Peggy's Christmas letter 2005

Notes from 2005

February 2005: As a result of taking Rev. John Morehouse’s sermon-writing class last year, I led a service at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Loudoun, sermonizing on “Healing Happens”. (If you look hard on the church website at http://www.uuloudoun.org/, you can find the text of the sermon). The service and the sermon went really well, and I got all kinds of strokes, hugs and positive reinforcement—hmm… I gotta do that again! Now, I just have to get it together to write my next sermon, titled “Just do it!” (originally not intended to be ironic)…. As part of that service in February, with my best singing buddies from the church choir, we sang Vermont singer-songwriter Rachel Bissex’s song “In White Light”…. We found out later that Rachel died of breast cancer that same morning, at around the time we sang her song… At the end of the song, Rachel’s lyrics go like this “It’s time to go/I hope you know/Moon will see you safely home/and as you walk this road alone/she will guide you in white light/in white light…..” I feel very blessed to have known her. She was a great lady with a beautiful spirit.

March, Spring break, Bill and I spent a week in an amazing cabin with an incredible Smoky Mountain view, higher up the same mountain where my land is located (near Cherokee, NC). In late March it was still winter, still bits of snow blowing hear and there, and pretty cold and dark on the land itself, down on north-facing shoulder of Blackrock Mountain. The good news is that the small, cleared, house-site that we call the greenhouse flat (further down my ravine) DOES get lots of sun, with a big rock wall of the mountainside protecting the northeast side, absorbing the winter sun and making it the warmest spot on the 6.3 acres. It also warmed up down in the trout streams in the National Park, and Bill caught some big ‘uns. Hiked on up to the top ‘my’ mountain (Blackrock Mtn.), and were rewarded with a stunning, 360 view of the Smokies. We also hiked around a proposed mountain retreat development, about an hour farther north but still in the Great Smoky Mountains, on Big Laurel Creek near the fun town of Hot Springs, NC. This new land faces due south, and has trout stream access. It’s not as high in altitude, but still scenic. It’ll be a much more pleasant place in winter. Several visits later, in September, I bought a second piece of Smoky Mountain land, this time at Big Laurel Creek. Check out the bicycle parked in front of the Steady Eddy coffee shop, not far from my new land. Think there might be some aging hippie/river rat/counterculture types hiding in them thar hills?

April, 2005, trip to Murray, Kentucky to visit Bill. In the middle of semester-ending grading frenzy, Professor Bill had little free time, and it was clear to me that there’s not much going on at Murray that attracts me (except Bill!). We looked at little houses for sale, and Bill even made an offer on one, which turned out to have deal-breaking, serious foundation problems. He’s pretty entrenched at Murray State University (tenure= guaranteed job for life, and it’s even a mostly fun and occasionally rewarding job). Still struggling with how to find a way to be together during the school year. I remain at my happiest when spending summers and school breaks with Bill.

May 4, 2005, Alexander Lee Fallon, my grandson Alex, was born. Expecting a normal birth and baby (although the caesarian was anticipated because the baby hadn’t turned around), Alex’s mom and dad, Michele and Elias, as well as all the rest of us—grandparents, aunts, uncles, etc. found ourselves visiting Alex in the neonatal intensive care unit, trying to smile at him and hold his hand through the holes in the side of the incubator, while he was hooked up on the ventilator and many other tubes. That was a hard time; unsure of his future, touched by his bravery while dealing with our own fears. Alex did survive and is thriving today, although he is still breathing with the help of a machine that pushes air into his lungs through a trach tube in his throat. His diagnosis is congenital myopathy – which is really just a description of the fact that there’s something wrong with his muscles – why or what is wrong with his muscles, whether a cure will be found, and whether he will continue to improve significantly on his own -- is all unclear. He went home from the hospital after about 6 weeks, and continues to grow longer, gain weight, develop and improve in tiny but noticeable increments. The best news is that he is bright-eyed and responsive, quite aware and alert and full of personality. He’s got lots of long curly dark hair, has normal facial muscles and some fine motor skills in his hands and feet (he can hold your hand and squeeze back.) Recently, he has learned to vocalize quite a bit, but he seldom uses his new loud voice to complain—it’s more like he’s saying ‘Hey! Hey! Hey!”, because he loves to hear himself, and enjoys this new skill he’s learned. Alex is going to a special physical therapy program where they’re teaching him to use a proximity switch—he moves his hand, and a fun animation and music starts. When it stops, he has to move his hand again to start the next song—and, at 7 months old, he learned how to do it right away (genius—didn’t I tell you?)

I am very proud of and so impressed by my son and his wife, and what strong and wonderful parents they are. They are totally confident that they can take care of Alex, give him whatever he needs, and love him. Sure enough, they take wonderful care of him, and he is thriving in response.

you’d like to join Alex’s online ‘care-page’ updates, send me an email at mlfallon@aol.com, and I’ll send you an invitation.

I made a lot of trips to Pittsburgh to see Alex over the summer and fall. Mostly, I stayed with my daughter, Meadow & her husband, Dora, in the loft of their great old apartment in funky, urban Bloomfield. Dora is still cooking at Silky's Pub, right down the street, and getting great reviews in the local press. Meadow has discovered a great way to use her verbal/writing ability, editing talent and quick keyboarding skill in a job that many of her generation only dream of: she gets to sit in front of a computer watching TV programs all day as a close-captioner. If only she could pick the shows she has to caption...

Late June – early July, Camping in the Great Smokies: see my posting, below for more photos and details. Camped on my land for the first time, tucked snugly under the extra-large plastic tarp to keep the drenching downpours from sneaking into the tent, listened to the thunder rolling over the mountains and the burbling of my very own brook, close encounter with clever raccoon (no bears, but did see bear scat in a wild, high valley with a pristine trout stream not far from my land in the National Park), had some great trout adventures, sat in quiet meditation beside many splendid trout streams, drove my new Toyota pick'emup truck, up the very rough road into Big Laurel Creek, confirming my need for a tough 4 wheel truck and (yee-haw: what fun!) discovering that I really do love driving up and down the side of a mountain on an almost impassible mountain road. Checked out the brew pub/local music scene in Asheville-- and loved it. Bonded with the town of Hot Springs, a confluence of Appalachian trail hikers (the AT goes through the town), a post-hippie, post-luxury scene at the Hot Springs themselves, whitewater rafting on the French Broad River, with a very welcoming local population who happily embrace all the tourism engendered by wilderness adventure. Gotta find a way to move down there.

July 05: A week camping at Cape Henlopen with dear church friends and Bill. It was hot, almost unbearably so, but, still, totally wonderful. That's Bill in the chair, Julia Faber on the boogie board, and Chris & Dene under the umbrella.

May - August 05: While spending the summer with me in Purcellville, Bill spent many days sitting with his father in a hospital and nursing home near Mt. Vernon, as his father’s health declined. Col.William Schell passed away on August 7

at the age of 89. I’m glad for them both that they could spend so much time together near the end.

August 12-22: My adventures in Germany (see posting below with lots of photos ). Bill & I flew together to Frankfurt, and explored Regensburg, where he was staying to teach international affairs for the fall semester to the Murray State Univ. kids on an exchange program at the University of Regensburg. We also explored other Bavarian sites, including Bayarische National Park (up against the Czech border), and the charming ‘twin’ towns of Garmisch and Parten-Kirchen at the foot of the German Alps. Took the cable car to the highest point in Germany, the Zugspitz. We stayed in a really old castle at Harburg, and the another night in an old hotel in the medieval town center of Gelnhausen (near Frankfurt). Had a wonderful time. Hated coming home to my job and leaving Bill there. He had a great time, all semester. With only a handful of students (as opposed to his normal 150 or so), he had plenty of time to travel and record the local color in words and photos. Check his blog at http://www.regensburgblog.blogspot.com/. Take a look at the archived stuff for some interesting insights and unexpected linkages in art history as he toured museums in Berlin, Amsterdam and Prague.

October 3, 2005: My son Elias turned 30. This turned out to be harder on me & Larry than him, I think. For his birthday, we all went out to his favorite brewpub, the Church Brewworks, in a beautiful old brick building, in a de-consecrated church not far from where Meadow and Dora live. (And, where do they keep the big brew-vats? On the altar, of course..) Alex came, too -- his first brewpub. He did well, was especially fascinated by the high ceilings. The group shot, left to right: Chuck, Michele, Pat, Susan (Larry's fiancee) & Larry Then, Meadow, Elias & Alex (he's the little guy)..

All year, 2005:

Still working at netASPx. It’s… well, not that exciting, to be honest. 80% of my job is the boring stuff I’ve been doing forever but which needs to be done (people would notice if they didn’t get paid). 35% is the more challenging and interesting HR director stuff that I wish I could spend more time on. Yeah, that does add up to 115%, and that’s part of the problem. But, I do enjoy my work and my co-workers have been part of my life for so long that they're old friends.

Dog update: Chewie and Lila are 11 and 9 in human years – ancient, in retriever years, becoming crotchety, arthritic, demanding, requiring expensive medications. No major personality changes – but, whatever they were before, they are now more so. Chewbacca is feeling pretty good since he’s on a new special nutritional supplement and his hair has grown back. He’s gentle, loving, worries a bit, smart and quick to discern patterns, and still vocalizes like a wookie. Lila is still relentlessly cheerful, and tries hard to be adorable to me (the alpha female) but sometimes she is scarily aggressive at other dogs on leashes, sometimes nasty to Chewie (because he acquiesces), and sometimes terribly anxious. The other day the hot sun sent melting snow sheets sliding off the tin roof, and the resulting booming noises sent Lila into a panic, whereupon she tried to hide in the corner behind the Christmas tree (sending the tree sideways). (Thankfully, nothing broke.) Never mind that we’ve heard that noise of snow sliding off the roof frequently each winter since 1998 – it still terrifies her. Maybe I need to increase the dose on her anti-anxiety drugs (unfortunately, I'm not kidding about that...).

Purcellville update: new houses all around my little old house, a big new church on the crest of the hill behind me, blotting out the sunrise. On top of that, a huge construction project going on literally next door, as an old house was demolished and a big new road is being put in along the driveway right-of-way, to connect the historic Carver School with 20^th Street as part of the old school’s renovation as a senior center & events center. The noise and mess are getting really old. I have to keep telling myself that my property value will improve greatly as a result of this.

Church update: still active in the Unitarian Universalist church. Wonderful new friends keep walking in the door, wonderful old friends there have now been part of my life for almost 7 years. The community is wonderful, supportive, challenging, and my spirit feels well-nourished and growing. Still doing too much committee work, but at last I got someone else to do the newsletter (yay, Mike!), and that has helped enormously. Through some brilliant work by our volunteer historian Leslie Wright, we got our historic building placed on the National Register Of Historic Places. Leslie wrote an amazing sermon about the history of the building (it was built in 1880 by African Americans who had been enslaved at nearby Oatlands Plantation). She invited the descendents of the families who had built the little chapel to attend a special service to dedicate the historic designation plaque. Those descendents came, dozens of them, and they were happy to witness to who they were and what they remembered of the church (the Mt. Olive AME congregation had merged with another congregation years before UUCL bought the building). Let me tell you, there was some serious Jesus praisin’ going on that day, and all I can say is “Amen!” It was quite moving.

Rev. John Morehouse left our church to move out to a church in California. We miss him terribly, but we are lucky to have found almost-Rev. Amy DeBeck She's gonna be just great, I can tell.
We gave Rev/ John a good send-off: see photos (that's Barbara & Mike, saluting, and Bill, John & Peggy) .

One of my favorite things is singing in the church choir, although the choir didn’t have the best year ever, having lost our talented director Ted a year ago. Been singing a lot with Bill, too, and with my friends, Barbara and Karen, and anyone else who can strum a guitar. My name is Peggy, and I’m a harmoniholic. The trouble with being addicted to singing harmony is that you can’t sing it with yourself in the shower—it takes two voices to make the magic happen.

Loudoun County, Virginia, is exploding with McMansions, and I’m no longer so certain that it’s one of the most beautiful and pleasant places on this planet to live. However, I have some great friends and a wonderful community here, and I will hate to leave that when the time comes. (And, that time will come, since if I stay here I’d never be able to afford to retire, even if the real estate bubble IS bursting as I write.)… Still doing tai chi at the community center, and walking daily, but struggling with fascist (or is that fasciitis?) feet… For Christmas, I’m heading to Pittsburgh to be with my kids, their spouses, my ex (Larry, a.k.a. Granddude), and best-grandchild Alex. I hope you and yours have a warm and peaceful holiday! May the coming year bring you peace, joy and happy trails,

--Peggy