Let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you; bind them around your neck; write them on the tablet of your heart. (Proverbs 3:3 ESV)

It’s not very often that I do this, but today, I’m going to share the same reflections here that I did over at my souldare blog. I just got back from a wonderful weekend getaway in Chicago. So much goodness shared, yet we came home weary (at least I think we all were tired out from all the walking, talking and absorbing of the cultural experiences, we chose.)

Here are some words I wrote to capture the experience:

I didn’t buy any clothes at Bloomingdale’s.
I didn’t get to take the elevated train.
I didn’t take a smoke break in Bloomington.
I didn’t miss a thing.

Took a taxi and and a Uber though,
Talked with strangers, who we felt we knew.

Listened and danced and drank in the blues,
we learned the blues can carry you through;
these blues they find you, they hold you close.

They wear red sunglasses in the middle of the darkened room,
or maybe faded overalls. Fruteland Jackson
is how they call themselves.
In their occidental, dapper hat they say,
“The light blinds them on that stage.”
We hoot and holler and say,
“Come on.”
They tell us stories that make us glow.
They sing us like they know.
They tell us the blues are good to them;
We believe, because we felt it then.

I didn’t buy any souvenirs, but I spent
my memories with them.
I wanted to read those days like a book,
something new every five minutes.
But then the train brought us home, brought us home,
brought us home.

And when they had read it, they rejoiced because of its encouragement. (Acts 15:31 ESV)

 

Before we left for our vacation, I wandered around my house to pick some books to read. I call them the “stowaways.” The stack looks very ambitious, but my intention wasn’t to read them all. I just like their company, and the options.

Before I share more of my reading adventures, I want to share this great opportunity to win a copy of my book, plus a whole bundle of books about journaling!

My friend, Dawn, is hosting a great giveaway of books from the Random Journal Day reunion. Most of the books in the giveaway have been a direct result of each author keeping a journal or blogging. Several are self-published, and I am honored to be one of the contributors to the bundle. So go over and put your name in the hat to win some great books!

Also am giving away a second copy of my book, here today, as promised a couple weeks ago. And the winner is…Susie Klein! (Susie, send me an email at kelrohlf@souldare.com, and I’ll send you a signed copy.)

On vacation, I read three books and one play. And I thumbed through the Field Guide to birds, checked out some definitions in the dictionary, and read the daily devotions in Every Day A New Beginning. I read the intro to Dawn’s book, Journaling for Discovery and Delight, in preparation of going through her prompts this spring in my journal.

I leave you with a short review of each book and the play, which I did finish while cruising the Tomten waterway:

Come Rain or Come Shine by Jan Karon

I picked this book up around Christmas time, because I often find solace in the Mitford series. The stories of Father Tim often parallel my own spiritual journey. This book was about the upcoming wedding of Father Tim’s adopted son, Dooley to Lace Harper. The story was a fun way to catch up with the characters. The threat of rain on their wedding day, and their attitude of pressing on either way, helped me keep a positive outlook on our trip, when rain threatened to dampen our mood. (Thankfully, even when it did rain on this trip, we were tucked into a covered slip at a marina.) One rainy day, I read most of a play recommended by our younger son.

Mr. Burns by Anne Washburn

In this futuristic, post-apocalyptic play, the characters reminisce and frame life through the lens of The Simpsons episodes. It is a three act play that covers a time period of about 75 years. The first act finds the characters, living outdoors, surviving the recent nuclear reactor fallout. Around the campfire, they reconstruct an episode of The Simpsons from their collective memories. (My cultural experience of The Simpsons was limited to watching over the shoulders of my two teen-aged sons, so I can’t say I remember the episode they refer to in the play, however a houseboat plays into the scene, and I thought that was interesting, as we were traveling on our boat. And it ties into the next book, that I read.) But before, I review the next book, let me just say, that the play Mr. Burns is a well-crafted homage to the show, but even more so, a brilliant and sinister contemplation of fighting for life, even in the imminent shadow of death.

Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate

This book was recommended to me by a friend, just before we left on our trip. Little did I know that part of the story was set in Memphis along the Mississippi river. The children in the story grow up in a shanty-boat on the river. Based on a true story, of children taken from their families to be adopted out to wealthy families, this book was one I could not put down. One scene, where two of the children escape to find their birth parents, and the peril of their shanty-boat on the river during a storm, could have been lifted out of the Mr. Burns play. The peril of the children does end happily over time, but the motives and conditions of those who worked at the children home were disturbing, yet tastefully handled by the author.

I find it fascinating when a theme emerges or connections can be made when reading several different genres and stories. The last book that I read on vacation was a memoir.

Girl Meets God by Lauren F. Winner

This book starts out in Memphis, Tennessee but then travels between New York city and North Carolina. Lauren shares the story of her origins, her father Jewish and her mother Baptist. The memoir chronicles her journey from converting from reformed Jew to Orthodox Jew to eventually embracing Christianity. She has a very frank, yet humorous, self-deprecating way of telling her story. A fascinating connection between her story and my reading list is that the Mitford series plays in to her conversion to Christianity. I love her voice and style, and how she weaves her Jewish religious experience with the Christian liturgical calendar, which enlarged my view of how these two faiths intersect.

What have you’ve been reading lately? How does reading impact your life?

 

 

 

 

 

. . . Jesus himself stood in the midst of them, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. (Luke 24:36 KJV)

We pulled into the Florence Marina on Monday afternoon, it was our last day on the Tomten Waterway. The sun sparkled off the water, and puffy clouds reflected off its stillness. We had been at this marina seven springs ago; a spring break trip that was cold and rainy. The memories of awe and frustration lingered in my mind. Awe because it was one of the first times we locked down a river system, and frustration because I was imagining a sunny, warm vacation where I’d come home with a tan.

On this afternoon, I could NOT remember staying at this marina before, but we both knew we had because our intention this trip was to connect the points on the river that we had previously visited to draw the line of our boating experiences from Kentucky Lake all the way down to Panama City Beach, Florida.

As I have mentioned previously, endings are bittersweet for me. And I tend to stop enjoying myself, and press into “Can we just get this over with?” mode. But this trip, I wanted to end differently. I imagined myself enjoying it all the way until we parked the boat back in the storage lot near our home.

And I am happy to report, that so far, so good. When we first dreamed of owning a boat, we made a promise to ourselves that packing and unpacking, and cleaning and putting away the boat would be part of the “fun” and work of having this great gift. Since we trailer the boat to where we put in, and  then leave the truck and trailer there, at the end of our trip, we have to rent a car to retrieve them.

Tuesday morning, we woke after a restful evening in the marina. We did our usual routine of making coffee and walking the dog, and then the rental car place picked up Les to get the rental car. When he returned, we piled into the car with Kokomo. Driving through the back roads and highways of Alabama, keeping my eyes open for the wonders of the countryside paid off. We noticed a cemetery with flowers on every single grave. An Easter tradition? We thought it odd that a road sign read “Police Jurisdiction.” And we enjoyed the dogwoods dotting the pine forests that lined the highway down to Demopolis.

At the Demopolis marina, our truck and trailer waited for us. We thanked the marina manager for letting us store them there, and I followed Les in the rental car to travel back to the Florence marina. A round trip total of eight hours, but definitely less time than taking the boat back down the river. It’s part of the adventure.

We got back in time to visit with some neighbors on the D dock, who have been living on their boat since October. They used to live in south city St. Louis. Small world. We enjoyed sharing tidbits and the mutual dream of navigating our boats through the Great Loop. (The Great Loop encompasses the Mississippi river, the Tomten waterway, around Florida and up the Intercoastal waterway to the Hudson river across to the Erie Canal, and then a canal through Canada that dumps into Lake Huron, then Lake Michigan and through Chicago, and for us, back to St. Louis on the Illinois river.) Whew! That will be quite the adventure, but in the meantime, we do sections at a time like we did this spring.

We walked over to the marina restaurant, and mentioned we were newcomers. The hostess asked if I wanted to “fire the cannon.” I immediately said, of course! The gentleman who escorted me to the end of the dock explained that the admiral of a ship would have one of the crew fire the cannon at sunset to tell the harbor that it was time to take down the ensign, and call it a day. I hit the little cannon with a mallet hammer and it sounded off. It told the occupants of the marina that it was time to end their day, and enjoy dinner etc. It made me smile, because being asked to participate in their tradition endeared the place to my heart, and now I’ll never forget the Florence Marina. We went back to the boat satisfied that our time on the river and getting ready to go home were worth all the work.

As I started to write this blog last night, thunder and lightning gave their own signal to call it day. Albeit, a little anxiety producing because as the rain and wind whipped up, the local tornado alarm sounded. I was curled up in the hull of the boat trying to write this post, when I shut down the computer, and called the dog to come up on the bed with me. (She’s not allowed on the bed normally.) I told her we’d be safe together and even if not, an unexpected peace blanketed us. Les looked at the radar, and said, “I guess we could take cover in the bathrooms up on the parking lot.” I just stayed in the bed, and snuggled with Kokomo. Thankfully, the storm passed by without any harm. The wind rocked us through the night, and Les shooed the dog back down to her spot on the floor, so we could get a good night’s rest. We would be getting the boat onto the trailer in the morning, after returning the rental car, and enjoying a breakfast in town.

As I write this now, we have the boat on the trailer. Getting the boat on the trailer can be tricky, but this time, even with the marina manager watching I drove it on the trailer like the seasoned sailor that I am, and we pulled the boat back onto land to ready it for travel home. Peace accompanies us home, and we dream of future adventures on our Intuition.

 

When it comes to endings, I often feel deflated. When it comes to accomplishments, my feelings soar. I am happy to  report that we completed the 10 locks that were part of our route from Demopolis to Florence, Alabama on the Tomten Waterway!

The Wilkins lock is special not just because it was the last one for us to go through, but it was also the tallest. It lifts or lowers its occupants about 8o feet.

On Sunday morning, we rose with the sun, as the blue moon set across the river from the Midway marina. We celebrated Easter with greetings from our fellow boaters, one even said “He is risen!” and I replied, “He is risen indeed!” I took pictures around the marina, and then we ate our decorated Easter eggs, coffee cake and drank coffee, while deciding if we should leave with one of the other boats to lock through the last three locks together. As timing would have it, we and they were ready to leave at the same time.

It helps the lockmasters out, when local boaters go through in a small group, so as to keep the lock from having to be emptied and filled so often. As we approached lock number eight, our confidence was high that we could secure our boat on the first try. Even with the audience of another boater, which can throw off your rhythm. We arrived just as the lock was letting out a tow pushing a load of scrap metal down river.

We secured the boat, and the lock filled and we made it up without a hitch. We repeated the same success at the ninth lock. (These three locks were in a 18 mile stretch, so we’d go 5-8 miles and it was time to do our thing again.) The other boat led the way. And we secured our lines and held on for our ride up the lock.

It was five miles between the last two locks, so we drove the boat at top speed to zoom up to the last one. The gates were open and the lockmaster was ready for us. Our wake followed us in a little bit, so we were tossed a little, as we drove up to the wall to secure to the floating bollard. We were a little mesmerized by the 8o feet walls, and had to take two tries to get secure. (We did realize in lock number 8 that we could add a third fender to keep the back of the boat from banging into the wall. We added that between locks 8 and 9. That way when the swirling water tried to push us up against the lock wall, I didn’t have to worry as much about holding the boat off.) Sometimes it takes several times to learn the nuances of a skill.

We thanked the lockmaster, and said good-bye to the other boaters. (They were headed to Florence, AL that day, another 80 miles north.) As we made it to the top of the lock and out into the area called Bay Springs Lake, we sighed a relief that we had completed our task for the day. We spent the rest of the day enjoying the balmy spring weather, while relaxing at a nearby park and beach area. At dinner Les toasted us, for “completing ten locks.” Here’s some photos from inside the last lock.

Today we travelled 80 miles to complete the trip on the river.

I’ll share some other musings and photos from the trip tomorrow.

P.S. I didn’t forget about the giveaway, I’m trying to coordinate with Dawn’s announcement. If you comment on today’s blog post, I’ll add you name to the drawing to win one on my books! (Defining Moments: Overflowing with Words.)

 

“Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.” (Matthew 6:34 The Message)

“Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.” (Weil)

To be a successful boater, you have to be paying attention to many things at once. Thankfully, Les and I have each other to point out the things that the other one might not be giving attention to at any given moment. This keeps us from bumping into things like docks, other boats and the walls inside the locks.

Every once in awhile, I will pluck up my courage and offer to drive the boat out of a slip, or up to the dock or even into the lock. So when we left the Columbus marina, I backed us out of the slip with a couple pointers from Les. As we turned a corner towards the dock, he gave me another bit of advice, but I loudly asked him not to tell me right then. Sometimes I don’t want advice, even though I need it. We worked it through, and really I just didn’t want to feel stupid. So we agreed I wasn’t stupid, I just needed to be reminded of how close I was getting to the other boats. I wasn’t paying attention to all the factors.

Yesterday, we needed to go through three locks to get to our anchorage for the night. (We will go through ten locks total by the end of this trip.) The three were fairly close in succession, so we had lots of opportunity to fine tune our approach to catching the bollard with our lines.

In each lock, there are several floating bollards that you throw a line over to hold the boat near the wall. We use two lines to hold us in, and then use boat hooks and fenders to keep the boat from banging into the wall. Usually we are going down river, so the lock releases the water and the water gently drops us down.

But when you go up river, the lock fills up and floats the boat to the top. We have to be more attentive in this situation, as the incoming water tends to whirlpool and push the boat towards the wall. We brace the boat off the wall with the boat hooks, while holding onto the ropes, and in my case take pictures at the same time.

Each lock is pretty similar, and for this trip we’ve agreed to use the same procedure each time to master our technique. Les drives up to the bollard and I stand ready to keep the back of the boat off the wall, as the current and momentum usually pushes the back end toward the wall first. He catches the bollard with his line, then eases the boat forward and I catch it with my line. Sometimes one of us misses getting the line attached, and we have to try again. Sometimes it’s windy in the tank and we have to adjust for that, too.

Today, we went through the seventh lock of our trip. We each got the lines on the first time, and rejoiced in that success. But we reminded ourselves that we have three more locks to go, so we can’t let down our guard, we still have to pay attention for each lock we encounter.

After completing our day, we pulled into an inlet behind the lock, near a boat ramp where we could take Kokomo for her evening walk.

The need to pay attention while boating is paramount to our physical safety. Paying attention to our surroundings, also lends itself to some awesome sightings of goodness, like noticing the moon appear over the trees in our little cove last night.

How does paying attention enrich your life?