Given that I last posted in December 2025, it’s clear that the two years it took me to write about our six month sabbatical in 2023 took their toll. And finishing writing about 2023 at the end of 2025 also means that events and adventures of the last two plus years largely went unrecorded, at least in this blog.
I’ve always been fond of in res media, so rather than “catch up” I’ll start in the here and now, also called the present. However, I can’t promise there won’t be throwbacks to some adventures of the past, which include a trip to Morocco to climb (unsuccessfully) Mt. Toubkal (May 2024) or our backpacking trip along the Lost Coast of California in 2025.
In the meantime, husband J has concluded his 37 years at Rollins College and is now a professor emeritus. It’s not really sunk in yet, since his normal June routine involves not having to teach – but I suspect September will feel very different. By the way, while I think he looks like the bartender in the Shining in this photo, the most remarkable thing is that his colleagues didn’t give him a pocket watch – it was a pocket compass!
And yours truly stepped down as an equity partner in January in favor of an “of counsel” position, which is providing me with a lot more flexibility.
That’s quite necessary in the type of year that 2026 has thus far revealed itself to be. So far we’ve ranged from a wedding of daughter #2 to T in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico in January, baby sitting grandson L when he’s visited from New Bedford (I did 48 hours solo for various complicated reasons, which is about as daunting as any mountain I’ve climbed), and moving my parents, at least temporarily, to Orlando for a while (they shall be known as M and E). And that doesn’t include the seemingly never ending remodel of the property in NC (known as Five Oaks), where, having completed the house, we’re now embarked on hardscape.
Even all these changes don’t reveal J’s and my ever advancing age as much as the fact that the topic du jour among our friends seems to be the always scintillating topic of Medicare.
But somewhere in the midst of this – not humdrum, but somewhat routine – existence, there’s got to still be space for the unexpected. And for me, at least, that means finding some sort of goal to focus on – whether it’s another 20 mile Mammoth March or something else. By the way, the Mammoth Marches are fantastic. I think we’ve now done four. They sell out fast, so get tickets early.
Anyway, I didn’t mean to wander into a plug for Mammoth March. But we do need to find a doable, but relatively short, adventure somewhere. Suggestions?
I have a brand new pair of hiking boots (my last pair of Renegades was literally thrown into a garbage can the last day of the Lost Coast hike after the entire insole fell apart, not to mention a loose seam…) and I’m working on breaking them in. Hopefully they will break in before my feet do. Five miles today. More to come.
FromSwamptoSummit 