June 8, 2016
After mom’s final months last winter and spring, I had volunteered as SAG support for the Philly Habitat for Humanity’s Ride For Homes. I enjoyed being with everyone, but I wished I could be on my bike instead of in the van. This year, I committed to do the ride myself, and raise money for the wonderful work that Habitat Philly does in the community. Emily would be riding again for the third time and I looked forward to sharing this experience with her once again. I actually started training last summer and fall, and since the weather had been mild, I road almost once a week all through the winter. Continue reading
It was spring break at Princeton and I arranged to spend 11 days at Forest Refuge. It had been a pretty mild winter so far and I had no weather trouble driving up to Barre where the ground was bare (no snow as in this picture). The temperature was moderate, with cold mornings, when I loved walking out on the beautiful deck after breakfast, and warmer afternoons for crunching through the dead leaves in the woods. 
Today is my sister’s birthday, and I just got home from a wild time we spent together in Las Vegas (well, not so wild really) and a fantastic bike trip in Death Valley. Ever since a meditation buddy told me about a transformational trip he took there, I have always wanted to go – to Death Valley, that is. It seemed fitting to use some of the money left in the joint bank account I had with my mom to finally go, now that she is gone. 
I thought Pierrot would be my farewell performance with the Richardson Chamber Players, but Micheal contrived to let me do one more thing. Does it count if it is not singing? The concert was a collection of things written in or by concentration camp composers and it included a fantastic piece by Victor Ullman that I had actually performed in NYC with Continuum a number of years ago. It was a setting of Rilke’s The Lay of the Love and Death of Cornet Christophe Rilke for solo piano and narrator. A 30 minute tour de force for both the piano and the voice, it was actually not that different from Pierrot. 
I’m writing this much later, but I want to preserve some continuity for what will follow. I think this was my 21st year singing High Holy Days in Wichita. I don’t remember much about the singing, so it was either perfectly fine or perfectly awful, or somewhere in between. I do remember that I went to the Sedgwick County Zoo where I hadn’t visited in many years. 
This summer we were invited to visit Michael’s old Eastman buddy, Michael Coren, while he was in residence at the Vail Festival with the Dallas Symphony. We decided to combine Colorado with a return to Idaho and the Middle Fork of the Salmon River. It was another journey of discovery and healing, grieving and recovery. 
Today is my parents anniversary and they are both gone. Michael and I just returned from Rhode Island and Cape Cod where we took my mom’s ashes to rest in her favorite places. It was just a year ago on Father’s Day that we buried my dad’s ashes in the Temple Beth-El cemetery in Providence. Now, once again on Father’s Day, we gathered with friends and family to reunite my mom with my dad in that lovely spot. Except this time it was pouring! 
A lot of time has gone by since the Richardson Chamber Players performance of Pierrot on March 1, but I wanted to relate the crazy time leading up to it and my thoughts in the aftermath.
Remember how I have remarked that external circumstances so often reflect your inner state of mind? I had arranged to spend nine days at Forest Refuge with Taraniya teaching. The first thing that happened was that the check engine light came on in the outback just as I was getting on the Garden State Parkway. Is this serious? Should I turn around and go back? 
Our travels over Fall Break accomplished a number of things, all having to do with the heart. We started out in Barre at the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies. Remember when I went to seshine with Michael? (see the blog entry from June 17, 2012) Well, he was finally making good on his part of the bargain – to come to something at IMS with me.