
I've also been checking into the "ideal job" -- I'll say more about that in a minute, but first, a tangent. "For those who came in late..." (as the film The Phantom starts -- I love it by the way -- such a bad film, but a sweet story) this summer, after my retirement, I told people I would hang out in Chicago and look for the perfect job, and if I did not find it, I'd head out around the world: the trip I am now on. Well, somehow the job did not manage to fall into my lap (as I am sure you are aware because I am -- theoretically -- going around the world), but the idea of it did. The week before I left (or thereabouts) I had lunch with a friend who suggested exhibit design. It's perfect! it combines art and science (in a science museum), education, and my continued interest in learning new things! Unfortunately, I had already given up my apartment and possessions, and bought a ticket to NY, etc. So, it remained an idea. Until now (sort of). Vanessa has contacts in the museum field, and one (at the Historical Society) has offered to let me shadow and/or participate in putting together an exhibit. Very Cool. If it works out. If it comes together I may be here longer than I thought -- though I've already been here longer than I thought -- so I'm not sure what that says. (This is a photo of the lemon tree that grows just outside their kitchen window. It has the best lemons I have ever tasted -- "almost like fruit!" and not a bit like the song.)


I miss everyone in Chicago (or returning to Chicago, or nowhere near Chicago). Enjoy the weather where ever you are and have a good, happy holiday -- whatever you chose to celebrate or ignore!

And finally, for real this time, I just found this quote that I copied from somewhere at some time. Just a reminder...
For if every true love affair can feel like a journey to a foreign country, where you can't quite speak the language and you don't know where you're going and you're pulled ever deeper into the inviting darkness, every trip to a foreign country can be a love affair, where you're left puzzling over who you are and whom you've fallen in love with. All the great travel books are love stories, by some reckoning...and all good trips are, like love, about being carried out of yourself and deposited in the midst of terror and wonder. -- Pico Iyer, "Why We Travel"