Reality Check

We’ve been having some brilliant fall weather this week, so I saddled up the bike, strapped on my camera and went for a nice ride out into the dunes.

It wasn’t a hard ride today, but more of a slow meandering cruise. It was quiet and peaceful and crisp, so when I happened along this small memorial, I decided to stop and sit for a while. It isn’t the first cold granite marker that I’ve seen while wandering among the dunes - unfortunately, they are almost common along this part of the coast. The inscription on this one is short and simple. A brief slogan about freedom, then nothing more than a date and the number of dead.

1945. 9 Bodies.

The memorial doesn’t say who the people were or why they were killed. Dutch Resistance Fighters? Jews? Gypsies? Gays? In some respects, it really doesn’t matter.

As I sat, I replayed in my head any one of the grainy black and white films that could have captured the events that led to these memorials being placed here. We’ve all seen these films, it doesn’t matter which era, or war, or conflict, or police action that they are from. They are all abstract footage that we quickly and simply label as ‘terrible’ or ‘horrific’, then we move on.

But today, I sat in the grass on the edge of this small depression and allowed myself to think about what happened here and what is happening somewhere else in the world today. For a brief minute, it actually felt real to me.

Funny how that can happen - if you let it.

Hillbillies

Beth and I spent the last three weeks on holiday in America. I have to admit that I wasn’t really looking forward to it this time around. Our agenda for the trip was jam-packed and I worried that it would turn into a near constant scramble to get from point A to point B in time to visit person C and get task D accomplished before needing to purchase item E and then visit person F and on and on and on. What weighed on me most was our goal for shutting down the house in Maryland for winter. The frantic memories of doing that job last year still taunted me and kept my planning off balance.

But aside from Beth’s little “schedule me another 5 minutes at work” incident at the airport on the way in, the trip couldn’t have been better. We started out up in Williamsport with Beth’s family to celebrate her pap’s birthday. We think he’s 92 - they didn’t keep very good records up on North Mountain back in those days and no one seems to know for sure. Both pap and Virgetta are doing great and as always we enjoyed their old fashioned hospitality, cooking and storytelling - even though someone or something always ends up shot by the end of the story ;-) Happy birthday Pap and Aunt Mandy!

We also spent a few nights with my family in Ligonier. Meg, Timm, and Terri all stopped over and we got out for some nice walks around the property with Sam and the boys. Steve and Jen moved to Philadelphia and were unable to join us, but we still managed a few traditional “Glasstetter” evenings of great food and stimulating conversation where we solve all the world’s problems. Then both Beth’s and my parents joined us at the house in Maryland for a few evenings where we celebrated an early Thanksgiving, complete with turkey, cranberry sauce, and apple pie. My mom cleaned up at a cutthroat game of dominos and we finally got the wood pile cut that the renters left behind over a year ago.

On any trip back to the States, no matter how short or how long, we can always count on good visits with our families. As usual, we were not disappointed this time around and had a great time with everyone.

But the unexpected pleasure of this trip was the time that Beth and I spent alone at our old house up in the mountains. We stocked up the fridge, filled the wine rack, fired up the hot tub, cancelled our planned construction project and just kicked back to relax. Once we were settled in, we only ventured outside the gate to our property one time the entire vacation. Gezellig.

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The forest is crawling with deer this year, more than we have ever seen on our land. We enjoyed filling the feeder with corn and watching them every morning from the hot tub and every evening by the fire.