Egypt

Saturday, February 19: Day 1. We spent 27 hours in transit and arrived at the hotel at 9:00 pm. The first impression that I had of Cairo was the traffic. Our guide said that on any given day there are 14 million drivers on the road: the monster awakens at 7:00 and doesn’t slow down until midnight. I thought that the traffic was like jazz in that there is a constant improvisation to it; a syncopated rythym. There were large trucks and buses and motorcycles and cars and pedestrians, all competing for space on the road, and none of them seemed to follow any rules. For example, the lane lines were just a suggestion as three to four cars fit into a road designed for two.  The pedestrians crossing the street seemed to be able to “close their eyes and shut their ears” before risking their lives to get from one side to the other.  The motorcycles weaved in and out of traffic and, if there was even three feet between a bus and a concrete barrier, the motorcycles would find a way to squeeze through. The Egyptians seemed to have no fear of death.

Sunday, February 20, Day 2.  It was museum day as we visited the National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, which was the most professional and modern museum with many of the exhibits under glass, and the Egyptian Museum, which was much older but contained a lot of artifacts that Tracey was able to touch. Another highlight of the day was the Alabaster Mosque, which is easily identifiable from all around Cairo because of its size and the beautiful silver coating on its domes. 

Since Americans are viewed as VIPs, we had our own police escort. They had their lights and sirens on the whole time that we drove from museum to museum and they helped guide us through the traffic. Also, we had an armed guard on our bus with us, just in case. All tourism ended in 2011 with the Arab Spring and was only allowed to restart in 2017. I think that we got the VIP treatment because Egypt is hoping to encourage more Americans to visit their country. 

We stayed at the Ritz Carleton and Arab Oil Nations was finishing up a major conference on Sunday.  There were a lot of obviously important men coming in and out of the hotel; one sheik had his own four man security detail, each with guns bulging out from under their jackets. It was chaos out in the front of the hotel as visitors had to get through a security fence, bomb sniffing dogs, police with mirrors on the end of poles to check for explosives under the vehicle, and, of course, xray screening.  It wasn’t all tense, however, because a table of four sheiks, noticing that Tracey is blind, sent over a bowl of Egypt’s finest dates. It was a nice gesture coming from complete strangers.

Monday, February 21, Day 3. We took a 45 minute flight from Cairo to Luxor to see the Temple of Karnak. It was exactly what you would think of when you think of Egyptian temples as it had a huge statue of Ramses II on the inside, along with great columns and broad avenues lined with sphinxes. On the outside of the huge walls were two statues, at about thirty feet high, guarding the entrance to the temple. We saw a light show on the walls of the Temple of Karnak later on in our tour. 

We boarded “The Tosca,” the ship that took us up the Nile, at the end of the day. It is a nice ship with an all wood interior in the party room, lounge, and common areas. Because the Nile had been so low for the past four months, no cruise ship had been able to sail up the river, which explains why the locals were so glad to see us. Little kids cheered us from the shore as we sailed by. It was warm enough for us to relax and sit in the sun on the top deck and, as we passed by one small town after another, we noticed that each town had at least one minerette that would call the Muslims to prayer five times a day. It was eerie and exciting to be immersed in a culture so different from my own. 

Tuesday February 22, Day 4.  Each temple that we visited was special for its own unique reasons. The Dendera Temple demonstrated the Greek and Roman influence on the later Egyptian art and architecture. The Temple of Luxor, located on the site of Thebes, the capital of the New Kingdom, was just like a picture from a world history textbook. It was enchanting and I had to pinch myself to remind myself that I was really in the presence of this awesome piece of work. 

I am beginning to understand the enmity between the Middle East and the West. The Dendera Temple had a beautiful relief stolen from it by the French and one of the two huge obelisks that were stationed in the front of the Temple of Luxor is now located at an intersection in Paris. Several times throughout the tour our guide would say, “this is just a reproduction. You would have to go to the British Museum to see the original!”  It makes me think that we need a new Antiquities Act which would force all countries to send back these treasures to the country of origin. 

At the end of day we took a horse and buggy ride through Luxor. Imagine being in the Cairo traffic, with the motorcycles and pedestrians mixing it up with the cars and buses, and the only thing between you and meeting the Lord is an 18th century buggy. I named our horse “Elmer” because he was but a step from the glue factory. Some of the cars waited until they were right next to the horse before they honked at us to get us off the road. You would think that Elmer would rear up and sprint off somewhere but, since the horse was used up and praying for death, it just put it’s head down and continued on.

Tuesday February 23, Day 5:  The Valley of the Queens was special because the tomb of Nefretari had hieroglyphics that were in full color. Salt deposits in the mud that the temple was buried in helped to protect the art and everything looked brand new. The Valley of the Kings held King Tut’s tomb and Tracey and I had our picture taken next to the famous mummy. The Temple of Hatshepsut was our final stop. This is a popular attraction with the locals because it is so open and accessible. We had to complete with high school and college students for space on the tram that took us from the front entrance to the attraction. One boy chatted me up because he obviously just wanted to practice his English. We were one of a few white people in a sea of Arabs. 

It was on this day that I became tired of everyone asking me for baksheesh, or a tip or a bribe. If you wanted to use the bathroom, for example, an attendant was there asking for baksheesh after he handed you a towel. Guys would run to you when you left the airport, grab the handles on your luggage, roll the bags across the street, and then ask for baksheesh.  If you were at a temple then a local would give you extra information on the attraction and then ask for baksheesh for this little bit of information. It became almost absurd when I tipped a guy at a nice restaurant five dollars. He returned to my table a few minutes later to exchange bills with me because the five dollar bill that I gave him was old and dog eared. It was all about getting as much from the tourist as possible and I quickly grew tired of the hawkers trying to sell us their wares as soon as we entered or left a temple.

Thursday February 24, Day 6:  It is not very often that I am surprised but I couldn’t believe how beautiful the Cataract Hotel was in Aswan. We took high tea on the terrace and had a georgeous view of the boats sailing on the river. Our guide showed us the exact table on the exact spot on the terrace where Agatha Christie wrote, “Death on the Nile.”  The expense of building, maintaining, and staffing this luxurious hotel reminded me of what it might have been like to visit a maharaji in India during the time of Britain’s Raj, or the Greenbrier in the U.S.  But we were in Africa and I am willing to bet that this was the best hotel on the whole continent.

Friday February 25, Day 7:  This was a hard day. We left the hotel at 8:00 to catch our 10:15 chartered flight. Only, because this is Egypt, our plane was late and we didn’t board until 11:45. That meant that we could only spend two hours at Abu Simbel, which is at the southern border of Egypt. We were back on the ship at 6:00 so we spent ten hours in transit to see this historical site. Don’t get me wrong, it was worth it, but I am glad that I didn’t know beforehand how tough this day was going to be. 

When the Aswan Dam was built much of Nubia was flooded and, since Abu Simbel is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, money was collected from all over the world to move the temple to higher ground. It wasn’t just the statues of Ramses II that had to be moved but the whole mountaintop. The temple was cut apart into 40 million pieces, moved block by block, and reassembled. The temple is a national treasure for the country of Egypt, the it was worth the effort, but I would like to know how many man hours it took to undergo such a massive project.

Saturday February 26, Day 8:  We passed through the Aswan Dam, with the Nile on one side of the dam and Lake Nasser on the other, on the way to the Philae Temple. What makes this temple unique is that it is built on an island, so it is difficult to get to and, like Abu Simbel, it was moved by taking it apart to avoid being submerged.  To make sure that it wouldn’t sink under water again UNESCO paid to have it rebuilt on top of the first cataract.

The other attraction for today was to get into a sailboat and sail on the Nile. The hook was that the sailboat had no motor so we were relying on the skills of the captain, and his knowledge of the wind, to get us back to port. Of course, the hawkers couldn’t let us enjoy our leisure cruise as two boys rowed to our boat, hung onto side, and began to sing. Their hope was that some tourists would offer them baksheesh for their efforts but when they realized that no one was going to give them money, they let go of the boat and paddled away.

Sunday, February 28, Day 9:  This was our last full day on the Tosca and our last port of call was Esna. We have made a lot of friends while on the cruise but the people whom we became the closest with are Laura and her two children, Amelia and Chase. They had a small cocktail party in their stateroom last night and it felt good to be one of the few two people to be invited. This morning I felt a rush of gratitude as Tracey and I were sitting by ourselves and Laura, sensing that we wanted company, reserved all of the seats around us so that we could spend some time with her family. Up to that point, I was feeling grumpy and not in the mood for small talk but Laura, Amelia, and Chase are so effusive that I immediately lightened up and wanted to share some stories about our trip. 

One of the reasons why we wanted to travel with the U of L group is that we were hoping to make some connections and follow through when we arrived back in Louisville. For the first time, I think that this plan may work with Laura and her family as they are a guaranteed good time and we all enjoy each other’s company.

Monday, February 28, Day 10:  Our tour of Coptic (Christian) Cairo included the Cavern Church, where the Holy Family fled to after Jesus was born, and the Flying Church, which earned its nickname because it was built on poles.

Our U of L traveling group is used to Tracey and I now. We make a unique pair and I am sure that our fellow passengers were trying to figure out who was the guy wearing nothing but Ironman clothing and his blind wife.  One lady said that I was a good person for taking care of Tracey. She made it sound like charity and I had to disabuse her of that idea. “What you have seen on this trip makes it look like our relationship is one sided. Believe me, we are equal partners.”  And then I play up how much smarter than me, being the only blind woman to graduate from the U of L law school, and then summing up our relationship by saying, “She’s the brains of the outfit.”

Tuesday, March 1, Day 11:  They saved the best for last as we toured the Giza Pyramid, Sphinx, Memphis, and the Step Pyramid of Djoser.  We were allowed to climb on the Great Pyramid and then go inside of it. For some reason the electric lights wouldn’t work and we had to take steep stairs down into the pyramid with only our cell phone lights to guide the way.  The experience was exactly what you would think that it would be and it did not disappoint 

Wednesday, March 2, Day 12:  We we supposed to fly to Israel today but British Airways canceled our flight. Our tour offered us a side trip to Alexandria so, rather than spend the day hanging around the hotel, we took a three hour bus ride to see Egypt’s second largest city.

We visited the major attractions of the catacombs of Kom El-Shoqafa, Pompey’s Pillar, the Roman amphitheater called Kom El-Dikka, and the Alexandria National Museum.  It was worth the effort to drive so far and, according to the law of unintended consequences, we were able to see a different and much more modern Egypt once we left Cairo. The city stank of decay but once we reached the suburbs we crossed Africa’s largest suspension bridge, for example, and planned communities that would not look out of place in the U.S.

Hike Day at Camp

   Fr. Early quieted the Mess Hall so that he could take a poll on how many campers would go on which hike.  There were four hikes: Blue Hole, Mosby's Cave, Devil's Backbone, and the Nature Center.  Scott had already established Mosby’s Cave as the most popular hike and, since the cave could be dangerous, Padre always went on this one.  Polk liked to lead the hike to the Blue Hole.  The big attraction to this hike was to have a mud ball fight in the creek but, when a camper got hit in the eye the summer before, and had to leave camp to have surgery, Fr. Jubal Early  outlawed the mud ball fight and few campers wanted to go with Polk.  The hike to the Blue Hole was frequently cancelled.  George liked taking the oldest kids with him and he spent the first part of the week recruiting them to go on his hike.  It was call the Devil’s Backbone and, by mileage, it was the longest hike.  The highlight of the hike was grabbing onto a thick metal wire which helped to guide the campers down a steep, rock infested, hill.  The final hike was with Franklin.  He liked to take the youngest campers to the Nature Center.  It was a short hike and they were always the first back to camp and were fed peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and bug (grape) juice.

   After breakfast the campers were allowed time for a cabin clean up and to use the bathroom.  They were given an hour to get ready and then everyone met up at the camp fire ring where each hike was dismissed to go on their adventure.  The Mosby’s Cave hike always left first because it was the largest and was unpredictable in terms of how long it would take the campers to get through the cave.  Scott made a final count of how many kids were going with him, gave the number to Fr. Jubal Early and was on his way.  George was next and he followed the same routine.  Finally, Franklin gave his number to Padre and the little ones, most of whom were only nine or ten years old, made the short hike to the Nature Center.  Once everyone had left Fr. Jubal Early hustled down the trail to catch up with Scott.  Some of the older campers noticed that he was running late and that is why they thought that padre was the Lone Eagle.

   The administration of Forrest State Park had fenced off the entrance to Mosby’s Cave for safety reasons and only Fr. Jubal Early had a key to the gate.  Before Scott allowed any of the campers in he had them place their towels outside of the entrance so that they had a way of drying off once the cave tour was over.  The campers had been told several times to bring a towel and a flashlight but, because they were so young, inevitably only a few of the campers remembered to bring these basic supplies.  After just a few yards of standing up straight, the cave narrowed and the ceiling lowered so that the campers had to bend down to avoid stalactites encroaching from above, or shimmy through a small opening to progress to the back of the cave.  At “Fat Man’s Misery,” at about half way through the tour, the campers had to wade through a pool of waist deep water.  Scott was prepared for this and he told the campers that at this point of the cave tour they were allowed to yell one cuss word once.  The boys loved this part of the hike and would yell their curse word more than once.  Twelve year old boys had a surprising large vocabulary of curse words for their age and they used a variety of curse words to express their displeasure at having to sink their butts into the water.  Meanwhile, Scott shouted “Numb Nuts” loudly and often because those two words aptly described his predicament.

   The campers made their way to the back of the cave and waited for the stragglers to catch up.  Once they were all together Scott told a quick story of how Mosby’s Cave was named after the Confederate general who used the cave as a hiding place during the Civil War.  Then the whole group of thirty kids turned around and made their way back to the entrance of the cave.  It was remarkable how hot it felt outside of the cave, especially since the campers had been wading through the cold water for a good part of the tour.  They laughed as they made their way up the trail, having been through the crucible, and were proud that they had notched one more anecdote on the stick of experience that would ultimately lead to manhood.  Slowly they made their way to the river for lunch.

   Meanwhile, George led the Devil’s Backbone hike; or, as the other counselor’s liked to call it, The Death March of Bataan.  It had earned that nickname because George liked to hike as far and as fast as the time would permit.  The Backbone hardly had a trail.  It was only two to three feet wide and was in constant danger of being overgrown with weeds.  The first major obstacle was the steep hill, punctuated with several small cliffs, where the campers had to hold onto a thick steel wire to make it down safely.  The wire had small, sharp prongs protruding from it so George encouraged the campers to hold onto tree roots and thick vines on the way down.  Once at the bottom of the Backbone, the campers liked to look back up at how far they descended.  This done, George hiked the campers so far back in the woods that they were on the edge of the boundary of Forrest State Park. 

   After wading through the waist deep water, the fun of the hike seemed to be drained from the campers.  They still had a long way to go but now their clothes were damp and their shoes were wet.  To make better time to the meeting place on the river, George took a shortcut by hiking on the railroad tracks.  He knew that Fr. Jubal Early would be looking at his watch and scanning the horizon, waiting to see George hiking down the trail towards the lunch at the campground.  George was always the last hike leader to make it to lunch so Padre wouldn’t be too concerned if he was a little late.  Besides, George loved to hear the campers complain about how hard the hike was; he remembered that it was those same campers who, just three days before, had kept him up half of Sunday night when they were challenging each other not to fall asleep.  They would sleep well at the end of hike day.

   When George finally arrived at the campground, and everyone had their drinks and hotdogs, there was an expression of relief that the ordeal was over, almost as if they had just completed some sort of campaign in a long forgotten war. 

        Polk and Josh led the hike to the “Blue Hole.”  It was a short hike and the only pay off was to play in the creek for awhile.  However, Polk was in his element.  He liked to pretend that he was in the Marines and his favorite nickname for the campers was “maggots.”  After the summer was over, Polk was going to enlist.  Meanwhile, he liked to call cadence and the campers loved to get in on the act with their response.  Polk started out with…

       He was just a rookie trooper and he surely shook with fright.
       He checked off his equipment and made sure his pack was tight
       He had to sit and listen to those awful engines roar
       He ain’t gonna jump no more.”

   And then the campers joined in on the refrain.  
       Gory! Gory! What a hell of a way to die 
       Gory! Gory! What a hell of a way to die 
       Gory! Gory! What a hell of a way to die
       He ain’t gonna jump no more.”  
.
   After a few more verses, Polk switched to another old favorite.
       Hey, Hey Captain Jack
       Meet me down by the railroad track
       With a rifle in my hand 
       Lord I’m going to be a fighting man
       Sound Off! One! Two!
       Sound Off! Three! Four! 
       Bring it on down! One! Two! Three! Four! One! Two! Three! Four

   The campers loved the call and response and begged Polk to do another cadence.  For some reason it made the boys feel more grown up and manly.  So Polk went on…
       My pants are loose, my shoes too tight. 
       My balls are swinging from left to right.
       Say “Um. Oogawah.”  We’ve got Van Dorn Power

   It was all in good fun and the campers would take these chants back home with them and sing the songs to their parents.  This was just a few years into the post Vietnam War and a lot of the parents didn’t like some of the militaristic aspects of Camp Van Dorn.

   The Nature Center hike didn’t go down to the river for lunch, so “The Blue Hole,” always arrived first for lunch.  Aside from leading the cadence, the next best thing about his hike was tricking the campers into believing that he had McDonald’s take out waiting for them at the river.  All that they had to do was to pick up garbage on the way to lunch.  There was a lot of debate among the campers as to if there really was going to be McDonalds waiting for them.  Polk had already prepped the Flatheads for his little trick and when the campers approached the picnic area Lo and Skirrel began to sing the McDonalds jingle.  It was a small thing but any time the counselors could play mind games with the campers then they never failed to let and opportunity go by.  

        The hike to the nature center was for the campers who were too young to go on the other hikes or for the kids who didn’t want to get wet.  Franklin brought a book with him and let the campers walk around while he read.  There wasn’t a lot to the nature center, just some boring displays and a few animals that had been captured but were too sick or hurt to be sent back into the wild.  Since these were the younger campers, they had short attention spans and finished their tour quickly.  This was the only hike that didn’t go to the river so Richard made them sandwiches for lunch and sat with them while they ate.  After they had their sandwiches, the youngest kids had the complete run of the camp until the other hikers came back and they really liked that they were in charge for awhile.

   The three main hikes met down at the river for hotdogs, chips, and Bug Juice.  The kids weren’t used to eating outside so having their lunch by the river seemed like an adventure.  Fr. Early allowed them to take their time and they sat and watched as the boats and barges sailed on by on the Holston River.  Both campers and counselors were tired so it was a long slog to get back to Camp Van Dorn.  Their shoulders were stooped, their heads were bent down, and their shoes made a sloshing sound because they were filled with water after wading through the creek or Mosby’s Cave.  

   There was an open field on the way back to camp that was never used by anyone because there was no drainage system for it and fetid water was everywhere.  For some reason, Polk made it a practice to run and dive, face first, into the slimy water.  He skidded off the surface, slid a few feet, and then got up and did it again.  His excuse was that he was already wet and dirty from his time in “The Blue Hole” so a little more water and mud weren’t going to make a difference, and he even chided the other counselors for not joining in on the “fun.”  It was disgusting because the water stank and was filled with mosquitos.  The campers, and not a few of the counselors, thought that Polk had gone too far with this exercise in foolishness, which is probably why he did it.

   When they finally made it back to camp both campers and counselors immediately went to their cabins to lie down and take a nap.  Usually it was a chore to get the campers to settle down during rest period but after a long hike, that wasn’t a problem.  The general feeling was that everyone had earned a little down time after expending a weeks’ worth of youthful energy in one day.

   Hike Day was rounded out with time at the pool, ball field after dinner, and finally a movie at the lodge.  It was very relaxing because everyone felt like they had earned the down time after expending so much youthful energy.  The week was half over, the campers had finally settled in, and now Van Dorn was beginning to feel like a second home.

   When George was a camper the movies were shown on an old bedsheet and Fr. Early used a reel to reel projector.  The problem was that he would have to rent the movies, which was extremely expensive to do, and there wasn’t much of a selection.  The Disney movies were boringly wholesome and the titles were limited to features such at “Davy Crockett” and “Pollyanna.”  All of that changed when Padre bought a VCR and a large television.  During the off season, he recorded a lot of movies so there was quite a selection, but even with a lot of titles it was difficult to find a movie that the campers had not seen.  The campers spent an awful amount of time in front of the tube when they were home, especially during the summer, which was one of the reasons why their parents sent them to camp.  There was no way to solve this problem so the campers had to satisfy themselves by rewatching a movie that they had probably seen several times before.

   The main problems with being a counselor at Camp Van Dorn was that there was a lack of privacy; you were always on duty.  George liked to cheat the system a little by slipping out of the back of the lodge during the movie to go to his cabin to read for an hour and a half.  The problem with that was when George turned on his light, it lit up the whole upper unit and telegraphed to the other counselors that he was shirking his duties.  At the next counselor meeting, Danny, the Uber-counselor, chastised George by stating that all counselors should attend all activities.  That was fair and George knew it, especially since it came from Danny.  He stopped skipping out on movie night but he was more than a little upset that everyone knew what everyone else was doing and, of course, felt free to share their opinion.  Everyone knew everyone else’s every move at Van Dorn

Disneyland v Disney World

                Disneyland v Disney World

   I asked my youngest daughter, Virginia, where would she like to go for a Daddy-Daughter weekend and she replied, “Disneyland!”  We have already been to Disney World a couple of times so she wanted to be able to compare the two parks.  Personally, I didn’t care where we went because all that I wanted was to spend some quality time with my daughter.  It seems excessive to fly to L.A. to go to an amusement park but the trip was painless, as we had a direct flight from LAX to Louisville, and it wasn’t that expensive.  Virginia was happy because she got to pick the park, the rides, and even the restaurants for the whole weekend.  I was happy because I was able to make some new memories with my daughter as we spent a lot of quality time together.

   The biggest difference between the park in L.A. and the one in Florida is how compact and convenient everything is at Disneyland.  For example, we could easily walk from the front gate to our hotel and we had a plethora of restaurants to pick from outside of the park.  This is significant because it cost me ninety five dollars to eat at the Naples Ristorante in Downtown Disney and almost half of that to eat at The Cheesecake Factory, which was virtually right across the street.  A second major difference is that Disneyland consists of only two parks.  A section of the California Adventure Park is dedicated to the Marvel Studios and it was there that we witnessed Spider-Man jump from one building to the next, had our picture taken with Dr. Strange, and saw the Black Panther take on some bad guys in a street fight.  It was great to see all of the characters live.

   Unfortunately, the one thing that Disneyland and Disney World had in common was the long lines.  We spent over two hours waiting to ride “Web-Slingers” for example.  Although that was the longest that we had to wait, there were several other rides with wait times exceeding ninety minutes.  By the end of the second day my hips were really hurting me from standing for so long and now I know that I am only good for two days at Disney.  It would have been better to buy a Fast Pass for fifteen dollars for each ride, a price that I would have gladly paid if I had known that the wait time was going to be so long.  Still, I promised Virginia that we could make the trip again in 2023 if she wanted to give it a whirl.  The only caveat is that it has to be just Virginia and me because I want her full attention if I am going to spend the time and money for a major trip.

Epic Caribbean Cruise

 An “Epic” Caribbean Cruise

A good tour guide can make even a dull excursion interesting and that is why I was glad that we found Tony to show us the island of St. Maarten. He was a true character who didn’t mind doing a little personal business while he showed us the island where he had lived for his whole life. For example, Tony made a stop at the place where his very pregnant daughter works so that he could drop off some cash and a few slices of Conch Cake, a local delight that contained no conch but a whole lot of butter and sugar. Tony said that he had to sneak it out of the house because it was so good that his girlfriend didn’t want to share it with anyone. Also, we made a stop at the place where Tony lives so that we could meet his two grandsons. The younger boy was nicknamed “The Little Terrorist” because he was always picking on his six year old brother.

What I appreciated about Tony was that the 62 year old man was how open with these two tourists from Kentucky. For example, Tony said that his father was wealthy but, because he had “too much kids,” no one inherited much when he died. Tony worked at excavating for his father, and still has huge and powerful hands to prove it, before becoming a supervisor. Now that he is retired, he leads tours when the cruise ships are in port and in his spare time he volunteers to take the old folks to their medical appointments. He picks up work wherever he can and once did a couple of shifts for when the movie “Speed II” was filming in town. “Sandra Bullock was a very nice lady but Chuck Norris was nice as well.” Some of the other celebrities that he has seen on the island where Lionel Richie, Michael Jordon, and Lil Wayne. St. Maarten’s is known for having famous people fly in for the New Year’s Eve celebrations and Jeff Bezos, who has a $450 million dollar yacht, arrives annually so that he can park it in the bay and bring in the new year in luxury.

Tony grew up on the island and showed us where his house used to be. In 2017, Hurricane Irma, a category 5 hurricane with winds up to 300 mph, shook and removed the walls and ceiling from the foundation of his house. Tony said that he went outside to watch the hurricane but when he saw a huge cargo container flying by at about twenty feet off of the ground, he decided to go back inside to take shelter until the storm passed by. Irma devastated the island. A “Planet Hollywood” hotel was completely destroyed and its rusty skeleton frame was still standing by the beach. Another hotel was completely rebuilt when the wealthy owner shipped in 200 workers, and all of the building materials needed, to start the hotel all over from scratch.

On our tour of St. Maarten we passed many roundabouts and in the middle of them were statues of local interest. For example, there was one roundabout in a busy intersection that had an enslaved man who had been frees and the chains around his wrists had been broken. In another area the roundabout had salt pickers and a third had a variety of transportation workers.

Meanwhile, motorcycles passed us dangerously to the right and left; Tony said that they had a death wish. The two most popular places to go on the island are Airport beach and the nude beach. Since we had time, we drove to the airport and watched as the planes dropped within 100 feet of us as they flew down to the runway.

At the end of our tour Tony drove us by where his father had his funeral. Because his father had made a lot of money with his excavation company and through real estate, he was well known throughout the island. Tony’s father was so popular that the funeral director had to turn people away from the service. Only family members were allowed to attend the visitation and even then the funeral home was packed from wall to wall. I stole a line from “The Big Chill” when I said that “I could never get that many people to come to my funeral.” Tracey picked up on the reference and, right on cue, countered with another line from the movie; “I’ll come. And I’ll bring a date.” Tony laughed out loud at our repartee. And with that our two hour tour of St. Maarten’s ended.

The second great tour that we took was in Barbados with our nineteen year old guide, Evan. He gives tours on the side as is studying to be an art teacher. What I appreciated about Evan was the fact that even though he is a young black man, he didn’t sound bitter or angry as he told us the stories of Barbados’ history of slavery. He could have made us uncomfortable by becoming bitter as he told us of captured runaway slaves were put into cages in what is now called “Freedom Square.” To make matters worse, the local businesses at the time had the cages removed because the enslaved people made too much noise in their cries for pity, and they smelled bad. Evan remained professional as he pointed out to us where the slave market was located and the still present auction block where the enslaved Africans were bought and sold. To cover up the sins of the past, Bridgetown put a statue of Admiral Nelson on the auction block. It has since been removed because the locals thought that it was inappropriate to put a statue of a famous British lord in Freedom Square since Barbados had achieved independence from the UK in the 1960s. One final note on slavery was the fact that a parking lot had been built on top of a mass grave for enslaved people. The choice was to take that expensive downtown real estate and either turn it into a cemetery or make it a parking lot and, as Evan said demurely, “the parking lot won.”

As we continued with our downtown tour, it became clear that Bridgetown was not interested in preservation as most of the historic buildings were run down and in a state of disrepair. The two exceptions were the Mutual Life Assurance building, the most famous historic building on Barbados, which was built with the 20 million dollars that Britain had paid for reparations for their part in the slave trade. Mutual Life held a place for the local planters could meet and find a way to look after each other. The other building was a synagogue. Barbados has had a strong Jewish population since its colonial days and it was the Jews who figured out how to turn the local sweet grass into rum. Everyone grew rich as the Jews taught the process to the Portuguese and the Dutch.

One final excursion of note was when we went to ride “The Flying Dutchman” and the “Canopy Zip Line” on St. Maarten. Tracey and I have done zip lines before but “The Flying Dutchman” is the world’s steepest zip line at 1,050 feet in elevation across 2,800 feet of cable. We screamed all of the way down the mountain and hugged each other in exhilaration once we arrived at the bottom of the line. Before we dropped we watched as a grandmother tried to calm her granddaughter’s fears about zipping down the mountain. I always like to play the comedian and so, when I saw that the girl was nervous, I said that “if something bad happened and the line breaks, it will be the worst four or five seconds of your life.” The seventy year old lady was nonplussed and replied, “then it will be over.” She didn’t say it with remorse, more like it was a matter of fact and that maybe it would be a relief. But then she skipped to the starting line and screamed with joy as she took the leap off of the platform. I learned a lot from that old woman in the few minutes that I watched her.

People look at me askew when I tell them that Tracey and I went on a cruise because everyone is afraid of COVID, but we felt perfectly safe. Everyone on board had to test negative before they were allowed on the ship. Three ports (St. Lucia, St. Thomas, St. Kitts) refused to let us come on their island but to make up for it, Norwegian Cruise Line gave us 20% off of our next trip. We immediately went down to the front desk and ordered our next cruise. The “Epic” has a great gym and that is important to me since I worked out for 90 minutes every morning. And because we have been on this ship several times, Tracey knows it well and can find her way around without assistance. There is a bar on the top deck with huge umbrellas so Tracey can perch herself there and became best buddies with the bartender. Norwegian gave us other perks like a handicapped room on the 14th floor for no extra charge and free admission to the specialty Japanese and Brazilian restaurants. Finally, because the ship was at 50% capacity due to social distancing, the wait staff was literally standing behind us at dinner to serve us. It was nice to have so much attention.

Traveling is a pain in the neck and I understand why people say that they don’t want to do it. My father in law, for example, always wanted to take a cruise through the Panama Canal, but when Tracey got serious about taking him, my father in law would not hear of it and wouldn’t even consider going. Now that our trip is over I can understand the way that he felt. There were a lot of things that went wrong. For example, I forgot our passports and vaccination cards and had to turn the cab around when we were on our way to the airport to retrieve them from our condo. When we arrived in San Juan we had to take a COVID test and, if the outcome wasn’t negative, then we would have had to spend two weeks in isolation. On our flight out of San Juan, we spent 10 hours in the airport on Sunday when our plane developed mechanical problems but the airline would not cancel the flight. Eventually they gave us vouchers for a hotel room and dinner but the restaurant was so busy that we had to wait almost three hours at the bar for dinner and dessert. Finally, on Monday, I received four texts giving me four different times for our departure. We decided to err on the side of caution and get to the airport early and spent an additional five hours waiting for a flight out.

Non Sequitars

• Evan asks for $25.00 for the tour. I pulled out the money and said, “I’ve been meaning to clean out this wallet for awhile.” Without missing a beat, Evan said, “and I would like to help you do that.”

• A collective groan came from the group of four sitting next to us when I said that Tracey and I are retired and it didn’t matter when we returned. I think that they groaned because they alll had to be at work on Monday. A little later on, I said to the group, “You should retire early and travel!” Of course, everyone says that but few are able to achieve the dream

  

Cheryl’s Early Years

 Cherylanne’s Early Years

My sister, Cherylanne, always seemed much older than myself. That is probably because she acted as though she were my second mother, which only makes sense because Cheryl and Mom were so close. Those two spent countless hours in the kitchen together and it was clear that Cherylanne was Mom’s favorite. From my earliest days, I remember those two fussing over their Weight Watcher’s diet; measuring their fruit in a small scale and toasting cheese bread in the oven. As she became older, it was Cheryl who cooked most of the meals and she took over other parenting duties as well. She put up and decorated the family Christmas tree, for example, because the holidays weren’t my parent’s thing. When it came time to celebrate our birthdays, Cheryl was the one who asked us what we wanted for a gift to make our day special. Often, Cheryl went out and bought the gift herself, after my mother gave her the money, but would also buy us something that came from her and she used the proceeds from her job to buy it for us.

Cherylanne had many jobs outside of the home. She worked at Kentucky Fried Chicken when she was sixteen and she boxed up the leftovers to place in our refrigerator so that the kids always had our favorite food to eat. Other jobs included being a cashier at Target, a teller at a bank, and a hostess at Mama Grisanti’s, one of our regular restaurants that my father liked to take us to. An anecdote from her time at the restaurant was when she received a tip of just a few coins from a check of over a hundred dollars. Upset at being shortchanged, Cheryl ran out to the parking lot before the customer had a chance to leave, gave the tip back to him and said, “Here! You obviously need this more than I do!”

This demonstration of gravitas was unusual for my older sister as she was not an aggressive person. The Cherylanne whom I remember while growing up was shy and an introvert. The situation became so serious that my father got an exchange student from Ecuador for Cheryl to become friends with. The young woman’s name was Ruth Brenz and the two became inseparable. For some reason, Ruth came to love banana ice cream and she walked to Baskin Robbins with Cheryl at least once a week to get the frozen treat since it was unavailable in the grocery store. There were other exchange students but it was Ruth who really helped to get Cheryl out of her shell.

I think that Cherylanne would have liked to have a big house with an even bigger family. To pass the time while watching television in the family room, for example, she used to make architectural drawings of her dream house and she made drawings of her ideal wedding dress. Cheryl was so good at drawing that a pen and ink rendition that she did of a bridge in one of Louisville’s parks was selected to be printed in her official high school calendar. Also, in her spare time, Cheryl liked to sew and the patterns and clippings were strewn all over the dining room. In my opinion, she was born to be the perfect wife with a big family. She probably would have liked to have ten children instead of just the one.

One of Cheryl’s teachers in high school was Fr. Wagner. One day, after class, my sister went to the old priest for extra help and he became impatient with her. Fr. Wagner told my sister that she would never be anything more than a housewife. That slight stayed with her and gave her the fire that she needed to continue with her schooling. Cheryl took a course from a local school to learn how to take dictation. When that didn’t work out, she attended Eastern Kentucky University and earned a degree in law enforcement. After she married and started a family, Cheryl went back to school and earned her RN while living in Pennsylvania and made a thirty year career as a nurse.

Now that Cherylanne has passed, I am afraid that all of these memories would be forgotten if I didn’t spend a few minutes to type them out. As I watched my sister laying on her deathbed with literally hours left to live, I realized that our bond really came from our early years together. Now that she is in heaven with my parents, I regret that we had lost touch and wish that we could have become closer instead of distant. The image that will always haunt me is of Cheryl, lying in a dark hospital room with the machines whirring and pinging, and no one was allowed in to comfort her in her final hours on this earth because she was contagious. She was a giving person who dedicated her life to helping other people as a nurse and yet there was no one at her bedside to even hold her hand as she perished. It was a sad ending for someone who deserved much better.

Amtrak to Denver

 Amtrak to Denver

Surprise, when it come to travel, is seldom a welcome thing. I was surprised when I arrived at the Amtrak station in Salt Lake that they didn’t have an actual building for me to wait in. Instead, the porter met me on the tracks and scanned my QR code. Since this was the first time that I had paid for a compartment, I was a little nervous when I asked about the accommodations. The purser said that I was in cabin 5, and when I asked for a key to my berth, he said that there wasn’t a key, so I had to keep watch on my valuables whenever I left the cabin. The third surprise, after no train station and no locked cabin, was how small my berth was. When I opened the cabin door all I saw was wall to wall bed with no room for anything else. Literally, if I wanted to put on my shoes, I had to open the cabin door to give me enough room to put my shoes on.

Still, for me, trying to find a refuge on Thanksgiving, the accommodations were perfect. My day on the California Zephyr was filled with naps, reading, and looking out the window so that I could enjoy the gorgeous scenery all day. The train slowed as we climbed the mountains and, as I laid on my back to watch the landscape roll by, my mind’s eye drifted back to when I would ride in the back of the station wagon as we drove to Minneapolis and Vermont when I was a kid. The drone of the train riding on the rails made the memories from my childhood flood my brain. For awhile, I wasn’t a sixty year old man reclining on a bed; I was a five year old Jeff who was whiling away the hours by watching the glorious Rocky Mountains and the sparkling water of the Colorado River

Amtrak is perfect for introverts because there is very little interaction between you and the other passengers. The only time when I left my compartment was to go to the bathroom or get something to eat. My berth felt like a retreat, similar to my cabin on a cruise ship or the little bedroom that I had at the Gethsemani Abbey in Bardstown. The train accommodated me well because it forced me to slow down, and yet, I was in perpetual motion. It felt like I was accomplishing something even while I barely moved during large parts of the day. Frankly, I was in heaven, and since my parents have passed and I don’t have much in the way of family obligations for the holidays, I am already planning my Thanksgiving Amtrak vacation for next year.

Before I took the train I had to fly into Salt Lake City. I arrived at 10:30 in the morning and, since my train didn’t leave until 3:30 am the following day, I had some time to kill. I took the light rail from the airport to Temple Square to take a tour of the Mormon’s campus. The tour guides were all young, female, and pretty, and I had the idea that they were used for recruiting purposes. My beautiful two guides showed me the Assembly Hall, the Tabernacle with the silver roof where the choir played, and the temple, which was under reconstruction. The original sandstone base was crumbling and the Mormons were replacing it with granite. The whole campus was impressive but, after a quick tour of the convention center, I was ready to move on. After taking some pictures of the capitol, I walked to my hotel and went to bed early so that I could meet my train.

After I took the train to Denver, I spent all day on Friday taking a bus tour of the local attractions. We drove to the Garden of the Gods, which held some unusual rock formations, and I hiked around the area for awhile. Our lunch break was at Manitou Springs, an old hippy enclave which has morphed into a tourist trap, but since I don’t like shopping I just walked around the town for awhile. Finally, we drove up Pike’s Peak and enjoyed the views of the surrounding countryside.

This wasn’t a trip for everyone. I was constantly moving, ate on the fly, and barely talked to anyone. On Saturday, for example, I was out of the hotel at 6:00 am so that I could take a solo walking tour of Denver for four and a half hours. The sun was just coming up when I made my way down the 16th Street Mall and I took a lot of pictures of the Christmas decorations while the lights were still on. The final item on the agenda was to walk around the capital and take some pictures of the interesting buildings. This done, I took the light rail to the airport. It was a whirlwind of a vacation but I am glad that I did it because I have been wanting to go to Denver for a long time and I will use any excuse that I can get to ride Amtrak.

Religion at Holy Trinity

 Religion at Holy Trinity, Trinity High School, and Sacred Heart Academy

My absolute earliest memory occurred at Holy Trinity in their first church building, which had been erected in 1953. It was in that same year that Trinity High School came into existence by purchasing the old Holy Trinity property on Shelbyville Road. I remember being a toddler and, because I was teething, I gnawed a dent into the pew in front of me. Why my parents didn’t try to stop me, I will never know, but I chewed a chunk out of the pew. When Holy Trinity outgrew the old church building, it was converted into the school gym and a new, more modern church, was built in its place. It was in this church building where my father took us to mass every Sunday morning, where my brother and I became altar servers, where my sister was married, and where my children became altar servers. It is where I still attend mass today.

Call me old fashioned but I do not like to wear jeans to mass but prefer putting on a pair of slacks and a collared shirt. For this reason, I only attend mass when the Sundays when I know that I am going to the opera or ballet, since I will already be dressed. I always arrive early, about a half hour before the ceremony begins, so I have my choice of places to sit and I choose a pew close to where my family used to seat themselves when I was a child. Meditation might be too strong of a word, but since I’m in the exact same place where I was fifty years ago, I like to close my eyes and think back to a time, long ago, when I was young and impressionable. The memories swirl around inside of my head, decades of them, and I use the alone time to sort them out.

When I first attended Holy Trinity Parish School, it was so new that it didn’t have a kindergarten or a first grade, so I had to go elsewhere for my first two years of schooling. Finally, in 1969, I was admitted to the second grade, but only after I was tutored by Mrs. Kissel, an old teacher who specialized in helping remedial students. Sister Julianna was our principal and she was a mean old woman; I think that she enjoyed that fact that everyone at my school was afraid of her. My own experience with the nun was that she caught Doug Ware and I fighting in a classroom after lunch. He liked to hit me in the face and say “slap him until his face turns red.” Doug had been picking on me since I first attended Holy Trinity in 1969 and I finally had enough and I fought back. Sr. Julianna separated us, talked to Doug first, and then blamed me for the fight. Without even asking me any questions, Sr. Julianna slapped me hard on the back of my head. The blow hurt but not as much as the injustice of being blamed for a fight that I did not start. The only other nun that I knew at Holy Trinity was Sr. Alma Rita and she was so mean to my brother that he tried to correct the injustices done to him by setting the convent on fire. The flames died out quickly but Tommy was sent to the public schools as part of his contrition. Ultimately, he was sent to a military school where he graduated with honors. To this very day I think back on my time in my Catholic school, and the nuns who taught me, with a mixture of anger and regret.

I did enjoy attending mass, however. I found the routine of it relaxing and satisfying. My father thought so too and even went so far as to take us to the midnight mass at the cathedral for Christmas. His dedication to Catholicism went to such an extreme that he pulled into a local church on the Sundays when we were on vacation. He liked the ritual of it, but my mother, who was never religious, only attended to support my father and stopped going to mass when he became too sick to leave the house. Since I have always enjoyed contributing to something bigger than myself, I became an altar server while I was eleven years old. It was fun to put on the robes, light the candles before the ceremony, process in with the priest, and to help with communion. One of my jobs was to hold a platter under the chin of the parishioners so that if they dropped the communion then it would not fall to the floor. Also, I rang the chimes when the priest held up the body and blood of

Christ to receive God’s blessing. There was a certain magic to the mass and I wanted to be a part of it. I even enjoyed hanging out with the priest before the ritual began.

Today, I consider myself to be a low wattage Catholic, which means that I only attend mass at Holy Trinity a couple of times a year. At different points of my life I have tried to deepen my faith. For example, I tried to read the whole Bible on my own but gave up after Jeremiah because I found the book dark and repetitive. When I was a teacher at Sacred Heart, I led thirteen senior retreats over fifteen years, and the seminal part of my speech was that I had wanted to transfer to a seminary when I was in college to become a priest. After all, all of my heroes in my formative years were priests. And yet, when it came time to contact the recruiter for the Archdiocese of Louisville, I couldn’t pull the trigger. My faith simply wasn’t strong enough. The career of a priest was attractive to me because I would be able to lead a whole community of parishioners, serve as an example for others to follow, and I liked to idea of sacrificing myself for a greater good. But I was low wattage and not a very good Catholic because I don’t believe in hell, barely believe in heaven, and have no problems with Islam and Hinduism. Also, I believe that women are equal to men and should be allowed to become priests. Finally science tells us that people are born gay, so I am very accepting of the LGBQ community and think that they should be able to accept communion.

If these reasons weren’t enough to stop me from committing myself to the priesthood, then there is the problem of pedophile priests and the Pope’s inability to do anything about them. There is no connection between homosexuality and pedophilia so it is alright with me if gay men and women become priests. However, there are countless stories, reported in the media from all over the globe, of priests who have been accused of sexually abusing young boys. Unfortunately, and unfairly, because of the constant bad press, all priests are suspected of pedophilia. They have to find their own way to prove that they are worthy of the trust of their parishioners. I am still working it out, but to have that dark cloud of suspicion constantly over me as a priest is a good enough reason for not taking vows.

This is not a sad blog entry where I have a tell all story about being abused. None of the priests I have known over the years had done anything that I know of that would lead me to believe that they are pedophiles. Instead, this is a story about how I am trying to be a better Catholic and how I am deepening my faith by serving as a lector and a Eucharistic Minister for Sacred Heart. When I lector I read the chapter and verse over and over again because if the passage doesn’t make any sense to me then it won’t make any sense to the congregation. I like to be a Eucharistic Minister because sometimes, when I look deeply into the eyes of the people receiving communion, I can see the Holy Spirit working. There are a lot of true believers at mass and it is inspiring to see their faith reflected on their faces. In my own limited role, I feel like I am making a contribution and serving as a good example for others; it’s just that I will never be able to do those things as a priest.