; my first experience with this phenomenon was that March 2005 trip to South Carolina, where he made the local news for picketing a funeral of several local soldiers. I long ago ceased to believe that Fred was newsworthy, largely because media attention feeds his mission and thus his ego.

The attention that the media is giving Fred now is too much, too late. They didn't find him newsworthy until he picketed Matthew Shepard's funeral; what makes him newsworthy now? Has patriotism become more prevalent than compassion? Or is it just a slow news day?

In which unkind comments are overheard on the school yard

As is my custom, I walked Evan to school this morning. We had a good time, walking and talking and playing tag.

When we got to school, Evan's friend Cody met him on the school yard. They played together a bit, and then from off to my right I heard an older kid say, "Cody is a girly-boy!" "Hey, that's not a nice thing to say," I responded. He either ignored me or didn't hear me.

Cody certainly does have some traits that might elicit such taunting. He seems to favor pink; he loves fairies (he wanted to play Tatiana to Evan's Oberon this morning); he loves butterflies. His Land's End backpack is big, pink and out there, and has "Cody" embroidered on it. So what? Meanness is still plain meanness.

Shortly I noticed that Cody was rubbing his eyes and sniffing back tears. I said to him, "that was a mean thing to say, wasn't it?" "Yes," he whimpered. "Cody, you're alright," I said. He came for a hug, which started a hug attack, and a new round of tag with Evan as "it".

Cody and Evan are similar in a lot of ways - both are only children of career parents (Cody's mom is a dentist), both are bright. They've been friends since the summer, and I hear that the two of them seem to get into trouble together. They tend to feed on each other.

I almost said to the mean kid, "Yeah, but Cody'll be a better father one day than your dad is!"

In which is contained political comments that really need saying

In my "away" life, I spend a lot of time listening to news. I am, after all a card-carrying news junkie. I tend to listen to NPR in the mornings, while CNN is the evening drug of choice. As long as I am alone at a site, I read USA Today daily - after all the hotel provides complimentary copies, and one must have some diversion at lunches taken alone.

This of course means that I have ample time to digest the news and views of the day. This week, one thing really has me thinking - the War on Terror (insert your own dramatic baritone inflection).

The War on Terror isn't a war. You can't make war on an idea or a concept. You can make war on a country or a people, which the US certainly has done in Iraq and Afghanistan. You can have a war against terrorists, but of course one must decide who is a terrorist and who is not, and there is a lot of gray between the "is" and "is not".

What is commonly described as the "War on Terror" is simply a reaction against a predictable outcome precipitated by the West's [1] actions in the region over the past 150 years. We've shoved our weight, imperialism and policies around in the Middle East since the British decided to colonialize. I suspect that a lot of our foreign policy in the 20th century was designed specifically to keep the region destabilized, in order to maintain the flow of cheap oil. We are now seeing the effect of those policies in the increased instability and violence, both in the region and emanating from it.

Additionally, the current US administration's stance ("you're either with us or against us" to paraphrase) completely discounts the portion of the population who consider themselves patriots and opposed to the wide range of actions bundled under the concept "War on Terror". It polarizes the people.

I listened to Bill O'Riley's comments on Good Morning America yesterday morning. I can't stand the man, but he did say some valuable things. He identifies a section of the country as "secular progressives". Although he dismisses us as just 20% of the population, and that we're bashing the administration without offering solutions, he did get the characterization right. He says that we think that we live in a bad country, and that sweeping changes need to occur. That we brought terrorism on ourselves with our policies in the Middle East - our greed, exploitation of foreign oil, and lying to the world. So far, that's pretty much how I feel.

Of course, he then says that we control the media (if that's correct, why is the media lapping up this whole "War on Terror" thing - an invention of the Bush administration?), that we control the ACLU (currently representing Fred Phelps in actions opposing the laws against picketing at funerals), and that we have tens of millions of dollars to pour into propaganda. He's intelligent enough to correctly describe the progressive sector of the population, but totally incorrect in his conclusions and the percentage of the country that believes that this administration is dead wrong.

One thing he is correct on - although we can clearly identify the issues, we really have not offered solutions. I don't think it's because we're not creative enough to come up with a workable solution to the mess we made in Iraq, or the rise of Islamic actions against Israel, or how to insure security without damaging liberty. I think it's because we're speechless in the face of overwhelming complexities. It's not as simple as sending in the Marines. Force makes an impression alright, but that impression isn't usually favorable.

If the Arabs pulled together as a unified group of peoples, tribes and countries, they could strangle the West's economies, albeit not without risk to their own western-money-fueled economies. Obviously there are few good solutions.

I would suggest that our dependence on oil - of which the vast majority originates in the Middle East - is the single largest risk to our security. If we could break this dependence, it would be a step in the right direction. If we could learn to treat each other with decorum and respect, rather than pouring verbal gasoline on the fires of discontent, this too would be a step in the right direction. How can fault be found with either of these things? Oh, wait - there is no enormous pile of cash at the end of either of these rainbows.

Yes, Virginia, it is all about the money.

[1] The US and EU, mostly.

In which I have a ridiculous day

“Ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous,“ I muttered, gazing out the panoramic south windows of the terminal at Rochester – Monroe County (NY) airport.

The woman at the table next to me overheard my comment. “That’s it, then,” she said. “Yes,” I said, “all that for an hour.” “It’s a good thing he didn’t stay to lunch!” she said.

In many ways, the afternoon and evening have been utterly ridiculous.

After a particularly successful week at the client site in Rochester, I had an opportunity to depart the station about 40 minutes early. After my weekend trip to Niagara, I have been interested in the geology of western New York, especially the phenomenon known as the Niagara escarpment. The Niagara escarpment is the high ground or bluffs south of Lake Ontario through which the Niagara river has cut a gorge with Niagara Falls at the south end. Similarly, the Genesee River has cut a gorge through the Niagara escarpment on its way toward Lake Ontario. The town of Rochester was sited at the point where the High Falls spill over the edge and drop into a gorge cut through the Niagara escarpment.

I was in search of the High Falls; I had seen signs directing the curious in downtown Rochester. I happened to be on the Inner Loop, a tiny ring road around downtown. I saw the sign too late. This meant that I had to do some extra driving, but I did finally find the place. The drive was complicated by the presence of an abnormal quantity of police cruisers and motorcycles. Something was obviously afoot.

The falls were interesting, not only for the geological phenomenon. Rochester was founded at this place primarily because the falls were seen as a power source. As a result, masonry buildings that have long ago been abandoned flank the cliffs at the falls’ end of the canyon. The structures were built into and atop the cliff walls; the works of humans and the works of Nature morph into one another not unlike the cliff dwellings of the American southwest. There is a certain organic quality to the transition between masonry and shale.

Returning to the Inner Loop, I again remarked upon the unusual police presence. This was beginning to look odd. I called Chris, who did a little research (he’s often my substitute for wi-fi connectivity when I’m in the car) and discovered that Dick Cheney was visiting Rochester. Due to arrive at 4:30, the local constabulatary had kindly cleared I-390 from the airport to downtown for his caravan. How…nice.

This of course meant that no one else had the right to drive on the highway into downtown - the highway that they had bought through their tax dollars. Nice. It seems that self-serving, war-mongering, hyperbole spewing politicians with bad aim get the highway to themselves, displacing probably tens of thousands of their constituents in the name of security. Ridiculous.

This was bad enough. When the south-bound traffic began to slow, I started to get mad. Dammit – if I’m late to the airport, I’m gonna be really mad. Fortunately, slow was the worst of it. The police presence on the road between the interstate and the airport was causing people to drive badly. Cops everywhere, turning into odd back-entrances, parked along the road. It was just 3:30.

When I dropped off my rental car, I discovered that Budget had charged me a rediculous $80 for fuel. I had to get them to dig my original rental agreement out of the trash to demonstrate that I had already paid $38.08 for the fuel purchase option. They did of course issue a $50 credit, but still...

I knew weather in Chicago was slowing down incoming flights, and my flight was probably one of those. The ticket agent kindly re-routed me through Washington Dulles. It meant that I had three hours at Rochester to kill, and it meant that I was getting into Denver three hours late, but hey, I was getting home tonight. Which seemed better than getting stuck in Chicago until Saturday.

As I sat at my Washington-bound gate, the wisdom of the new route became very clear. The Chicago-bound flight was first delayed half an hour, then an hour and a half, and ultimately five hours. The later Chicago-bound flight was cancelled, causing a great deal of activity across the concourse. I suspect that my Washington flight filled up at that moment.

And full it was. The airlines tend to fill flights to a ridiculous level nowadays. I had a center seat for the flight; at least it was an exit row. I tried to get a better east, but no luck.

While I was in the air for the 3:40 to Denver, Orbitz notices kept piling up on my cell phone. As it was, I was delayed three hours, but at least I didn’t have to sleep in Chicago. Had I kept my original flight, I would have arrived in Denver at the truly ridiculous hour of 1:30 am.

Overnighting in Chicago would have been ridiculous, but understandable due to the weather. What I still don’t understand is how one man, one citizen of the United States can justifiably consume so many resources and disturb the routine of many, many fellow citizens. I don’t care if that one man is the vice president of the United States.

Standing at that window, I considered the cost of Cheney’s visit to Rochester. The private airplane (unmarked, of course). The disruption to the other flights arriving or departing (no planes can be moving on the tarmac while the veep’s plane is arriving or departing) and the people who were sitting on those planes, waiting. The cost of the police, sheriff and highway patrol officers who were blocking off the highway, protecting one person rather than the thousands in the community. How many victims were made in Rochester in one afternoon? The residents who could not get where they were going; the people made late to work, or to flights, or to pick up their kids at school. The cost of the bad-ass black SUV that escorted that unmarked plane across the taxi lanes to the runway. The cost of airport staff who also stood by as escort service. The fuel involved in getting him there, and back, and running all those extra “security” vehicles such as the police cruisers. The PR effort to get the word out to the community not to park vehicles on roads near the airport.

"Utterly Ridiculous," I said. I, too, am glad he didn't stay to lunch.

In which Melanie leaves the county

The plan for today was Niagara Falls.

I got up late - too late for breakfast today. I hurried through shower and dressing, pausing only long enough on the way out to Mapquest the route, and to pack my laptop for the trip. After all, I've got only enough on-board memory for 11 shots at 3.1 mp, and I anticipated needing to dump pictures . I left at about 10:30, too late as it turns out to get breakfast from McDonald's either. I did order a Big and Tasty burger which was actually pretty good.

Unsurprisingly, the route is very well marked, and my Mapquest directions only served as assurance that I was on the right track. It was noon when I arrived at the park. Parking was $10. This seemed to be a bad omen, and I prepared myself to pay for just about everything I wanted to do. Luckily, walking is free, and so the parking fee turned out to be worst of it.

I first walked over to the brink of the American falls. It is spectacular to see the vast quantities of water that spill over the falls. As in Yellowstone, there is the suspicion that all that water must eventually run out, that there can't possibly be so much water to fuel the spectacle that is Niagara indefinitely.

From the American side, you are in close proximity to the action and can see the vastness of the Niagara complex. Across the American falls to the south is Goat Island, which divides the falls into the American and Canadian sides. Goat Island is accessible from the US side of the straight (what we call the Niagara River is actually a straight between Lakes Erie and Ontario) and from a distance seems to be completely developed as a park. Staircases lead down from the island into the gorge, permitting access to the bottom of the gorge. Undoubtedly, there is a charge for this access; the park runs tours down into the gorge below Goat Island.

Standing on the American bank, one can clearly see the long lines of people snaking their way along the opposite Canadian bank, as well as the buildings and parkland that surrounds Horseshoe falls on the Canadian side. A trick of geology prevents anyone standing on the US side from seeing more than the very southern side of Horseshoe Falls. To my right was the Rainbow bridge between the US and Canada. Pedestrians are permitted to cross the Rainbow bridge, and since I had already parked (and paid ten bucks to do so) it seemed more expedient to walk than to drive. After a check of the documents required for re-entry to the US, I decided that I was going to walk across to Canada.

Now, if you measure the distance from Rainbow Bridge to the American falls and the distance from Rainbow Bridge to the Canadian falls, the distance to the Canadian Falls is probably twice as far. I'm thinking as I'm heading for the customs house that I have a bit of a hike in front of me. However, I know that I can pretty much walk indefinitely, and besides, it's only 275 feet above sea level.

The problem is that there is no place where you can view the American falls head-on as long as you stay in the US. I was gratified then that the view from Rainbow bridge affords a panoramic view of both of the falls. The problem with the American side of the falls is that no matter where you are on the American side, the view is at best oblique. There is no The smallish dark squares in the water are two "Maid of the Mist" boats, out for their tours.

In the center of the Rainbow Bridge stand two flag poles, marking the point where Canada and the US meet (or are divided). I suppose the light pole is the effective boundary.

Once across the bridge, I had to enter Canada. This apparently involved questioning a slightly flustered American tourist to the Canadian customs officer's satisfaction. I had my single piece of identification out - my driver's license - but he never even glanced at it. "Where do you live?" "Kansas. No wait, I was born in Kansas," I laughed nervously. "I live in Colorado." "Where are you going?" "To the falls." "Where did you spend the night last night?" I faltered. I can't ever remember the name of the hotel on the fly. "Rochester." "Where are you staying tonight?" "Rochester." I didn't offer New York; either Rochester isn't a Canadian city to which one might walk from Niagara Falls, Ontario, or he was able to supply the US state himself. No matter. Satisfied that I didn't pose a threat to any Canadians, he waved me through.

I emerged into a formal garden, with low sculptural hedges, terraced with granite down to street level. This was quite a change from the American park, where the landscaping is more organic. The British influence was apparent; I had stepped into a formal nineteenth-century British estate garden, although facing an icon of the North American landscape.

The Canadians have built stout granite walls between the street and the precipice of the gorge. I found them to be a more substantial barrier to pitching over the edge, although they are perched right on the edge. From here, the majesty of the American falls was now apparent. The American falls seem too be the more stable of the two, with talus at the foot of the falls. The American Falls carry only about 10% of the water in the "river", and so the volume is not enough to carve out a plunge pool. Although erosion happens here, the American Falls are comparatively stable.

The Canadian Falls - Horseshoe Falls - is a completely different cataract. Carrying the vast majority of the Niagara's water, Horseshoe is retreating rapidly toward Lake Erie. Since the end of the last ice age, 12,500 years ago, the falls have moved seven miles south. In the 328 years since European "discovery", the falls have retreated 1280 feet, and they of course continue to move, although at a reduced pace; hydroelectric diversion has reduced the flow by half. Nevertheless, the falls will eventually be reduced to rapids between Lakes Erie and Ontario.

But for now, Niagara attracts millions of people a year, a large percentage of whom were at the Falls today. I am surprised at the number of visitors who are neither US nor Canadian citizens. Indians, Arabs, and Oriental peoples seem to predominate (blacks are noticeably missing). I surmised that the large number of Indian visitors account for the great number of Indian restaurants that I noticed driving out of the park. Is it that we Americans take for granted the jewels of our own landscapes, leaving the visitation to those for whom "Niagara" and "Yellowstone" have for generations been symbolic of our continent? Why are places that define our culture visited more by foreigners than by ourselves? Is it simply that the dollar is weak? Or - in spite of what seems to be prevailing opinion abroad - is America still seen as the pinnacle of cool?

The hike over to the brink of the Canadian Falls was every bit as far as it looked. Dressed in my usual black attire, I was beginning to get pretty hot. I was not disappointed in the destination, however - except that it seemed that there were constantly at least 300 people milling around me. The shots from the brink of the falls - they call it Table Rock - only begin to describe the effect. The water is deep greenish blue, from the dissolved minerals contained in it. It's flat just below your feet, before it plunges over the edge. The mists rise from the invisible depths, cooling the air wherever they blow.

Of course, where ever there are tourists there is money, and where ever tourists might be persuaded to part with that money there are gift shops. Table Rock is no exception; in fact it could be argued that Niagara is the great grandmother of marketing to tourists. The park building at Table Rock had not one gift shop, but two - with much the same merchandise of course. I did pick up a few items for the folks at home (well, the maple sugar candy is for me) managing to avoid the really cheezy stuff.

I was tired, and becoming in need of sustenance - not so much that I was going to wait in line for a soda at inflated prices though. So I decided to head back to Rainbow Bridge and see if my country was going to let me back in. There was a tiny bit of doubt, since I had only a driver's license and neither passport nor birth certificate in my possession. My right foot had decided to become painful for no apparent reason too.

I did take a couple of ganders over the edge on the way back and discovered a rainbow in the mist below the walkway. I am struck by the resemblance between the rainbow and the bow of Rainbow Bridge. Yes, that's the bridge I had yet to arrive at and to cross in the picture. The American Falls are on the right.

I was kind of glad to be able duck into a candy shop that was nearly empty of tourists for a soda, but not so happy when she charged me $1.78 US for a bottle of diet Coke. I crossed to the English garden and took advantage of the shade for a few minutes. I had started to feel somewhat sunburned, and was pretty eager to get out of the sun.

I climbed the granite stairs to the Canadian Customs house and opened the doors to be faced with a couple of turnstiles and a bank of change machines. No Canadian officers as expected. And a sign that read "PAY TOLL TO U.S.A." - I thought I got the entire placard in the picture. Dang! In any case, the government of Canada was chargingg us to leave! Either that or the US government was charging us to enter! This must be what is meant when they say that they'll get you coming or going. It seemed quicker to change a dollar rather than to dig for quarters.

After the walk back across the bridge, (I forgot to note earlier that it seems very far down to the water from up there) I entered the US Customs House on the east side of the Niagara Gorge. Here I had to wait in a short line for a couple of Japanese girls who were filling out forms, evidently incorrectly. The customs officer took my driver's license and mumbled something to me. After two tries, he restated the question, "where were you born?" and I was able to infer that he was asking my citizenship. "Oh, citizenship! In the US. I'm a US citizen." I know he mumbled, because he was speaking to me on my left side, and I hear a little better on that side than the right. He typed something into his computer, handed back my license and sent me off, back into the US.

I made a brief stop back at the visitor's center in the New York state park, and selected a route back to Rochester. I had used the New York Thruway on the way west. It's a good highway, and the toll was $3 including the Niagara River bridge. But I wanted a more local experience going back. I headed north on the Robert Moses State Parkway, which passes many historical and geographical points of note. They all looked interesting, but I was simply too tired to care. I would like to go to Fort Niagara State Park, which is rich in history, but another time.

Western New York is a fruit-growing region par excellence. The southern shore of Lake Ontario creates a unique climate for raising fruit. I stopped at a couple roadside stands and picked up locally grown apples, peaches and tomatoes. As I was trying to make selections at one stop, a lady thrust a huge peach into my hand. It's hard to shop and eat a two-handed peach at the same time but it was worth it. It was the first thing of substance that I'd had since breakfast, and I really appreciated it.

I hadn't planned on dining out, since I had made a kettle of soup last night, and needed to eat on it. It was almost 7 before I got to eat, but it had been a good day. The payoff has been made for this trip - tomorrow it's back to the really hard week of the installation. But I have apples and peaches to take with me to work - tasteful reminders of the weekend.

In which the payoff is collected

Weekends are the payoff for spending two weeks at a time away from home.

The last time I worked in upstate New York it was January. January is not an ideal time to visit Buffalo. Anticipating as much, I brought along plenty of sewing; we were preparing to go to Estrella and I was using all available time to insure that we were clothed at the War. It's been a while since I loaded up the sewing machine. I've resigned myself to doing what I've always really wanted to do - I'm seeing the county.

Of course, Saturdays are often a slow start. After a week of dealing with jet lag and the trials of training for 7 hours a day, I usually sleep late on Saturday morning. This morning was typical. I got up late and discovered that the "partly sunny" morning was less than "partly". In no hurry, I showered and dressed, and made it downstairs just in time to make myself a waffle for breakfast.

One of the cool things about "seeing the country" is bringing back pictures of my adventures. However, for as long as I've been working in this traveling job, I've been camera-less. Well, not exactly - I have bought a couple of 35mm cameras for traveling, but they both proved worth less than the purchase price, and I never got even one roll of film out of either of them. This weekend, I'm expecting to do some things that I really want to share with the folks back home, and so Chris and I had been discussing the possibility of getting me a camera. So, this morning I picked up a Kodak C533 from Best Buy. It was $149, which was a little higher than I wanted to pay, but it seems to be worth the money.

What I didn't buy was a SD memory card, since we've got a collection of those from the Olympus with the fried power card. Of course that means that I'm fairly limited in taking pictures. I can get 11 3.1 mp pictures on the internal memory - I'm going to have to take the laptop with me to dump pictures frequently this weekend. I just couldn't bring myself to spend $60 on a gig of memory, knowing that MicroCenter back home is selling a gig of memory for under $20.

With memory-recorder in pocket, I hit the highway. The Lake Ontario State Parkway. The Parkway is a four-lane highway that parallels the edge of the lake for most of the New York shoreline. Commercial vehicles are prohibited, probably as much for maintaining the character of the highway as for the low bridge clearance. Whether the low clearances are by chance or design, I don't know. I was struck by the extreme quiet of the lakeshore - the Parkway had very little traffic, and whenever I parked the car, the peace was absolute.

Of course, I never seem to have any cash on me, and so I had to bypass the Hamlin Beach State Park. I finally stopped at Point Breeze, where there is a park along the river that feeds into Lake Ontario. The park rests largely under the Parkway; the Parkway runs on bridges high above the river and park. The park rests on the east bank of Oak Orchard Creek, which is larger than most Colorado rivers. The creek runs fifty feet below the park, where a long line of docks host maybe 50 or 60 boats, both private and municipal. Steps connect the park with the docks at the edge of the creek.

This seems to be a point of entry into the US from Canada. A Customs office is located near the steps, and the official nature of the location is underscored by the presence of several police boats in the docks. Yet, the park seems dedicated to the people who would use it, and the docks are populated by boats of all sizes, descriptions, and values. Although the Saturday afternoon seemed remarkably quiet - few people were out and about - three boats cruised by as I stood on the dock. There were two small powerboats and one large yacht. The boats seem to run in a channel on the east side of the creek; the west side is shallow as evidenced by the sandhill crane fishing over there. Small streams tumble over the brink and splash into the creek. One opposite the steps down into the creek's gorge was particularly noisy.

After visiting the park, I turned south toward route 104. I wanted to see some upland landscape. I had suspected that I might find a bit of fresh produce out in the countryside, and I was not disappointed. Of course, without any cash on me, I didn't get to buy anything. I stopped at Hurd Orchards, on the county line just west of Rochester.

Hurd Orchards is a farm and market. I can only describe Hurd Orchards as enchanting. I expected a fruit stand. I was surprised to find home-made preserves, tea, dried flowers and baked goods. And a dozen or more varieties of apples. Peaches. Tomatoes. They serve a lunch menu in the barn, which opens out to the cherry orchard. The farm values conservation and sustainable practices, maintains sections of the property for wildlife habitat and forestry, uses very few chemicals, and favors physical barriers against animals who enjoy the same fruits that the people do. It's a beautiful slice of the county, and seems to be very livable.

I reflected on the beauty that was a part of Colorado's attraction for us. There are some very beautiful places in Colorado. The beauty of many of those places depends upon the fact that very few people have had an impact on the landscape. This means that the beautiful places where people do live are few - few enough that the demand is controlled by astronomical real estate prices. I find western New York to be beautiful, but it is a different sort of beauty than the majesty of the Rockies. The landscape here is what the mind's eye evokes when one thinks about the American countryside. There is a palpable connection to our cultural history as Americans. This is what the 19th century agricultural landscape looks like.

I have to admit that I can see myself living in upstate New York. Being here in September, I don't know what is in store for the summers or the winters, but I really love late summer here. I can imagine cozy Christmases - I would guess that the instance of a white Christmas is somewhat higher than in Denver - and sparkling autumns. Maybe I'm just getting old and nostalgic. Besides, the median house value is $140,000 less than Denver.

The afternoon was getting on, and I had decided that I was going to make a pot of soup for supper, and I wanted a nap. Of course, this made supper rather late, but after a trip to the super market, I put together a rather nice seafood bisque. I wasn't able to buy seafood in small enough quantities to make just a single batch. This of course means that I have soup for the next three nights. Par for the course.

Tomorrow, I have plans to go to Niagara Falls. We'll see how this goes, since I'm carrying neither
passport nor birth certificate. Hopefully US customs will be having a good day.

In which a raincoat is required

I seem to have made a fateful mistake.

I didn't bring my raincoat.

I've been in Rochester, New York for 5 days; it's rained for four, with seemingly increasing intensity. Driving in this morning was decidedly unpleasant; rain for Easterners may be as lunacy-provoking as for us Westerners. Visibility was reduced on the interstate, but at least people were driving well - it's that long stretch of Route 15 that was nutty. People stopped in the left lane for no reason; backups for no reason; drivers posturing for position despite unfavorable traffic (and weather!) conditions.

I did bring my fleece jacket, expecting to need it at night. And an umbrella which I seem to always leave in the place I don't need it. Newspapers make good umbrellas, I think.

Four days of rain is somewhat a novelty to this Westerner. Being a 30-year resident of Kansas has made it not so novel - it's beginning to get downright depressng.

In other news, I realized that this is the Rochester from which Lynn and Michele hail. I put the pieces together yesterday. Duh.

In which the routine returns

The weeks before Thress Stags were hectic, crazed, and productive. They were also completely focused on two things - Evan in school and Three Stags. It was a relief to be home for the month of August.

Both projects have been fraught with challenges - it seems that very little was easy with either kindergarten or Three Stags. The hard physical work ended once we got home on Monday, but now the hard parenting has begun.

I don't think it was that difficult to get kids established in school when I was Evan's age. We thought that once school began, the routine would be something of a relief, but the routine has turned out to require a lot more maintenance that we would have believed.

It seems that our kid is a little immature for kindergarten. No wonder, he's a boy, and he's 10 months younger than most of the kids - his birthday is in May. He's not yet interested in reading (we wonder how that could happen in our house) and his academic skills were somewhat below the average for incoming kindergarteners according to the baseline tests. (The baseline tests seem to be somewhat inflated from the reality of our childhoods.) So, we've embarked on a literacy crash course for Evan. It's requiring a lot of dicipline, mostly on the part of the adults.

Evan gets home at 4:00, and he has an hour of literacy stuff - Leap Pad DVDs, Leapster games, etc. - before supper at 5:00. Then more literacy stuff, like worksheets, practice writing, or games, until Bath at 7:00. In bed by 8:00. In the morning, if there's time between tooth brushing and school, he can watch educational DVDs.

It's working - he's really picking up the letters, sounds and concepts, so I know his brain's ready for it. But his butt's not. He can't hardly sit still. He can't concentrate on anything more than a couple of minutes. He is, in a word, immature. This means that a lot of what we're teaching isn't just letters and words, but how to be a student. It's taxing on all of us.

Imagine my relief when I got to turn attention to traveling 1300 miles east to Rochester, NY. Airline travel and two weeks dealing with reluctant trainees seems like a walk in the park compared to pushing a reluctant kindergartener toward literacy. I work, I eat, I watch TV or read, I sleep, I eat, I work, I may shop a little.... Yes, it's away from my bed (and all that means) for far too long, but this roI woutine is a known quantity, and thus easier in so many ways. In a week, I'll feel differently, but right now, I'm pretty content where I'm at.