Category Archives: Barbara Pattee

Our Book (Part 1 of 3)

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“The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.” St. Augustine

 

My husband, Roger, and I embarked on Holland America’s Panama Cruise after a short Sunday flight to Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Our first day was spent relaxing, eating, and playing Scrabble. On Monday, we docked at the cruise line’s private island, Half Moon Cay in the Bahamas, where we were treated to a delicious buffet lunch. They served ribs, grilled chicken, hamburgers, hot dogs, mac and cheese, a variety of salads, fruit, lemonade, and cookies. We could also purchase soft drinks and liquor.

 

While at sea on Tuesday and Wednesday, we socialized with many fellow travelers playing trivia in groups of six people, listening to music, and line dancing. Playing games with the passengers was a fun way to meet new people. At dinner, we met a delightful couple with whom we spent time telling stories about our various travel experiences, our children, and our grandchildren. They enjoy long biking trips as well as cruises. Roger also started teaching me how to play cribbage.

 

Thursday, we took our first excursion to the National Aviary on Isla Baru about 45 minutes from Cartagena, Colombia. We saw some of the most beautiful birds I’ve ever seen. More than 138 species represented the thousands of birds including the Harpy Eagle, the toucan Caribbean, the Pink Flamingos, and the Crane Corona. The Aviary supports three systemic eco environments – rainforest, coast, and desert – to accommodate the wide variety of permanent exhibits.

 

The next morning, we arose early to see an awesome man-made wonder of the world. We transited the Panama Canal, sometimes referred to as “The Ditch.” The engineering marvel of this canal can’t be overstated. As we went through the canal heading west on the right, we passed a huge cargo ship crossing the canal going east on the left. We marveled at the coordination of the raising and lowering of the water, the movement of the ships, and the “mules” which guide ships through the lock chambers. Mules are locomotives so named because they replaced the many mules which originally helped guide the ships. While many marveled at the engineering, I marveled at who first thought of this process.

 

After dinner, I attended an intriguing 2001 Irish-American spy thriller. The movie, The Tailor of Panama, starred Pierce Brosnan, Geoffrey Rush, and Jamie Lee Curtis.

 

Saturday was spent at sea. Roger played pickleball. I participated in a line dance class. We both played games, socialized, and enjoyed the delicious cuisine.

 

Our Sunday excursion at Puntarenas, Costa Rica was a Tropical Mangrove River Cruise where we saw crocodiles, macaws, herons, and egrets. Sadly, we also saw numerous tires, debris, and building materials that covered part of the landscape due to severe flooding a few years ago. It was interesting to learn that Costa Rica’s major export is technology. In the evening, we participated in Barry from Boston’s sing along.

My 2019 To Do List

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“When at first you don’t succeed, try try again.” — Frederick Maryat

 

In 2018, I resolved to read one book each month, but I came up short reading only nine. I accomplished my second resolution of entering a writing contest. I didn’t win, but it was worth the effort to prove I could complete a story by the deadline.

 

My most ambitious resolution of writing a minimum of 5,000 words each week for three months to complete my 65,000-word manuscript also came up short. I wasn’t even close. I realized my problem is that I tend to edit as I go. This prevents me from getting my rough draft completed.

 

This year I’m writing a To Do List instead of a List of Resolutions.

1) Read a minimum of one book a month.

2) Write 600 words a day without editing.

3) Organize my clothes closet by the second week of January.

4) Organize my linen closet by the end of January.

5) Organize the pictures on my computer and delete the unwanted ones.

 

What is your New Year’s list of things you wish to accomplish?

Just Google It, Grammie

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I miss the days of finding information in my family’s World Book Encyclopedia. Using these reference books to complete a homework assignment took much longer than it should have. Why? Because I’d continue reading about whatever subject I’d accidently run across while looking for the information I needed to complete my report.

 

As an adult, I wanted a more up-to-date set of encyclopedias and purchased the Encyclopedia Americana © 1986. For years I’d make time to grab one of the books at random, open any page, and read. I learned about a variety of plants, researched foreign leaders, and studied the solar system.

 

To research a topic now, I simply google it as my granddaughter suggested. There’s no longer the strong possibility of inadvertently discovering something quite different from my original topic of interest. Now my concern is what to do with my old set of encyclopedias. The libraries don’t need them. Used bookstores won’t take them. Modern families have the internet at their fingertips, and I hate to send them to the landfill.

 

What do you suggest I do with my encyclopedias?

This Is Us Has Returned

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The television show, The Paley Center Salutes This Is Us, debuted with much fanfare one week prior to the return of my favorite TV show, This Is Us. The Paley show discussed the many layers of the characters’ lives including the birth of triplets, one of whom was stillborn. The Caucasian parents’ adoption of an abandoned African American baby who was born the same day makes for many awkward moments in their upbringing.

The time-tripping story takes you throughout their lives, often in the same episode. Viewers must watch carefully for clues to which era is being portrayed. The Paley Center program introduced the creators, writers, directors, and actors of this popular dramatic, multigenerational series. The program revealed insight into how they were able to portray the intertwining of the characters’ complicated lives from childhood to adulthood.

The writers worked diligently to create a believable family drama and allowed the actors to have some input into how their characters evolved. One heart wrenching example involved one actor’s disclosure that his father died when he was ten years old. This allowed the actor to use the impact of his loss in a compelling reaction to the death of his actor father during a significant scene.

The popularity of this series prompted People Magazine to publish an entire issue devoted to the complete guide to the show. Each character is described and featured with beautiful color pictures. Snippets of storylines are explained and hints of scenes to come are revealed. For devoted fans of This Is Us, this magazine is a keeper.

​Some fans of the show go online after each episode to discuss the numerous story lines and how they are affected by them. Many people have said they relate to the characters’ problems and are touched by the way characters handle each situation.  

To understand this compelling, multigenerational, multiracial story, watch the series from the beginning. Get a copy of the magazine. Have your tissue handy. If you are already a fan, please tell me how this show affects you.

The Joys of Travel

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The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.” – Unknown

“You only have a few magnets on your U. S.  map,” my boyfriend, Roger, said to me after one of our dates. “We’ll have to fill in the rest.”

He captured my heart with that statement. We married soon afterward and enjoyed traveling every year. I removed all the magnets that represented my solo trips because the map now chronicled our lives together. Our travels included visiting family members, often returning to the same states multiple times. We’ve joyed trips to Canada, cruises to the Caribbean, the Bahamas and a trip to Australia and New Zealand. However, our main goal was to visit all 50 states. During the ensuing years, we managed to add new states to the map.

On our most recent trip, Roger and I planned to fly from Missouri to Sioux Falls, South Dakota to spend one night and part of a day and then drive to Rapid City, South Dakota. Our late evening flight was delayed causing us to miss our connection in Minneapolis-St. Paul. Delta Airlines gave us a voucher to stay at a hotel in Minneapolis. We each received an emergency pouch containing a toothbrush, toothpaste, deodorant, and a few other essentials. In addition, we were given stand-by boarding passes for a flight out the next morning. One catch-all the flights were completely booked giving us an almost nil chance of flying out the next day.

We returned to the airport early the next morning with hopes of taking the first flight out. Passengers arrived at the gate taking their rightful place in line. With only about six minutes left to board, our names were called. With a sigh of relief, we boarded the plane. We landed in Sioux Falls around noon and immediately began our five-hour drive to Rapid City. When we arrived, we were surprised to see thousands of motorcyclists.

One of the residents explained that the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally is held annually in Sturgis, South Dakota for ten days during the first full week of August. More than a half million people were in attendance.

Our goal was to visit the Mt. Rushmore National Memorial and Custer State Park the next morning. The massive sculpture at Mt. Rushmore of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln is impressive. In Custer’s State Park, we saw a bison lumbering along on the side of the road. I got a great picture.

To stay on schedule, we left for our nearly nine-hour drive to Jackson, Wyoming hoping to arrive before the check-in desk closed at midnight. Hotel key retrieval arrangements were made just in case. On our long drive, we missed a deer by about four feet. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a picture because I was too startled.

We saw a bull elk which was too far away to get a decent picture. We arrived at our hotel with ten minutes to spare and collapsed for a long, comfortable night sleeping.

The next day, we toured the city of Jackson in Wyoming’s Jackson Hole valley taking in the charming western style features. One of the most interesting sights was the Jackson Hole’s Elk Antler Arch which presents a perfect selfie-photo op. I toured the Jackson Hole Historical Society and Museum, and we took a stagecoach ride during our visit. We drove through the Grand Teton National Park. The Grand Tetons, known as fault-rock mountains, occupy a majority of the Jackson Hole valley where people enjoy mountaineering, camping, and fishing.

Our drive through Yellowstone National Park, the first national park in the world seemed disappointing at first because we didn’t see any bison. We saw elk, donkeys, and shortly before the end of our journey, we finally we saw bison, thousands of bison. We took pictures of them running in the distance, fighting over a female, and nursing baby bison called red calves. The bison crossed the road, sometimes stopping and causing an hour and a half traffic jam. Drivers were warned to stay away from the wildlife, but sometimes the wildlife came to them. We took pictures of the bison, some up close and too personal.

There is a difference between bison and buffalo. Although we use the terms interchangeably, the American bison is native to North and South American and Europe while the buffalo resides in Africa and Asia.

Our trip to South Dakota and Wyoming completed our bucket list of visiting all 50 states. Our map is now complete. Perhaps we should add to our bucket list, “Fill in a world map.” What do you think?