This post is about the piano teachers' conference we attended this last summer, July 2013. We had not yet gotten to finalizing our notes during the activity of finishing summer lessons, beginning the school year and prepping for both Ribbon Festival, Christmas recitals and spending wonderful times with family during breaks! So, belated, here is Phil's account of the National Conference in Keyboard Pedagogy.
The NCKP was in late July and was located in Chicago. It takes place every other year, and Krysti has been there once before. This was Phil's first time.
The purpose of this conference is to bring support, insight, refreshment and inspiration to piano teachers specifically. Other conferences may be for private music teachers of all studies in general (Music Teachers' National Association, which also has state and district conferences) or for public/private school music, band & choir teachers (Ohio Music Educators' Association), but this conference is targeted especially for piano teachers. There were a wide range of topics addressed including teaching theories, studio practices, business management tips, stress reducers, discussion forums on topics peculiar to private piano teaching, international reports, and even considerations for students who are special needs.
Pre-Conference: Wednesday, July 24
We decided to arrive in Chicago earlier in the morning to enjoy a little of the city. We parked first at a downtown area garage, then decided to do a little strolling on Magnificent Mile. Our garage had a deal when you purchased $10 or more on merchandise from certain stores your parking fee was reduced, and so at Nordstrom we found a pair of 80's mirror sunglasses which looked totally awesome on me! Some of the stores there are a Disney store, an Apple store, a Garmin store, some fancy clothes and jewelry stores, etc. We also peeked in the Ghirardelli (they give you samples!) & Hershey's stores for fun. One peculiar business we stopped in was ("Lush"? something like that.) a soap and lotion place. There were attendants who offered free hand massages with their products. They used a pumice-like soap to cleanse and exfoliate our skin, and kept a bowl of very warm water for us to rinse with. The guy massaged our hands as the soap did its cleansing work, then after rinsing offered us lotion samples of differing thicknesses/weight. Maybe if we lived in Chicago we would come and buy organic soaps and lotions. Later, we visited the Water Tower Place to look around. We almost had lunch there, but we did have a little bit of a time crunch to avoid breaking into the higher parking fee tier. We decided to make a beeline to Giordano's Pizza on Superior Street. This is true Chicago deep dish pizza. You order your pizza when you come in so as to shorten the wait time while you sit, though it still takes a while. The place is adorned with pictures everywhere of famous people and Chicago events and the like. I spied one large print sentence which said something like "In good we crust" or some play on words like that. I remarked that they didn't say something a little more sacrilegious, like "Man does not live by bread alone, but by the toppings you put on it."
After we finished being out on the town, we returned to the car with a little time to spare, and then left to head to the Lombard area, where the conference was. It's further West of downtown a good ways. The room was nice although we had some trouble checking in. It seems they didn't have the rooms available.. even though we had reserved them through the conference some time ago. Whatever the case was, we eventually got to our rooms on the 11th floor and started settling in.
We had arrived for the pre-conference which was one of the highlights by itself! The Keynote Address was by Scott Price, who launched us forward with a rousing and heartening speech reminding us of our dedication to service, and why we do what we do. He wanted us to remember the value of being a private music teacher in that we almost have the position of a "surrogate parent," acting as a guiding, mentoring, nurturing influence on our students. Children young and adolescent crave attention and affection, and we are there are there for 30, 45, or 60 minutes a week to invest in their lives, teach them a skill, praise their achievements and encourage their progress. He advised us to know what the students need next before they know they need it. Next was Marvin Blickenstaff, famous renowned piano teacher who was awarded the MTNA Achievement Award (kinda like AFI's Lifetime Achievement Award). He spoke of "Beauty and Beasts" in the piano studio. He shared a little of his piano history, including the fact he wanted to quit piano because his older brother had been allowed to quit at 7th grade. But it only took three lessons to change his mind and totally excite him! His piano teacher "Fern" had over 900 people attending her 100th birthday party, so she had a huge span of influence over her lifetime. The audience may cheer at the fast, showy and loud pieces, but it is the beautiful music that brings both tears and healing. Marvin advised us on how (and how not) to verbally assess our students and to save the word "beautiful" for moments that truly are. Beauty in music is a technical aspect, much the same as a beautiful dance or Olympic performance is done with good technique and physical execution - it can't just be done because you want it to. Some "beasts" he pointed out included: only playing a few pieces a year which is too narrow a focus, or playing a new piece every week so they have done a hundred things but have nothing to play well; studio atmospheres which can either be overly critical, harsh and highly demanding, or can be just fun & games, loosey goosey and not accomplishing anything; or typecasting boys as doing fast & loud pieces and girls doing quiet melodic pieces instead of allowing them to explore the full range of music. There were other aspects as well but I can't retype the entire conference!
One of our other favorite addresses we listened to was Alan Walker's presentation of Franz Liszt as the "Ambassador of his time." This was a thoroughly insightful lecture seeking to debunk some myths of Liszt as the "Elvis of his time," meaning that he was flashy or vain. On the contrary; he held a rather poor opinion of himself, but was humble and giving. Some things about him: He said something like "Because music is from nature and even of God, we must give back," and he very much was a gracious giver. He gave to charities, he visited hospitals, prisons and asylums to give music therapy, he contributed articles to magazines and wrote books, he worked with music clubs and organizations, he never charged for lessons, and he lived a life of poverty. He also suffered personal loss and ridicule in his life, eventually leading him to escape to Rome and take holy orders. He would have committed suicide had the Scriptures not said "Thou shalt not kill," which included himself. He understood that musicians do their best when for a higher cause. He felt that music was his calling in life, not just a trade or profession. He was like a priest, connecting man to God thru music, stating that the "musician is the bearer of the beautiful." It was truly inspiring to hear so much of Franz Liszt that we never knew, so much so that we bought all four books of Alan's about Liszt's life. (We hoped we might get autographed copies, but we never saw him in the exhibit hall.)
Day 1: Thursday, July 25
As the conference proper began, we went to events like workshops, presentation sessions, and music showcases where you get a free tote bag of music books and the writers talk you through them and how to best use them. (That's part of the fun of conferences: free stuff!) We first went to the Hal Leonard showcase to see their new releases in Theory, Technique and Repertoire. After that we saw a session by Jane Magrath on intermediate to lower-advanced core piano literature. It was good to get a sense of pieces which either junior high or high school students should be working on before they truly reach the advanced level (things like levels 8-10 in our favorite repertoire books). I think we found that several of the pieces in the list are things we already have or teach, so it was good to receive that validation. Later, one of the workshops which was much appreciated was named "Stress-Free Business Practices For Your Studio." It was actually in two parts (which means piano teachers are very stressed). It exposed some of the narratives that we encounter and unwittingly accept - example: a mom calls 15 minutes before lesson and says "Susie won't be at lesson because we have a volleyball game tonight and then they're going out to eat after the game. Can she come at 9:45pm?" If we agree to this, then we declare that our own lives are less important than theirs and our schedule is dictated by them, plus our own family/unwinding/dinner time is unimportant. And really, if they're asking for another time, we should charge them for an extra time if we're being honest. Anyways, the lady giving the presentation had some nice ideas, and several of them are things we're already doing, so again there was some good affirmation. To finish the day, we attended the evening concert featuring MTNA National Piano Audition Winners. Each of these three students were incredible. They played pieces which were outstanding. There may have been a part or two when I said to myself "Hands aren't supposed to move that fast... --are they??" Chopin and Ravel were favorite composers among the students, as half the pieces we heard were written by them. But still, I hear those pieces, get spine tingles, and again I think to myself, saying, "Who writes stuff like this? How do they even conjure up compositions this crazy??"
Day 2: Friday, July 26
We started off going to see Randall Faber give a showcase on the Faber Piano Adventures, which is a favorite curriculum of ours. He focused on the beginner-elementary levels and supplementary materials. We use a couple different piano teaching methods, including Faber Piano Adventures, Helen Marlais' Succeeding at the Piano, and others here and there. It's really nice to watch the author go thru a book you are very familiar with and give you the bigger picture as to what it means, find out how it applies to this part or that part, and ultimately what higher concepts of musicality or technique you can infer when teaching the pieces in the book to your students. (it's kinda like getting a sermon over something you already know and you get a new facet of it.) Later that morning we had the pleasure of seeing Jarrod Radnich give a concertino and brief presentation. He played his famous Virtuosic Piano Solo pieces of "Pirates of the Caribbean" and "Harry Potter" (as seen on YouTube) for us - Live! - and explained a little on how he wrote them and what his observations and goals are. He's said to be "the force that is making piano cool again." I just remember his immediate remarks after finishing "Pirates" -- which doesn't seem to be getting any easier for him -- he said something to the effect of "I can't help but imagine Billy Joel when I play this song, because every day for the rest of his life, he has to play 'Piano Man' for his fans and the world at large. If I knew I was going to be playing this every day for the rest of my life, I wouldn't have done it so fast the first time..." The other presenters at that session gave reports on programs in foreign countries which form children's bands/orchestras and bring children together to make music, or about a piano teaching program at a women's correctional institution. There was also a banquet honoring Marvin Blickenstaff for his career and service. But at $100 a ticket, we felt it more prudent to seek sustenance elsewhere.
Day 3: Saturday, July 27
This was the final day of the conference. We went to go see a music showcase in the morning and we received our tote bags of freebies, but Krysti's coffee cup decided it didn't want to work anymore shortly into the program. That resulted in spilt coffee (HOT spilt coffee) and a return to the hotel room to redress and regroup. Returning to the conference, We listened to the keynote address for the morning talking about "the road ahead in piano study for the next generation." We then went to the second session of "Stress-free Business Practices for your studio." Like I said before, piano teachers get very stressed. We all tend to commiserate over the same issues, those being: ignorant parents who don't pay, don't bring their students on time and ask for free makeup lessons. Makeup lessons was a primary topic for part two, and other topics included creatively dealing with the double-booked student (a segue from makeup lessons), and communication with parents - essentially nurturing them to help give them a better perspective. Other discussions were: smoothly shifting to larger lessons and fixing those vexing problems like students arriving to early or staying too late, establishing "office hours" to separate home and office life, and developing canned responses to deal with parents who ask the same questions or making an easily accessible FAQ . The last session we attended was conducted by an acquaintance of Krysti's from Bluffton University, Melissa Martiros. She was the accompanist for Camerata Singers before I arrived there. She gave a presentation on "Pedagogical Strategies for children with Special Needs." The session gave an overview of conditions listed in the IDEA, or the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act, some insight into understanding these conditions, and coping with/adapting ourselves to such students. Krysti and I have both dealt with special needs students. One example: generally speaking (though not universally true of course), autistic students like/need to have a routine, so I often run the lesson in the same order from week to week with only slight changes. They may tend to have a need to move or make motions. To them, it's a type of physical release for internal pressure. (In extreme/severe cases, to order such a student who moves frequently to stop and remain still may be considered torture to their minds and bodies, and even physically "restraining" or guiding them in any fashion could trigger unbridled and perhaps violent responses.) Another example is that autistic students need to have all the ducks in a row, every rule must be followed and there can be no contradictions or exceptions, otherwise the system is null and devoid of merit. I have one student who has Aspbergers, and I have noticed he sometimes has bouncing tendencies though certainly not bouncing off the walls, and in the past he has gotten up and moved around and played with things distractedly. Sometimes he gives facial reactions if I mispronounce a word in a song or vocal reactions if it appears there's an impossible note which can't be played for some logistical reason, but I find so long as I keep calm and matter-of-fact about what's going on and admit any mistakes I may make, there's no problems. As per Melissa's suggestion for coping with autistic movements, I simply allow him to burn off any energy he may have, and I give him an instruction, letting him come to do it in his own pacing. He does a good job and progresses in his material. Thus with that, our time at the NCKP came to a close!
As this was the last day, the exhibit hall booths packed up in the early afternoon. We didn't stay for the closing recital in the afternoon, but opted to start heading home. That was a rather lengthy ordeal, given we ended up leaving during rush hour. The highways were more clogged than bad arteries, so we decided to take a bypass, going thru some outlying areas to find an alternate highway. This was more or less successful, though certainly not easy or streamlined. However, in the end we got home, hugged our kitties, and were thankful for another successful trip and break for a weekend.
Sunday, January 19, 2014
Just a little of what we've been up to lately...
Hello!! Krysti here. Just thought I would share a bit of what we've been up to lately! In random as-I-find-the-pictures-on-my-computer order. We had a really nice Christmas! We had our traditional orange-rolls and sparkling grape juice breakfast. I had coffee of course and added BaCoN to my plate!
Whitney loves Christmas! It's full of wrapping paper to toss around or sit on, boxes to sit in, ornaments to swat at, etc!!
Everett might be scared of Christmas!
Whitney helped us watch Pocohontas and Pocohontas II. (We watched a bunch of Disney movies again after Disney World!)
After we use the oven, you can usually find Whitney here.
Phil playing with his new phone, and Whitney enjoying her cat-nap.
Say goodbye to the old creepy basement!
The guys started in on digging out our new basement!!!!
We are halfway through our new jigsaw puzzle.
I found these flowers on clearance at Hobby Lobby and made Kaylah a little arrangement for her room. (She's really into Zebra and Leopard prints).
Phil helped me make these healthy breakfast-smoothies! We made strawberry banana flavor and also cherry vanilla flavor. They have oatmeal and chia seeds in them plus yogurt, milk, fruit. Stuck them in the freezer and I've just been transferring one to the fridge the day before I want to drink it :)
Phil and Kaylah helped me make probably about 20-25ish freezer-crockpot meals! It took less time this time around because I used some of the same recipes from the last time we did this, but also added some new ones. So, we got more meals done in less time! These are SO handy for our busy teaching nights. (Especially Wednesdays and Thursdays seem to be the busiest for both of us). So I just stick one of these in the crockpot around when I eat lunch, and then it's ready when we can grab it. Some of the recipes we did this time were "Christmas Chili", Colorado beef burritos, thai chicken legs, loaded baked potato soup, meatball stroganoff, pork tenderloin with apple cranberry sauce, taco chili, sausage and peppers, teriyaki chicken, savory chicken, lazy day stew, sweet and tang meatballs. Each recipe makes 2 sets of meals that we divvy up into 2 different bags.
Krysti & Phil 4th Anniversary!
I love the beach!!!!!!!!!!!
Well that's it for now! Toodle-doo!
Monday, October 7, 2013
New England
Hi guys! These are our trip logs from our New England trip!
We got to Provincetown in the afternoon, and it is quite the colorful place. (That’s a pun.) It was very obvious that the place is unabashedly liberal with it seemed more gay/lesbian couples than straight couples. Aside from that and the prolific rainbow flags (and does anyone know why Human Rights advocates use Michigan colors for their flag?), it’s a very artsy area with lots of art galleries, boutiques and restaurants/eateries. We did have the possibility of doing a whale watching boat tour from Provincetown, but time did not allow. A nice breeze cooled the area throughout the evening as we walked the area. The special feature we went to that evening was the Pilgrim memorial tower and museum to commemorate the Pilgrims landing in Cape Cod. We looked first at some of the museum pieces, mostly dealing with boats. Then we went outside to CLIMB THE TOWER.
After lunch we continued on westward, eventually we got
through to Sandwich, MA which had a few things we spent time to see. One was
the Green Briar Nature Center & Jam Kitchen. We looked around and sampled
some of the different jams, then we went outside and looked around their
garden. After that we went to the Heritage Museum & Gardens, which had fun exhibits!
Dan got excited and was texting back rapid-fire to Krysti about the concept car
collection. These cars were never put into mass production since they were
concept cars, but they sure looked cool! It was a car show before the Festival
of Wheels back home. I took lots of pictures and some video. The gardens there
were pretty, and there was a maze area with lots of vines mixed with Christmas
lights, and lots of blossoming trees. By this point being outside trying to
share our umbrella, we were both soaked in different spots by the time we were
finished.
The last thing we did before heading back to the hotel was
spend some time in the Sandwich Glass Museum. We started with a film/show about
the starting of the Sandwich glass factory, then watched a live demonstration
of glass blowing techniques. This I think was my favorite part of the day since
I’ve always enjoyed watching glass making. The museum was larger than I
expected and had hundreds of pieces, all different sizes and shapes, and
including a couple dioramic portions. Tomorrow we plan to get up to Plymouth
and eventually towards Boston.
Today was a packed day: Plymouth to Boston! We started out
to reach Plymouth and spent all morning into early afternoon there. We found
free parking and first worked our way towards Plymouth Rock, where the Pilgrims
landed. We later went to the Pilgrim Memorial Museum, which had a lot of large
paintings inside, some artifacts and a nice 15-minute movie. A lot of focus was
on Thanksgiving, and an interesting note we found was that Native Americans (or
at least some of them) don’t celebrate it as such but more like a day of
mourning or remembrance as the “beginning of the end” for them, so to speak. It
was a really good display!
But the bigger find for us was the Middle Street School of
Music!! We found this building that the business owners rented (they had
SPACE!!) and we got to talk with them about how they do their business and run
things and other considerations that we’ve been trying to figure out. They were
a great resource to tap and just pick their brains and I guess find someone
who’s doing the same thing we are, just in a different setting and
circumstances. The gal we talked to said they used to do a lot of gigging
first, then this opportunity to get a space and teach privately came up and
they went for it. I got some pictures and video of their place while we were
talking and sharing each other’s setup. She offered us a CD of hers that she
recorded with some friends of hers (including a few tracks with a guy who
sometimes plays with Aerosmith – not bad!), and we went back to our car and got
our 5 Myles High CD we had in the car and offered to swap for it. We were just
really stoked to have found these guys and talk about stuff for a little while
– completely unexpected and very wonderful!
Both of these items were rather inexpensive considering the
price of other items in the stores. The stores were really cool! Especially the
store where we got the cat. It was a store of “Items of particular interest” or
something like that, and everything in the store was really interesting, things
we hadn’t seen before, and in good condition.
We then drove to Boston. The plan was to get a head start on
our Boston bit, and we saw a few things, well, a TON of things… including the
Boston Public Library, which was HUGE!!
It had corridors and was like a labyrinth and museum inside a library. –
we also saw the courtyard area nearby which we deduced was nearby the Boston Marathon
Bombing area or at least related to it, because there were memorials set up for
the victims. We saw street musicians performing, and the bass player in it was
REALLY good! They all were good. Krysti liked the keyboard they had, which had
a “modulation wheel” so the guy could bend the pitch of the notes, wow!! That
would be fun. We walked eastward through downtown and wandered through the
Boston Commons, the public park, which was ginormous, and through towards the
Boston Town Hall area. Lots of people and lots of commotion. Like a lot of
other New England locations we’d been in, there was lots of “pride” throughout
the city, including the churches.
We did find Christ Church where past
presidents either attended or taught there. George Washington attended there
New Year’s Eve 1775 during the Boston Siege, and Roosevelt taught Sunday School
there I think, among other notable people being there. We went inside and
perused the hymnbooks, and on our way out I noticed a poster describing them as
a “progressive” church, meaning the enemy is making progress on them. They make
claims such as “We recognize the faiths of other people and so what’s true for
them is good and what’s true for us is good but it all leads to the realm where
God exists” (didn’t even say Heaven?). It sure must be hard to hold Biblical
convictions in this area. It’s all about not offending people and being
accepting of everyone and making people feel good. However, nothing on that
poster said anything about sin or need for salvation or necessarily Christ’s
sacrifice. The gay flag flies alongside the American flag often around here.
Well anyways, we did also go also to Harvard University,
took some pictures and video of that as well. Upon entering the Harvard Square
(I guess the middle of overall campus), we weren’t wondrously impressed like we
were at Yale. Everything there seemed really…. Predictable? It did actually
look like Bluffton University, with spaced out red brick buildings connected by
an interconnected system of sidewalks strewn on a massive yard of grass
punctuated with tall trees. We saw one or two tour groups, and special
attention was given to founder John Harvard’s statue. Apparently people have
for some time rubbed his statue’s left shoe, so much so that it has been rubbed
to a shiny golden color as countless people have posed next to him with their
hand on his shoe. (Yes we did it too.) It wasn’t until we left the Square and
went a little south of it and found a map that we realized the greater scope of
the school. Harvard is built of various schools, like the school of Law and
school of Engineering (like other large schools) which are rather separated
into their own sections north of the main square. All the same, we both felt
that Yale offers a greater aesthetic value than Harvard. Krysti remarked that
Yale seemed like it was secluded and secretive, like they have the secrets of
the world locked away in their castles, but Harvard was like “—meh. It’s a
school.” We did want to go into the
Harvard Library, but it seemed that we needed a Harvard ID for entry access.
Too bad. (That’s ok, the Boston Public Library was massive and awesome.)
Other things in today was we found an ice cream
all-you-can-eat benefit event to raise money for something Boston Bombing
related. That was a noticeable image throughout the city that we saw: Boston
united in Americanism of freedom and solidarity. Lots of “Boston Strong” mottos
spread throughout or related signage and events. Parking in Boston was
interesting as we kinda ended up first wandering some residential areas before
we figured out where to park. Harvard is a bit away from the Commons area, and
to do the Library/Commons, we did the public parking. This operation was
different that we’d done before and it made us a little nervous (well, she was
REALLY nervous, I was just kinda nervous). It’s somewhat valet-style, and you
leave them the car, they pack it in to the lot depending on projected time, and
the keys stay in the car while you keep a valet ticket. We didn’t like the
whole situation very much so we did as much as we could to feel secure about it
before heading out. Everything was fine, it was just very different and
overpriced.
Today was a well travelled day! We started off after having
some breakfast at the hotel, and drove to Salem, MA primarily to see
witch-related historical attractions. We had previewed some things Tuesday like
the Burial ground, so we got to see these things in full daylight. We started
with the Salem Witch Museum, which had a diorama presentation that was a little
on the creepy side. (Things narrated by booming old men are always creepy. I
guess that’s kinda the point.) In the dark there was a glowing blood red circle
in the middle of the floor with the Salem victims who were hanged inscribed
around it. The presentation had scenes set aloft around the perimeter of the
room. Eventually all parts of the walls were illuminated to continue the story.
The hysteria was caused by one thing and another, fueled both by fear of Satan
and the victim’s fear for themselves. It may seem like a stupid episode to
some, but the presentation helps to put you in their perspective. There was
real fear there, and the Sunday ministers would preach about the Devil and
other some such things. But to make it real to us, what do we fear? What sorts
of things cause hysteria in the times of our lives? After the presentation the
staff continued the tour with perceptions of witches, showing how witches
transformed into their various forms over the centuries from trusted medicine
woman who helped in childbirth and used natural herbs to aid illnesses to the
Wicked Witch of the West with her black garb and green face and flying
broomstick, stylized in this fashion to be used in storybooks as both
fictionalized yet mentally frightening. Nowadays witches by technical terms
refer more directly to Wicca, a nature-based religion claiming essentially
Mother Earth as the divining power rather than subscribing directly to Satan,
although there is also witchcraft as we know. The final thing they showed us
was a comparison of recent hysterias from fear of the Japanese to the Red Scare
to something about AIDS and then to Terrorism. Each of these problems was
fueled by specific events/ideas (Pearl Harbor, McCarthy, AIDS, and 9/11), and
these fears each had a scapegoat to take the blame. For instance, AIDS is
blamed on homosexuality and terrorism is blamed on Islam. So perhaps it’s a
subtle if not unintentional method of claiming that human reason is triumphant
above all else - once we figure things out after the fact. Perhaps the greatest
prevailing thought I had when it was all said and done is that God is more
powerful than Satan. When we are faced with fear and we feel unsure as how to
react, we need to keep faith in Christ and the hope of our salvation and
eternity in Heaven. Now the circumstances of those poor people centuries ago –
unexplainable behavior of young girls in trying circumstances, all exacerbated
by Scriptural/religious understanding and fanatical fervor – all of that living
in that time could make anyone question the existence of sanity. But the thought
I had was this: what if the preachers had spent more time preaching on our hope
in Christ for eternal salvation and had lavished love and prayer on the
accused? If they had spent more time fearing God than fearing Satan, they may
have remembered that Satan is not to be feared, and that God is a “mighty
fortress, a bulwark never failing.”
Well anyways….
After we finished at the witch museum we wandered the town of Salem a bit.
There was a helpful red line painted on the sidewalk to help guide you to
relevant historical locations, which we looked at, but not too many. We visited
the burial grounds again and got better pictures, found an antiques store to
browse, and then went to get lunch. I wanted to try the Lobster Shanty again,
hoping that the lunch crowd was considerably less than the later dinner crowd.
It thankfully was, and we enjoyed a nice lunch outside under large orange
umbrellas. I had a nice juicy “Red Eye Burger” which was a hamburger with white
cheese and egg, and a hot sauce of some kind, and a side of tater tots. Yummy!!
Krysti had Mac & Cheese with Lobster. We were both very satisfied. A very
different experience from the night before. I’m glad we went back.
After lunch we left for Glouchester. We walked the streets
and looked in various shops. One cool store was the record store which had lots
of vinyl albums, CDs, and DVDs. The place was decked with posters of famous
musicians. Krysti tried looking for a soundtrack to Les Mis, but they didn’t have one. There were several antique
stores we went into. Once we were finished we walked back and stopped in an
Italian café to get a lemon square. We strolled a brief stretch of seashore on
the way back to the car. “Time in New England – took me away…. To long, rocky
beaches - and you by the bay….” (Sorry, but it fits.)
Boston Museum of Fine Arts – that is an adventure. And considering the time we had, it was a challenge! We got there 6pm-ish – I’m SOOOO glad they have their own parking!! – and so that gave us about 3 ½ hours to conquer it. We got in for free, since Wednesdays after 6 is free night. So we saved $50, yay! It has 4 levels, the top and ground levels being the smallest and only in parts. It’s divided into different subjects: European, the Americas, the Ancient World, Africa/Asia, and Contemporary, plus a couple special exhibits, one being Samurai! Krysti’s favorite part was the “Blue & White” section, with a lot of things which were – well, blue & white. There were a lot of plates and ceramics/porcelain in different configurations. Some of them were arranged in complex hierarchies, and some were separate pieces arranged together to make a whole picture. It was very… artistic! It really was very cool.
My favorite was a little more broad, but I liked the European and American sections the best, and I think the American furniture parts made me go “Whoa.” the most. Many of them were insanely ornate and some of them were larger than I’d expect. It just made me do a little double-take. I found them more relatable to me than, for instance, stone artifacts and things like that. Not that I disliked anything though; it all was rather enrapturing! Perhaps the part we took most pictures off (no flash or video allowed) was the instrument room! There were more musical instruments on display than Mr. Sycks band room! (maybe.) There were many period instruments, most of which I’d never seen before but they were still recognizable as to what family they belonged to. When we first got to the room, there was a special concert there which you could sit in. We opted to wait and come back later since the room was pretty packed and we still had a lot of museum to see at that point. We got a LOT of pictures of the keyboards, including harpsichords, virginals, clavichords, square pianos, all period instruments. We’ll post those on the studio website/Facebook at some point to show our students.
We also did eat at the café in the middle of the building after finishing the 1st level. We were pulling ourselves along at a rather consistent pace to finish the place off in time before closing! I did take time to ask one attendant in the Ancient World section (standing next to massive stone edifices) about how the museum décor is sometimes suited to the artifacts being shown. I asked if the museum gets many renovations to accommodate new exhibits/artifacts being swapped out. She told us that a lot of things are rather permanent, meaning that most things, once they’re in, they’re staying in. Some items can be rotated out for others, but the especially large things - they stay indefinitely. (I overheard one person’s remark in the artifact preservation/restoration room that “it’s exactly the way it was a year ago,” so that may be an indication of the static tendencies of the museum. That’s fine though, it’s all cool!) We did finish in time, though! Whew! We had a huge day, so we were rather beat.
On a side note, I’ve noticed that I have weird and somewhat
original dreams while I’m on vacation. I guess the new activity and the
exhaustion gives me a real deep sleep and plenty of new stuff for my brain to
play with. Even my brain is on vacation. Trippy.
From there we drove back to Boston for another day in town.
We started in Faneuil Hall area, where we’d been before, and got a better map
than the one we had to help guide us. We’ve been getting lots of National park
stamps in our passport thing. We had lunch from Quincy Market behind it – a
food court type hall, Krysti had Indian chicken curry and I had a beef burrito.
Good stuff. Thus filled, we went thru some kind of Italian village in Boston’s
North End, saw Paul Revere’s house alongside one or two school class field
trips, then walked on to Old North Church. It contains the two lanterns which
brought alert to the British advance on
Lexington & Concord. The church has box pews with patron’s names on the sides. (So if you shoot back at someone staring you down with “I don’t see your name on it”, then you aren’t looking hard enough.) People could rent their pews or buy them and then decorate them as they liked. They also had stolen pirated angels that a pirate church-go-er gave to the church because he liked to see them.
We continued onto Copp’s Hill Burial Ground and walked around the graveyard.
Crossing the Charlestown bridge brings you into Charlestown,
the biggest attractions there being the U.S.S.
Constitution and the Bunker Hill memorial. The Constitution was cool to see even though we didn’t wait to go below
decks with the next group – we just went to the top deck. Lots of ropes,
cannons and more ropes. By the time we’d walked to Bunker Hill we were rather
exhausted! We didn’t actually go over the memorial but took a few pictures
instead. We walked back towards where we started to catch a couple other spots,
the Boston Massacre site and the Old Corner Bookstore, (which is now a
Chipotle) before going to the parking garage. We did toy with the thought of
getting the all-you-can-eat ice cream deal that was nearby Faneuil Hall but
opted against it.
We went to Legal Seafood for dinner, because we had seen it earlier. We got there and got our food ordered, but we found the overall experience less than satisfying. I ordered the garlic shrimp which was great and I shared it – it had pasta and the small tomatoes – but Krysti’s order came out not the way we expected. It was some kind of fried crab on Greek pasta. Perhaps the dish itself was fine by all standards, but even I tried the crab and I wasn’t sure what to make of it. It looked like a fried crab, but couldn’t find any meat really. Plus, our waitress seemed to have forgotten we were there and hardly paid attention to us or made sure things were alright or even fill our glasses with water again. To top it off, I also half-spilled (it remained mostly upright!) my water in a spattering motion across the table to her, so that didn’t help.
Destination: Ogunquit, ME. Ogunquit is a nice town similar
to other towns we’ve seen, but it’s fair to say we saw a lot more of it than we
intended. The first thing we did upon arrival was park along Ogunquit beach,
and we did some beach walking, which we hadn’t done yet. I opted for
flip-flops, and we had layers and jackets because we expected (by forecast)
that we would be seeing maybe a little rain but mostly clouds. We did have a
lot of cloud cover at first, but it started breaking and the sun started
warming us up. I shed my coat and zip-up layer and carried it with me, and
Krysti tied her jacket around her. We knew that there was a foot bridge a
little ways north on the beach, so we planned on taking that back into town and
getting a snack from there.
We ended up walking probably a solid hour down the beach,
wandering thru private beaches and wandering “how far does this go??” We
finally found what appeared to be a public access from the beach to the road.
We were clear into a residential area and had to walk ALL the way back, adding
another hour to our time. We did make it back to downtown, but my flip flops
were painful! We had been planning on eating at the Bread & Roses café, but
were so hungry we decided to save it for a snack later. We walked farther on
and found the Wild Blueberry for lunch. Krysti had the Lobster Bisque, and I
had the Lobster Roll. There was an older gentleman providing live piano music
throughout. Krysti was thinking of her upcoming visit to Burgundy’s restaurant
for dinner music, so we were analyzing the player’s piano style. He stayed in
the key of C for a considerably long time, but shifted from one song to another
rather subtly. He used a lot of shifting tempi, alternating thick chords and
sparse voicing, and mixed rhythms, to name a few.
I wanted to walk back to the car to grab my tennis shoes (my new ones!) to help make further walking easier. When I got to the car, I realized that I was already very burned after 3 hours in the sun without sunscreen. Firstly, my feet are (were) extremely white so they’re very sensitive to sun. Second, the forecast beforehand was thinking there was still going to be leftover weather/fallout precipitation from tropical storm Andrea, and the forecast was very wrong, and we weren’t prepared for it as I didn’t have sunscreen with me. So I could tell when I put shoes on that the heat was pulsing from my feet already.
We did stop back at the Bread & Roses so Krysti could get an iced coffee
and a chocolate peanut butter bar. Phil got “green monster” flavor ice cream
(mint, chocolate fudge swirl & Oreo). We got back to the car and started to
realize the extent of our sunburn. (we were both “red lobsters” ^_^.)
We ate at a restaurant on route 1 called the Maine Diner. This place has been graced by both Food Network’s Guy from “Diners, Drive-ins, & Dives,” and Mike & Frank from American Pickers, one of our favorite shows! I had a chicken cordon bleu wrap, Krysti had a warm lobster roll. There were lots of antique stores along route 1 but it was after 5 so most were already closed. We got to our hotel and relaxed early to try and get good sleep before church tomorrow.
We went to church at Thornton Heights UMC, about 60 seconds
from our hotel. They’re at the cusp of transition, with the pastor’s switch
happening at the beginning of July. There was a lot of sentiments this Sunday
for the pastor, including a new stole (sp?)for her that matched a new altar
cloth they were dedicating today. There was also an annual “blessing of the
wheels” which was probably similar to the “blessing of the pets” at Grandma
& Grandpa Groman's church. There were bicycles, scooters, strollers and someone
got clever and brought up their car keys, and other brought in a couple round
kitchen utensils. The congregation here was friendly and welcoming like the
other church last Sunday. They invited us to coffee/snack fellowship afterward,
which we attended briefly before going on.
We drove up to Portland, ME and found Becky’s Diner for
lunch, which Rachel Ray visited on a show (according to Krysti’s iPad app). I
had a bacon cheeseburger and Krysti had eggs, toast & home fries.
We walked
along some of the Eastern Promenade Trail path along the sea and then eventually
walked through downtown and found they had a massive party in the streets
festival of sorts. LOTS of people. Kinda too much, really. But there was a lot
of fun around, with vendors, bands and other small musician groups, and open
doors to restaurants/bars and shops. We tried to navigate the large crowds as
smoothly as possible until we got to thinner crowds.
The amazing thing about houses like these is that everything
is designed for a specific purpose, and everything follows a rather strict
formula. Homes today may be very generic, adaptable and flexible in purpose –
this home is deliberate in its design. You would be greeted by the house staff,
brought to a waiting room, offered some wine/port, and you would basically sit
and marvel at the room you were in, often complete with great portraits of your
hosts. The design is exquisite and, again, deliberate – often a specific theme
is focused on, like a floral theme or a food theme as in the dining room. The
guests would be ushered to the dining room when the house owners were ready,
and then you would retreat to the drawing room (short for withdrawing room).
The furniture matched perfectly to the room and fit the décor precisely. When
the house was sold/transferred to museum status, it was sold “lock, stock &
barrel,” so all the furnishings were included and probably 90-95% of the
materials were original in the mansion. We saw the 2nd floor as well
which had a few bedrooms, a water closet and a smoking room. Overall, the house
was lovely and highly ornate.
We got back to our car – the “parking lot” we were in
smelled like rotting garbage since we’d parked.. not entirely sure why but
there were many cars there parked and it
was free. We drove to Wiscasset to share a lobster roll at Red’s Eats (another
Food Network place). We didn’t stay and look in town but instead continued
driving back towards our hotel in Brunswick. We picked up a pizza for a full
dinner and relaxed watching tv. Tomorrow we leave early to head to Bar Harbor
for the last 3 days of our vacation.
Monday, June 10th
After exploring what we could of the park, we drove back out
to backtrack a little to our hotel. It’s a nice hotel! The folks at the front
desk said this was newly renovated, and we’re the second people to stay in our
room! It has that new building smell when you come into it, and Krysti made
special note that the toilet is the cleanest/newest toilet she has ever used.
(who is it that says “cleanliness is next to Godliness?”) Krysti also loves the
Blueberry flavored coffee in the front desk area. She’s had 2 cups already!
(well, one of them wasn’t completely full.)
We drove back to the hotel, upon which Krysti commenced a
lengthy stretch of office work (emailing, mostly) to ensure the summer session
with be as ready as possible when we return. Oh why, oh why, can’t people just
follow our system? If they had returned their summer form by May 22 like we
asked and emailed and explained and reminded at recitals, it would have saved
probably 3-4 hours of work. Seriously!!!!!!!!!!!!! Okay. We have two days left
out here on the east coast! Hopefully it doesn’t rain too badly like they’re
expecting.
We had already visited Acadia National Park and Bar Harbor,
which is mostly the east side of Mount Desert Island, so today we spent time
driving around the west side of the island. It was still raining pretty
thoroughly, from mist to light steady rain. We walked a trail partway, we drove
to what looked like a dock for the U.S. Coast Guard (which earlier during the
trip we learned was first called the United States Lifesaving Service). We
stopped at the lighthouse which is the southernmost part of the island facing
out into the Atlantic. Mostly we drove around to the little villages on the
west side before coming back to Bar Harbor for lunch at China Joy! Since I had
stuffed myself at breakfast, I actually couldn’t finish my lunch, so I got a
box and it’s sitting in the room fridge right now. (I’m gonna have to heat it
up tomorrow before we check out. Chinese for breakfast--??)
We came back to the hotel and relaxed, watching TV. We’ve
basically accomplished what we intended to do for this trip, and we looked at
visiting a little further past the island to the Schoodic National Scenic Byway
area. We yesterday decided to do dinner in Bar Harbor at Gayln for their early
bird dinner specials, and I got a whole boiled lobster. This was my first time
really having a full lobster for dinner, so having those lobster rolls earlier
in the trip helped my recognize what’s lobster meat and what isn’t. We shared
that then stopped at the market in town to get small cups of ice cream to take
back to the room! We ate ice cream and watched more TV – our favorite channels
are History, TLC, and Food Network.
Saturday June 1st
We left Bluffton around 5am to head east. We got some
McDonalds first thing. We had a 10-hour trip to Yale University. I tried a
Mountain Dew Kickstart for the first time, and I must say it’s WAY better than
Monster. (that stuff gives me the jibblies.) We wanted to look around Yale
campus since it was featured in Gilmore Girls. I kept saying things like “I
wonder if this is where Rory sat outside to study, or if this is where the Yale
Daily News is written,” etc.
While we were there, we found that they were
having the 5th Yale Reunion on campus and encountered a couple spots
where official reunion things were happening. I kept taking pictures of things
and a couple videos just because the campus is so beautiful! The buildings are
gorgeous stone – almost looking English or old Renaissance (minus massive
tapestries). We both felt it would be really cool to study there because of the
history of the place, but we also thought that current students would not
appreciate it as much. Since we’ve been undergrads (or grads) we’ve been
through the whole “kid lost in campus” feeling, and it would be fun in another
life to study at Yale or some other Ivy League school.
While we were there, we found that they were
having the 5th Yale Reunion on campus and encountered a couple spots
where official reunion things were happening. I kept taking pictures of things
and a couple videos just because the campus is so beautiful! The buildings are
gorgeous stone – almost looking English or old Renaissance (minus massive
tapestries). We both felt it would be really cool to study there because of the
history of the place, but we also thought that current students would not
appreciate it as much. Since we’ve been undergrads (or grads) we’ve been
through the whole “kid lost in campus” feeling, and it would be fun in another
life to study at Yale or some other Ivy League school.
After wandering around for an hour or so we stopped and had
dinner at a little restaurant called Caseus, which was featured on the Food
Network. Krysti had a mushroom tart and I had a sausage, both of these came
with veggies. It was a cool restaurant that was walking distance from campus.
Then we kept going another 3 hours or so to West Dennis Massachusetts and
crashed there.
Sunday June 2nd
We looked while eating yesterday for churches in the West
Dennis area and we came across Eastham United Methodist Church. They are a
small church but they basically ran the same way that Rockport does. They are
more of a “singing church” as Greg describes, than we are since they use the
responsive stanzas with full musical refrains in-between. Since we did that at
Rockport during Easter-tide we were familiar with it. The people there are
friendly and went out of their way to welcome us. We went to the 8am service
and then got a little breakfast at the “Donut Hole” up the street from the
church on route 6. She got a peach apricot shortbread square (which was
delicious!) and I got something called a “Tom Bomb” with was basically a
cinnamon donut in the shape of an oversized muffin.
The big idea for today was to eventually make our way up the
arm of Cape Cod all the way to Provincetown, where the Pilgrims came ashore.
The ulterior mission in this whole New England trip was to eat lobster too. So
the first important thing on our itinerary was to go to the Cape Cod National
Seashore visitors’ center, or at least one of them. This location featured the
Nauset Swamp area, which had a couple walking trails. One of them was closed
off due to the marsh flooding out a little onto the path. In the visitors’
center was a short film we watched about sailors and boats in the area.
For lunch, we planned to go to back a ways to Young’s Fish
Market to buy lobster rolls. So far, they’re the least expensive we’ve come
across, and they are yummy! We got them and took them to the shore to eat them
looking out over the water. We returned to the arm of the Cape to keep going
further north on Route 6. We stopped at several more trails to take pictures
and video. A couple of them were marsh-like with suspended paths in flooded
woods. It reminded me of the Everglades in Florida. There were several beaches
we saw from a distance too. I took lots of pictures.
We got to Provincetown in the afternoon, and it is quite the colorful place. (That’s a pun.) It was very obvious that the place is unabashedly liberal with it seemed more gay/lesbian couples than straight couples. Aside from that and the prolific rainbow flags (and does anyone know why Human Rights advocates use Michigan colors for their flag?), it’s a very artsy area with lots of art galleries, boutiques and restaurants/eateries. We did have the possibility of doing a whale watching boat tour from Provincetown, but time did not allow. A nice breeze cooled the area throughout the evening as we walked the area. The special feature we went to that evening was the Pilgrim memorial tower and museum to commemorate the Pilgrims landing in Cape Cod. We looked first at some of the museum pieces, mostly dealing with boats. Then we went outside to CLIMB THE TOWER.
Now, I have no idea how high that thing is, but it takes a
LONG time to climb it. The wraparound inside is more of a lot of ramps rather
than stairs. It makes the going a lot longer, but a lot easier. (and a lot
dizzier.) At the top you are supposed to be able to see Boston, but the horizon
was rather foggy. Nonetheless the view was wonderful. You could see the shape
of the Cape arm for a little ways. I timed how long it took to get down and it
was around 5 minutes or so, about 3 times faster than going up, I’m sure. We
kept looking around the museum and the town before heading back. For dinner, we
went to Karoo, a South African cuisine restaurant. She got mussels and I got
shrimp in peri-peri sauce, a kind of spicy tomato/herb sauce. We went back the
hotel and were able to check email and keep things going there. Krysti set up a
Facebook advertising campaign so we like to keep track of it to see what
response it’s getting.
Monday June 3rd
We had planned on the itinerary to explore “The Old King’s
Highway,” route 6A on Cape Cod. It goes from up the arm of the Cape, but we
started it at Orleans, MA and went west from there. It was persistently RAINY.
It might’ve been sprinkling, spitting, showering or pouring but there was always
some form of liquid precipitation. But we tried to not let it rain on our
parade. We stopped at a beach to look at it for a minute and drove on westward.
We had some stops planned on the route and I tried to find a couple places to
stop off and look extra.
We had the Cape Cod Potato Chip factory to visit, which had
a walking tour to go through. You could look through and watch the workers
doing their thing. At the end you could grab a couple free small bags of chips,
original flavor and a really yummy feta & rosemary flavor. We ate lunch at
the Blue Plate diner, which had a lot of blue plates lining the ceiling. She
had a bowl of clam chowder and I had a pastrami sandwich with fries. In brief
conversation with our waitress, we found that massive downpours like what we
had today are not very common. If anything, they might get a drizzle or light
rain, then sunshine.
After lunch we continued on westward, eventually we got
through to Sandwich, MA which had a few things we spent time to see. One was
the Green Briar Nature Center & Jam Kitchen. We looked around and sampled
some of the different jams, then we went outside and looked around their
garden. After that we went to the Heritage Museum & Gardens, which had fun exhibits!
Dan got excited and was texting back rapid-fire to Krysti about the concept car
collection. These cars were never put into mass production since they were
concept cars, but they sure looked cool! It was a car show before the Festival
of Wheels back home. I took lots of pictures and some video. The gardens there
were pretty, and there was a maze area with lots of vines mixed with Christmas
lights, and lots of blossoming trees. By this point being outside trying to
share our umbrella, we were both soaked in different spots by the time we were
finished. The last thing we did before heading back to the hotel was
spend some time in the Sandwich Glass Museum. We started with a film/show about
the starting of the Sandwich glass factory, then watched a live demonstration
of glass blowing techniques. This I think was my favorite part of the day since
I’ve always enjoyed watching glass making. The museum was larger than I
expected and had hundreds of pieces, all different sizes and shapes, and
including a couple dioramic portions. Tomorrow we plan to get up to Plymouth
and eventually towards Boston.
Tuesday June 4th
Today was a packed day: Plymouth to Boston! We started out
to reach Plymouth and spent all morning into early afternoon there. We found
free parking and first worked our way towards Plymouth Rock, where the Pilgrims
landed. We later went to the Pilgrim Memorial Museum, which had a lot of large
paintings inside, some artifacts and a nice 15-minute movie. A lot of focus was
on Thanksgiving, and an interesting note we found was that Native Americans (or
at least some of them) don’t celebrate it as such but more like a day of
mourning or remembrance as the “beginning of the end” for them, so to speak. It
was a really good display!But the bigger find for us was the Middle Street School of
Music!! We found this building that the business owners rented (they had
SPACE!!) and we got to talk with them about how they do their business and run
things and other considerations that we’ve been trying to figure out. They were
a great resource to tap and just pick their brains and I guess find someone
who’s doing the same thing we are, just in a different setting and
circumstances. The gal we talked to said they used to do a lot of gigging
first, then this opportunity to get a space and teach privately came up and
they went for it. I got some pictures and video of their place while we were
talking and sharing each other’s setup. She offered us a CD of hers that she
recorded with some friends of hers (including a few tracks with a guy who
sometimes plays with Aerosmith – not bad!), and we went back to our car and got
our 5 Myles High CD we had in the car and offered to swap for it. We were just
really stoked to have found these guys and talk about stuff for a little while
– completely unexpected and very wonderful!
We continued in Plymouth looking up and down the street in
all the different shops, and had lunch at a Thai restaurant (in honor of Cousin
Darrel ^_^). Krysti had Pad Thai
(reallyyyy yummmyyyyyyy!!) and Phil had chicken and rice something. A couple
stores were of special note for Krysti, and we purchased an antique bread box
to keep our snacks in for the kitchen (we had been looking for one off and on
and this one was in good condition and cheap!), and another store we got a
white cat that we’ll keep with us thru the trip and take home with us.
Well, a white cat made of porcelain.
We then drove to Boston. The plan was to get a head start on
our Boston bit, and we saw a few things, well, a TON of things… including the
Boston Public Library, which was HUGE!!
It had corridors and was like a labyrinth and museum inside a library. –
we also saw the courtyard area nearby which we deduced was nearby the Boston Marathon
Bombing area or at least related to it, because there were memorials set up for
the victims. We saw street musicians performing, and the bass player in it was
REALLY good! They all were good. Krysti liked the keyboard they had, which had
a “modulation wheel” so the guy could bend the pitch of the notes, wow!! That
would be fun. We walked eastward through downtown and wandered through the
Boston Commons, the public park, which was ginormous, and through towards the
Boston Town Hall area. Lots of people and lots of commotion. Like a lot of
other New England locations we’d been in, there was lots of “pride” throughout
the city, including the churches. We did find Christ Church where past
presidents either attended or taught there. George Washington attended there
New Year’s Eve 1775 during the Boston Siege, and Roosevelt taught Sunday School
there I think, among other notable people being there. We went inside and
perused the hymnbooks, and on our way out I noticed a poster describing them as
a “progressive” church, meaning the enemy is making progress on them. They make
claims such as “We recognize the faiths of other people and so what’s true for
them is good and what’s true for us is good but it all leads to the realm where
God exists” (didn’t even say Heaven?). It sure must be hard to hold Biblical
convictions in this area. It’s all about not offending people and being
accepting of everyone and making people feel good. However, nothing on that
poster said anything about sin or need for salvation or necessarily Christ’s
sacrifice. The gay flag flies alongside the American flag often around here. Other things in today was we found an ice cream
all-you-can-eat benefit event to raise money for something Boston Bombing
related. That was a noticeable image throughout the city that we saw: Boston
united in Americanism of freedom and solidarity. Lots of “Boston Strong” mottos
spread throughout or related signage and events. Parking in Boston was
interesting as we kinda ended up first wandering some residential areas before
we figured out where to park. Harvard is a bit away from the Commons area, and
to do the Library/Commons, we did the public parking. This operation was
different that we’d done before and it made us a little nervous (well, she was
REALLY nervous, I was just kinda nervous). It’s somewhat valet-style, and you
leave them the car, they pack it in to the lot depending on projected time, and
the keys stay in the car while you keep a valet ticket. We didn’t like the
whole situation very much so we did as much as we could to feel secure about it
before heading out. Everything was fine, it was just very different and
overpriced.
For dinner we tried to go to the Lobster Shack which was
featured on the Food Network, but we went in twice and they missed us both
times. No employees noticed or acknowledged us. So they struck out. We did
preview the Salem witch site, but we’ll probably get back to that tomorrow. We
got Pizza Hut nearby. We walked a lot today and we are sore! I said we’ll need
to take some Ibuprofen tomorrow to do the Freedom Walk in Boston.
Wednesday June 5th
The hysteria was caused by one thing and another, fueled both by fear of Satan
and the victim’s fear for themselves. It may seem like a stupid episode to
some, but the presentation helps to put you in their perspective. There was
real fear there, and the Sunday ministers would preach about the Devil and
other some such things. But to make it real to us, what do we fear? What sorts
of things cause hysteria in the times of our lives? After the presentation the
staff continued the tour with perceptions of witches, showing how witches
transformed into their various forms over the centuries from trusted medicine
woman who helped in childbirth and used natural herbs to aid illnesses to the
Wicked Witch of the West with her black garb and green face and flying
broomstick, stylized in this fashion to be used in storybooks as both
fictionalized yet mentally frightening. Nowadays witches by technical terms
refer more directly to Wicca, a nature-based religion claiming essentially
Mother Earth as the divining power rather than subscribing directly to Satan,
although there is also witchcraft as we know. The final thing they showed us
was a comparison of recent hysterias from fear of the Japanese to the Red Scare
to something about AIDS and then to Terrorism. Each of these problems was
fueled by specific events/ideas (Pearl Harbor, McCarthy, AIDS, and 9/11), and
these fears each had a scapegoat to take the blame. For instance, AIDS is
blamed on homosexuality and terrorism is blamed on Islam. So perhaps it’s a
subtle if not unintentional method of claiming that human reason is triumphant
above all else - once we figure things out after the fact. Perhaps the greatest
prevailing thought I had when it was all said and done is that God is more
powerful than Satan. When we are faced with fear and we feel unsure as how to
react, we need to keep faith in Christ and the hope of our salvation and
eternity in Heaven. Now the circumstances of those poor people centuries ago –
unexplainable behavior of young girls in trying circumstances, all exacerbated
by Scriptural/religious understanding and fanatical fervor – all of that living
in that time could make anyone question the existence of sanity. But the thought
I had was this: what if the preachers had spent more time preaching on our hope
in Christ for eternal salvation and had lavished love and prayer on the
accused? If they had spent more time fearing God than fearing Satan, they may
have remembered that Satan is not to be feared, and that God is a “mighty
fortress, a bulwark never failing.”
--I spent a lot of time on that, didn’t i..?
Well anyways….
After we finished at the witch museum we wandered the town of Salem a bit.
There was a helpful red line painted on the sidewalk to help guide you to
relevant historical locations, which we looked at, but not too many. We visited
the burial grounds again and got better pictures, found an antiques store to
browse, and then went to get lunch. I wanted to try the Lobster Shanty again,
hoping that the lunch crowd was considerably less than the later dinner crowd.
It thankfully was, and we enjoyed a nice lunch outside under large orange
umbrellas. I had a nice juicy “Red Eye Burger” which was a hamburger with white
cheese and egg, and a hot sauce of some kind, and a side of tater tots. Yummy!!
Krysti had Mac & Cheese with Lobster. We were both very satisfied. A very
different experience from the night before. I’m glad we went back. After lunch we left for Glouchester. We walked the streets
and looked in various shops. One cool store was the record store which had lots
of vinyl albums, CDs, and DVDs. The place was decked with posters of famous
musicians. Krysti tried looking for a soundtrack to Les Mis, but they didn’t have one. There were several antique
stores we went into. Once we were finished we walked back and stopped in an
Italian café to get a lemon square. We strolled a brief stretch of seashore on
the way back to the car. “Time in New England – took me away…. To long, rocky
beaches - and you by the bay….” (Sorry, but it fits.)
After Glouchester, we went to… Rockport! (Massachusetts.)
Rockport, MA was very cool! It was almost like a small piece of a European
village because of how the streets were narrow and there were a couple side streets
that angled off with more shops. It was rather similar to Provincetown in its
shop section, just not as high key and packed with busy people, just a little
quieter. Lots of art galleries, antiques stores and different novelty shops. We
stopped in one antique store and found a lamp with a porcelain lady as the
base. So now we have a cat, bread box, and lady-lamp. If this shopping keeps up
we’re gonna run out of room, and we’re not even halfway done with vacation!
Rockport is basically the farthest northeast into the sea as MA gets, so as we
approached the end of the thoroughfare we were greeted by the Atlantic Ocean.
We were tempted to buy Rockport, MA apparel but ultimately didn’t. (I took
pictures instead. Almost as good as the real thing!)
Boston Museum of Fine Arts – that is an adventure. And considering the time we had, it was a challenge! We got there 6pm-ish – I’m SOOOO glad they have their own parking!! – and so that gave us about 3 ½ hours to conquer it. We got in for free, since Wednesdays after 6 is free night. So we saved $50, yay! It has 4 levels, the top and ground levels being the smallest and only in parts. It’s divided into different subjects: European, the Americas, the Ancient World, Africa/Asia, and Contemporary, plus a couple special exhibits, one being Samurai! Krysti’s favorite part was the “Blue & White” section, with a lot of things which were – well, blue & white. There were a lot of plates and ceramics/porcelain in different configurations. Some of them were arranged in complex hierarchies, and some were separate pieces arranged together to make a whole picture. It was very… artistic! It really was very cool.
My favorite was a little more broad, but I liked the European and American sections the best, and I think the American furniture parts made me go “Whoa.” the most. Many of them were insanely ornate and some of them were larger than I’d expect. It just made me do a little double-take. I found them more relatable to me than, for instance, stone artifacts and things like that. Not that I disliked anything though; it all was rather enrapturing! Perhaps the part we took most pictures off (no flash or video allowed) was the instrument room! There were more musical instruments on display than Mr. Sycks band room! (maybe.) There were many period instruments, most of which I’d never seen before but they were still recognizable as to what family they belonged to. When we first got to the room, there was a special concert there which you could sit in. We opted to wait and come back later since the room was pretty packed and we still had a lot of museum to see at that point. We got a LOT of pictures of the keyboards, including harpsichords, virginals, clavichords, square pianos, all period instruments. We’ll post those on the studio website/Facebook at some point to show our students.
We also did eat at the café in the middle of the building after finishing the 1st level. We were pulling ourselves along at a rather consistent pace to finish the place off in time before closing! I did take time to ask one attendant in the Ancient World section (standing next to massive stone edifices) about how the museum décor is sometimes suited to the artifacts being shown. I asked if the museum gets many renovations to accommodate new exhibits/artifacts being swapped out. She told us that a lot of things are rather permanent, meaning that most things, once they’re in, they’re staying in. Some items can be rotated out for others, but the especially large things - they stay indefinitely. (I overheard one person’s remark in the artifact preservation/restoration room that “it’s exactly the way it was a year ago,” so that may be an indication of the static tendencies of the museum. That’s fine though, it’s all cool!) We did finish in time, though! Whew! We had a huge day, so we were rather beat.
Thursday June 6th
This morning we didn’t jam pack as many things into one day
as we have other days and we got a later start, sleeping in a little. We were
able to get some studio work done – making calls and doing some email. We got
breakfast at Dunkin Donuts (YUM! And they’re everywhere!) and then went to the Container Store nearby to
browse what they had. We purchased a small cord holder so as to keep our charge
cords in our bedroom at home from splaying out all over the floor.
From there we drove back to Boston for another day in town.
We started in Faneuil Hall area, where we’d been before, and got a better map
than the one we had to help guide us. We’ve been getting lots of National park
stamps in our passport thing. We had lunch from Quincy Market behind it – a
food court type hall, Krysti had Indian chicken curry and I had a beef burrito.
Good stuff. Thus filled, we went thru some kind of Italian village in Boston’s
North End, saw Paul Revere’s house alongside one or two school class field
trips, then walked on to Old North Church. It contains the two lanterns which
brought alert to the British advance on Lexington & Concord. The church has box pews with patron’s names on the sides. (So if you shoot back at someone staring you down with “I don’t see your name on it”, then you aren’t looking hard enough.) People could rent their pews or buy them and then decorate them as they liked. They also had stolen pirated angels that a pirate church-go-er gave to the church because he liked to see them.
We continued onto Copp’s Hill Burial Ground and walked around the graveyard.
Crossing the Charlestown bridge brings you into Charlestown,
the biggest attractions there being the U.S.S.
Constitution and the Bunker Hill memorial. The Constitution was cool to see even though we didn’t wait to go below
decks with the next group – we just went to the top deck. Lots of ropes,
cannons and more ropes. By the time we’d walked to Bunker Hill we were rather
exhausted! We didn’t actually go over the memorial but took a few pictures
instead. We walked back towards where we started to catch a couple other spots,
the Boston Massacre site and the Old Corner Bookstore, (which is now a
Chipotle) before going to the parking garage. We did toy with the thought of
getting the all-you-can-eat ice cream deal that was nearby Faneuil Hall but
opted against it.We went to Legal Seafood for dinner, because we had seen it earlier. We got there and got our food ordered, but we found the overall experience less than satisfying. I ordered the garlic shrimp which was great and I shared it – it had pasta and the small tomatoes – but Krysti’s order came out not the way we expected. It was some kind of fried crab on Greek pasta. Perhaps the dish itself was fine by all standards, but even I tried the crab and I wasn’t sure what to make of it. It looked like a fried crab, but couldn’t find any meat really. Plus, our waitress seemed to have forgotten we were there and hardly paid attention to us or made sure things were alright or even fill our glasses with water again. To top it off, I also half-spilled (it remained mostly upright!) my water in a spattering motion across the table to her, so that didn’t help.
But anyways, we decided to wander the mall the restaurant
was in and it was pretty big! We didn’t even do the lower level, but there was
a lot of ground to cover. Much bigger than a mall like Lima or Toledo. It was
cool. We were rather beat from all the expenditure of energy we had incurred
over the day so we went back to the hotel to call it a night and relax.
Tomorrow we plan to return to Salem to go to the Peabody Essex Museum (free on
Friday) and then go to Manchester-by-the-Sea to see what they have there. If it
is anything like Rockport, MA then it should be fun!
Friday June 7th
Today was mostly different from the pace we’ve been taking.
We first had breakfast at the hotel. I already knew from consulting
Accuweather, but it was rainy all thru today. The only planned things we had
for today was to go to Manchester-by-the-Sea and the Peabody Essex Museum in
Salem. Machester-by-the-Sea (“MBTS” from henceforth) wasn’t anything
particularly different from what we’d seen before in smalltown Massachusetts,
and because it was raining consistently we weren’t terribly keen on getting out
and exploring. We just drove around and said “OK that’s good.”
We drove back to Salem (which by this time, being the 3rd
time we were there, certain streets were beginning to get slightly familiar to
us), and ended up parking in exactly the
same spot we parked last time, in front of the Salem Witch Museum! This time we
were going to the Peabody Essex Museum. We planned it for this day because of a
special where you get Friday free. Apparently, it wasn’t. It was some weird deal
where I guess different facilities get certain days off, and the PEM (also
abbreviated from henceforth) wouldn’t have its free Friday till July. Oh well,
we were planning on seeing it anyway so we paid up. It was a nice collection of
mostly artifacts, with a Western helping of maritime related
artifacts/paintings. There was also a lot of Eastern things as well. One thing
Krysti took note of was a document and a small single piece with a Cross. It
was labeled “Christianity in Japan,” and featured a document that said “turn in
your brother and get $300 pieces of silver, turn in your father and get $500
pieces of silver.” (I don’t think that’s what Jesus meant by hating your
father, mother, brother, etc. to follow Him.) Christianity was highly
persecuted in Japan at the time that faith in Christ was rather akin to being a
Christian in a Muslim country. If your family found out, you were either
disowned and claimed as dead or they’d kill you themselves to “protect their
honor.”
Once finished there, we decided to find a place to eat for lunch, and with Krysti’s Food Network app on the iPad we found a restaurant nearby (The app is fully loaded, it doesn’t require internet. How convenient!) called The Little Depot Diner. It was really cool! It was small, like a trailer or something. It was all train themed, including train-Americana display affixed around, a working train set that would chug around the ceiling on its track, and a train whistle the young gal would pull and shout “Order!” (not “all aboard.”) The waitress reminded me of a younger version of my students’ mom, just with facial features and mannerisms. The atmosphere was very cozy, very small-town familiar feeling. It felt like something out of a TV show or movie where you have regulars come in with backstories you have no clue about, but they’re all rambling about the latest news or just calling each other by first names and coming and going with such ease like they’ve done it a thousand times before. It’s fun to drop into someone else’s story for a bit!
Once finished there, we decided to find a place to eat for lunch, and with Krysti’s Food Network app on the iPad we found a restaurant nearby (The app is fully loaded, it doesn’t require internet. How convenient!) called The Little Depot Diner. It was really cool! It was small, like a trailer or something. It was all train themed, including train-Americana display affixed around, a working train set that would chug around the ceiling on its track, and a train whistle the young gal would pull and shout “Order!” (not “all aboard.”) The waitress reminded me of a younger version of my students’ mom, just with facial features and mannerisms. The atmosphere was very cozy, very small-town familiar feeling. It felt like something out of a TV show or movie where you have regulars come in with backstories you have no clue about, but they’re all rambling about the latest news or just calling each other by first names and coming and going with such ease like they’ve done it a thousand times before. It’s fun to drop into someone else’s story for a bit!
Then we went back to the mall we had browsed before since it
was still raining and decided to be a little more in detail with our browsing. Krysti
purchased some camis from Forever XXI (we noticed when we got back to the hotel
that they have printed on the bottom of the bag “John 3:16!” Who knew!) and she
also got a little trim and styling at the hair salon! I took the opportunity to
explore a couple stores on my own, especially Verizon and Brookstone. I always
like Brookstone because they have cool items. Krysti gave me a heads-up that
they have a massage chair in back, so I had
to check it out. It’s a full-body setup that leans you back in a “zero-gravity”
mode to make you feel like you’re floating in the air, and it first “measures”
you to analyze how you’re sitting, how tall your back is, etc., to know a
little better how to massage you. I did a 15-minute full body massage and it felt GOOD. If I had a few extra
thousand to throw around I might be tempted to get one. It massages the whole body, even with channels to insert
your arms and hands in, so they get a nice squeeze/kneading. I also got a new
game from Gamestop, so I was happy and I’m set for quite a while. So after she
got her trim & style we wandered the rest of the mall to make sure we saw
everything, then we went over to Kohls, which was at a smaller mall a couple
streets north of us.
At Kohls, Krysti had a 30% discount she’d gotten in the mail
so this was the time to go for it. She found some good clearance items which
was great, and I was in desperate
need of new shoes to replace my tennis shoes and casual brown shoes. (those
brown ones have served me well – I almost think I’ve had them since college??)
We spent a good deal of time there, and after we checked out, we looked at the
rest of that mall. I had scouted ahead to see what our food options were there.
We decided to get some ice cream from the McDonalds in the food court rather
than a full dinner because we still had leftover pizza from Dominoes a couple
nights ago in our room fridge. (I had to dismantle the pizza box and re
configure it to make it fit. Then I had to re-dismantle
it to fit it into the microwave in the breakfast room.) We then just
“chillaxed,” as she puts it, trying out our new outfits a little, watched TV
and played with our stuff. Tomorrow we’re heading out early-ish to head up to
Ogunquit, Maine. The rain won’t stop anytime soon as the forecast suggests, but
we’ll see what happens. At least now I have new shoes to keep me dryer better!
Saturday June 8th
Destination: Ogunquit, ME. Ogunquit is a nice town similar
to other towns we’ve seen, but it’s fair to say we saw a lot more of it than we
intended. The first thing we did upon arrival was park along Ogunquit beach,
and we did some beach walking, which we hadn’t done yet. I opted for
flip-flops, and we had layers and jackets because we expected (by forecast)
that we would be seeing maybe a little rain but mostly clouds. We did have a
lot of cloud cover at first, but it started breaking and the sun started
warming us up. I shed my coat and zip-up layer and carried it with me, and
Krysti tied her jacket around her. We knew that there was a foot bridge a
little ways north on the beach, so we planned on taking that back into town and
getting a snack from there.
That was a really long
beach.
..aaand we missed the footbridge WAY back there behind us.
We ended up walking probably a solid hour down the beach,
wandering thru private beaches and wandering “how far does this go??” We
finally found what appeared to be a public access from the beach to the road.
We were clear into a residential area and had to walk ALL the way back, adding
another hour to our time. We did make it back to downtown, but my flip flops
were painful! We had been planning on eating at the Bread & Roses café, but
were so hungry we decided to save it for a snack later. We walked farther on
and found the Wild Blueberry for lunch. Krysti had the Lobster Bisque, and I
had the Lobster Roll. There was an older gentleman providing live piano music
throughout. Krysti was thinking of her upcoming visit to Burgundy’s restaurant
for dinner music, so we were analyzing the player’s piano style. He stayed in
the key of C for a considerably long time, but shifted from one song to another
rather subtly. He used a lot of shifting tempi, alternating thick chords and
sparse voicing, and mixed rhythms, to name a few.
We did continue on undeterred, and found the Marginal Way
walking path. We incorrectly labeled the beach as Marginal Way, but that was
just Ogunquit beach. Marginal Way is more of a stone walking path that hugs the
rocky shore on its way down to Perkin’s Cove. The walk down was gorgeous with
the waves crashing into the massive rocks that stretched for a couple hundred
feet towards the sea. We entertained the thought of taking the trolley back
into town, but we already were walking towards town again so we opted against.
We did stop back at the Bread & Roses so Krysti could get an iced coffee
and a chocolate peanut butter bar. Phil got “green monster” flavor ice cream
(mint, chocolate fudge swirl & Oreo). We got back to the car and started to
realize the extent of our sunburn. (we were both “red lobsters” ^_^.)We ate at a restaurant on route 1 called the Maine Diner. This place has been graced by both Food Network’s Guy from “Diners, Drive-ins, & Dives,” and Mike & Frank from American Pickers, one of our favorite shows! I had a chicken cordon bleu wrap, Krysti had a warm lobster roll. There were lots of antique stores along route 1 but it was after 5 so most were already closed. We got to our hotel and relaxed early to try and get good sleep before church tomorrow.
Sunday, June 9th
We went to church at Thornton Heights UMC, about 60 seconds
from our hotel. They’re at the cusp of transition, with the pastor’s switch
happening at the beginning of July. There was a lot of sentiments this Sunday
for the pastor, including a new stole (sp?)for her that matched a new altar
cloth they were dedicating today. There was also an annual “blessing of the
wheels” which was probably similar to the “blessing of the pets” at Grandma
& Grandpa Groman's church. There were bicycles, scooters, strollers and someone
got clever and brought up their car keys, and other brought in a couple round
kitchen utensils. The congregation here was friendly and welcoming like the
other church last Sunday. They invited us to coffee/snack fellowship afterward,
which we attended briefly before going on.We drove up to Portland, ME and found Becky’s Diner for
lunch, which Rachel Ray visited on a show (according to Krysti’s iPad app). I
had a bacon cheeseburger and Krysti had eggs, toast & home fries. We walked
along some of the Eastern Promenade Trail path along the sea and then eventually
walked through downtown and found they had a massive party in the streets
festival of sorts. LOTS of people. Kinda too much, really. But there was a lot
of fun around, with vendors, bands and other small musician groups, and open
doors to restaurants/bars and shops. We tried to navigate the large crowds as
smoothly as possible until we got to thinner crowds.
Eventually we turned back towards the shore towards the Victorian Mansion, which was our main visiting objective that day. It was a lovely house, and we had a very nice tour guide all to ourselves to show us the house. She guided is through the interior in much the same order as guests would have been guided through the house.
We got back to our car – the “parking lot” we were in
smelled like rotting garbage since we’d parked.. not entirely sure why but
there were many cars there parked and it
was free. We drove to Wiscasset to share a lobster roll at Red’s Eats (another
Food Network place). We didn’t stay and look in town but instead continued
driving back towards our hotel in Brunswick. We picked up a pizza for a full
dinner and relaxed watching tv. Tomorrow we leave early to head to Bar Harbor
for the last 3 days of our vacation.Monday, June 10th
We had breakfast at the hotel before heading out. We had at
least 3 hours and more of driving, as we planned to take highway 1 instead of
the interstate. We drove thru a lot of nice-looking small towns but didn’t take
time to explore them or we would have never gotten to bar harbor before dinner!
We did have lunch at Wendy’s with some time left before getting to our
destination.
We arrived at Acadia national park (not “Arcadia.” No “r”.)
The Visitor’s Center had a nice video segment of a full-length movie about
the park. We drove the scenic loop drive around, taking some stops for pictures
and video along the way. A few special noted stops were Sandy Point beach,
which was a stretch of sand beach rather rare in the park, and then “Thunder
Hole”, which is a particular setup of rocks in which the water can flow into
it, building concussive waves which trap the air into a pocket and create a
water explosion which, when forceful enough, can thoroughly drench nearby
onlookers much like a Cedar Point water ride. We eventually drove up to
Cadillac Mountain, the tallest peak on the east coast. You can see for a good
distance up there, so I tried to make sure I got pictures and video. Your ears
popped considerably on the way up and down. There is a hiking trail to get up
there, but we didn’t have 6 hours to spare going up then back down. A lot other
of what we saw was rocky shores which the waves crashed into and wooded paths
we walked through. We explored several outcroppings of salmon-colored rocks and
even found a few (freezing cold) crystal-clear pools of various sea life in its
own little world in the rocky formations.
After exploring what we could of the park, we drove back out
to backtrack a little to our hotel. It’s a nice hotel! The folks at the front
desk said this was newly renovated, and we’re the second people to stay in our
room! It has that new building smell when you come into it, and Krysti made
special note that the toilet is the cleanest/newest toilet she has ever used.
(who is it that says “cleanliness is next to Godliness?”) Krysti also loves the
Blueberry flavored coffee in the front desk area. She’s had 2 cups already!
(well, one of them wasn’t completely full.)
We drove into Bar Harbor downtown and walked around before
having dinner. The town is very nice with a big downtown area loaded with shops
and restaurants! We looked in several stores and got a couple items. One of
those is for the cats, although we won’t tell them when we get back. It’s a
little basket with green and pink patterns on it and a lid. The idea is that
Whitney might see it and decide she wants to fit inside it and curl up for her
nap. So we will let her claim it as her own if she wants it. (that’s the secret
to buying pet items, don’t let them know it’s for them. The pets should claim
all items for their own without human prompting. Besides, items deliberately
made for cats, in my experience, are doomed to failure.)
We had dinner at the Route 66 restaurant on Cottage Street.
The entrance was so awesome! It was set back a ways from the street, all decked
out with a little roadway leading up to it and lighted signs. We got inside and
the place was positively sprawling with 50’s memorabilia and route 66-type
items, including car parts, posters, pictures of film stars and music icons (Elvis,
Marilyn Monroe, etc.), with doo-wop and surfer rock permeating the tall,
ornately decorated dining room. The restaurant used to lie in a different
location but that was destroyed somehow. The owner bought an old church
property and moved “the best parts” of it there. I could tell it used to be a
church before firstly because of the tall, thin stained-glass windows and
secondly because the white walls & ceiling look like those at Cairo UMC.
The inside of the restaurant was just so fun to look at, with signs, props,
neon, lights, everything you’d expect in a 50’s restaurant and more. I had the
“Blue Moon” hamburger, which was essentially a bacon cheeseburger with blue
cheese sprinkled in it. Add some lettuce ketchup & mayo and you have a
delicious sandwich. Krysti had the nachos baked with a variety of peppers and
veggies. She got a box to go and then we realized much after the fact that we
left the box on the table. Oops.
We drove back to the hotel, upon which Krysti commenced a
lengthy stretch of office work (emailing, mostly) to ensure the summer session
with be as ready as possible when we return. Oh why, oh why, can’t people just
follow our system? If they had returned their summer form by May 22 like we
asked and emailed and explained and reminded at recitals, it would have saved
probably 3-4 hours of work. Seriously!!!!!!!!!!!!! Okay. We have two days left
out here on the east coast! Hopefully it doesn’t rain too badly like they’re
expecting.
Tuesday, June 11th
We had breakfast at the hotel, and we are very happy we’re
using this as our last stop. Good hotel, nice amenities, and good breakfast!
We had already visited Acadia National Park and Bar Harbor,
which is mostly the east side of Mount Desert Island, so today we spent time
driving around the west side of the island. It was still raining pretty
thoroughly, from mist to light steady rain. We walked a trail partway, we drove
to what looked like a dock for the U.S. Coast Guard (which earlier during the
trip we learned was first called the United States Lifesaving Service). We
stopped at the lighthouse which is the southernmost part of the island facing
out into the Atlantic. Mostly we drove around to the little villages on the
west side before coming back to Bar Harbor for lunch at China Joy! Since I had
stuffed myself at breakfast, I actually couldn’t finish my lunch, so I got a
box and it’s sitting in the room fridge right now. (I’m gonna have to heat it
up tomorrow before we check out. Chinese for breakfast--??)
Tonight’s our last night at the hotel, so tomorrow we check
out, do our last exploring and then start heading back home in the evening. We
decided during planning that it would be good to get a head start going home,
and find a place to sleep on the way home. We’re looking forward to a wedding
to play for this upcoming weekend and the Festival of Wheels we’ll catch part
of.
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