Senior pictures

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By train (May 13)

To almost no one I communicated with up North did it seem like South Florida could possibly be a mass transit mecca. But there are - as I've pointed out - actually three different train systems in the Miami area (not counting Amtrak). That may be too many. I posted in an earlier blog entry references to the old "People Mover" train that lumbers for free through downtown Miami - kind of like a similar train in downtown Detroit - complete with pictures of the track. I rode one of these during my Florida book research visit to Miami 10 years ago. But on this trip I planned ahead to ride two other suburban commuter train systems, at least one of which (and probably both) I'd never been on before. Mom and I had a debate beforehand as to whether the train that runs through Coral Gables is at ground or above-ground (like a monorail). I turned out to be right - it's above ground. Daniel and I actually drove around the station for a while looking for Fed Ex boxes, until he finally dropped me off at the station about five minutes before the scheduled train. An indication of how infrequently some progressive South Miami/Coral Gables folks ride the train may be that he told me the fare was $1.50 and in fact it is $2 now. Luckily, I had enough change. Pictured above and below are views of the tracks and the surrounding streets from the Coral Gables station.

The northbound train (below) came into the Coral Gables/University of Miami station just a few minutes later. The end of the line is only about three stations south of this, and so this was a relatively empty train.

The train roared north and into downtown Miami.

It crossed the Miami River that reminds me of the river in Chicago.

No doubt we criss-crossed one of the roads that Andrea and I had been on the night before.

I believe that huge empty lot below is the site of the old (but actually relatively new) (pink) Miami River.

Past the Miami Arena site the train goes through a relatively rough working-class neighborhood - the only neighborhood I was nervous driving through during my book research, you'll recall - but I didn't get any good pictures. Pictured below is the side of a high school named for an African American history figure (but alas I don't remember who - maybe Booker T. Washington).

It was lunchtime, but the train was already empyting out (below) as we headed northeast out of town, probably towards Hialeah.

The colorful houses pictured below are actually in much better shape than ones I had seen a few minutes earlier.

A giant flea market was one of the last sites the train passed before I prepared to disembark, for the transfer station.

As I got off at the transfer station and went down to ground level (by stairway, I think - although I was trying to be careful about my possible hernia) - I passed this system map (notice that there's only one line, which is one of the knocks against this system). I'm at the station where the gray line passes the green line (the train I'd just gotten off - the Metrorail - represented by the green line).

Andrea had encouraged me to be cautious, and so I had gotten there earlier enough to wait about half an hour for the northbound Tri-Rail train heading towards West Palm Beach. The knock against the Tri-Rail system is that they went for a freight rail track that I believe Amtrak also uses which is way west of town. This may be convenient for people driving to and from suburban stations, but not that convenient if you're trying to go all mass transit like I was, and also takes people nowhere near downtown destinations like the American Airlines Arena. The Tri-Rail trains were interestingly tall. I had ended up buying my ticket from a person in a booth instead of the machine. I actually got a receipt to expense account the second train ride ($3) (which was saving the church some taxi fare)

The picture my book painted - subtlely - of Anglos moving out of Miami-Dade County for Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach is obviously somewhat dated. At least on this suburban commuter rail train headed towards Lauderdale and Palm Beach, Latinos were in the majority. Most looked relatively well off.

Taking the elevator off and then down after I got off, I disembarked from the train about 40 minutes into the trip, just over the Broward County line in Hollywood. We had passed a Tri-Rail rail yard earlier on and then mainly passed industrial-type sites until we were training along Interstate 95.

Not a badly designed train station, that Hollywood train station.

Next, I was headed towards the parking lot in search of a cab. I had not pinpointed tha tthere would be cabs there and how much it would cost, and so I was relatively lucky. . . .

-- Perry

Medical update

Mom had an important set of medical appointments Monday. Through the decogram or whatever the doctor found that Mom had osteoporosis and some breakage on her vertebrae – not bad enough for surgery. The doctor – a back specialist – has given some mixed messages. On the one hand, he identifies with Mom and since he loves working he thinks she should too and work forever. On the other hand, he wants her to do exercises that are not easy for her to do while working. Possible is standing straight with her back against a wall for 5 minutes each hour. Tougher is sitting up very straight for 15 minutes of every hour. As with me, soon after we start working on her computer, we’re hunched over, and good posture goes out the window. We’re so used to this that it’d be hard to work all the time and sit up straight all the time – at least for us. He also says that he only does surgery, but says she doesn’t need to go to physical therapy – just follow his unrealistic advice. We’re hoping she goes to PT or whatever – to supplement/ complement tai chi and whatever she’s able to do at work – shortly.

On the one hand, Mom’s job (and sometimes driving) is where she feels most comfortable physically and keeps her sharp/happier. But by keeping her hunched over and keeping her from exercising her job may also be worsening her physical shape (and ultimately may make it hard for her to keep working).

The back doctor was actually less worried about Mom’s back and more worried – with her osteoporosis – about the possibility of her falling and breaking her hip. The doctor apparently raised the specter of what I know as a possibility because of my manager’s experience with his mother: (technically) “successful” hip replacement surgery with the patient never recovering and dying. Mom is also equally worried about another possibility: my Mom falling or just finding herself on the ground and not – because of her knees and back and weak muscles – being able to get up. Grandma Beck fell over a phone cord at their Westerville home – relatively late in her time there – and wasn’t able to get up for hours.

Mom says she’s a little depressed in general about her physical condition. As it turns out, she probably does need to get conventional knee replacement surgery on her other knee (the one not operated on last summer) – maybe at Christmas? – and of course one of the reasons she has trouble getting up is she was weak after that last surgery and she couldn’t race through physical therapy as they hoped she could. One of the many things she wishes she could be doing – going through her stuff at home – she said is hard because it’s hard for her to reach up and grab things – boxes, clothes, files – that she wants to go through. It’s also hard for her to cook and get dressed.

Except perhaps for some church, concerts, AAUW, and reading at home, Mom may not care much about the rest of this stuff. But if she can’t get fed and get up in the morning, she’s not going to be able to go to work. She didn’t have much to say about my wild idea that she move in with us, go to physical therapy or exercise ($5 water aerobics classes at our gym every morning and my PT has a gym with her practice), and telecommute to work. But Mom may need more help (on top of what Jodi and Clarence are doing to keep the inside and outside of her house somewhat clean) at home to still be able to go to work, and so on. . .

Speaking of health problems and possible medical leave time off, I finally called my surgeon back today. In addition to my back, neck, and shoulder continuing to bother me a little (continuation of summer 2007 Michigan injury), I’m afraid my hernia is coming back.

I guess Sunday night Vincent impressed his father so much with their tour of the Bardstown Road area that his father declared he’d be interested in moving to Louisville (!?) (don’t know whether to take that very seriously).

We met at new church family’s house Tuesday – a family whose father (with complications from cancer surgery) I visited in the hospital last week – and we finally put together that the mother teaches English (African American literature but some early U.S. literature) at Indiana University Southeast and – if Vincent ever finishes high school and goes on to college – this is a likely place for him to land and English is a likely major for him – and so she’d likely be one of his professors. She said the department has no creative writing major – but a general writing major whose components include poetry, fiction, technical writing, and non-fiction writing (including writing for the Web!).

Stephanie’s Mother reports that Bobby’s condition is still not good.

Aunt Sandy and Mom talked today about Mom helping Sandy for someone to help look after Grandpa while Sandy and Don are up at church camp in Mt. Vernon later summer. Grandpa hasn’t been very helpful about this. I may go up and help out for a few days.

Last week we also helped Stephanie’s father find some information about one of the tenants lined up against him in court. But fearing the worst, Stephanie’s father went ahead and settled early this week. Stephanie’s father also faces some security concerns around his properties.

-- Perry

Father's Day

Vincent’s father had invited him to go to Florida with him for a week last week but we pushed Vincent to stay and work more on his classes and help his Mother out at summer school. Vincent’s father ended up not calling Tuesday anyway, but called Sunday – finally headed down there, where his parents have moved to again – to ask Vincent if he could at least stop by and visit with Vincent Sunday evening.

We ended up having a decent sized argument with Vincent again, since he pushed to go with him again. An underlying issue is that Vincent’s friend Samantha is gone, and it’s not clear whether – unless they break up – Vincent would still want to go after she returns (unless she went to, which we’ve discouraged). But Stephanie really does want help with school – on this, their second and final week (math camp), and Vincent still hasn’t finished an on-line class since World History in April. Vincent was somewhat honest, at least implicitly: he did very little work for months and has recently started working some – 1-2 hours a day – but really that’s only four days a week. He argued that math will go quicker (I’m now sure he’ll be timed out of his math class) because for the English class – even though it’s more interesting and easier for him – he has to do some reading and writing – He’s been reading “The Lord of the Rings” series to compare this with “Beowulf.” He said he wants to finish and go to high school but he’s in no hurry to do either (which seems obvious enough). At some point he threatened to go anyway or to stay and not go to school with Stephanie – against the backdrop that if he goes he can’t come back to live with us (on top of him getting no job – though he’s got one these two weeks as Stephanie is paying him $10 a day to help her for a couple of hours plus he gets to work on on-line classes on the computers that are faster at school than the desktop at home is) – and Stephanie also mentioned the possibility of turning him in for not getting school work and – while he was gone – not going to counseling. At times Vincent has claimed he could still do school work while with his father but we’re very skeptical about that.

Stephanie was also concerned that Vincent’s father might end up getting a job and staying in Florida and then – if the idea was that Vincent was supposed to come back – we would have to end up going down to get him.

Stephanie ended up giving away some of the store by saying Vincent could go visit his father in Ohio after he comes back and after he helps her for another week (with no stipulation about class completion). That way – although he couldn’t visit with his grandparents – he could visits cousins etc. and if we got stuck going to pick him up it wouldn’t be so far away. Of course, who knows what Vincent’s father will really end up doing?

On Father’s Day evening, however (Vincent and he used to get to spend the day together in Ohio when it didn’t fall on one of Vincent’s father’s weekends), Vincent’s father did surprise by NOT getting lost on the way to our house and NOT showing up really early or late. I warned Vincent that Lazer Blaze was closing soon, and so Vincent’s father ended up whisking him off – but apparently they went to Bardstown Road, one of Vincent’s hangouts (and toured around by car or on foot?) and ended up going to the movie theater where the three of us saw “The Taking of Pelham 123” earlier this week to see the Will Ferrell movie “Land of the Lost” (and apparently got some food in there). Vincent made us nervous by turning his phone off during the movie and getting home at 12:30 a.m. (he had earlier pushed for staying home Monday because he figured he would get home late – but not that late). I didn’t fall asleep until after he got home – although I figured Vincent’s father had come to his senses and decided not to keep driving all night to Florida but to spend the night in an affordable motel in Louisville and Vincent ended up staying with him – or Vincent had decided to go on to Florida. Besides movie theaters (which I didn’t think of), there’s not a lot open on Sunday nights at midnight in Louisville. Vincent hadn’t taken any stuff with him, but he also hadn’t put clean sheets on his stripped bed. But Vincent also had tried any last-minute school work to try to convince us – he spent the last couple of hours before his father arrived watching the last episode of the R-rated vampire porn TV show that Stephanie bought, going out for a walk and a smoke, and playing video games. All of this made me wonder as I sat in bed and worried about this and other things: catching up with things at work, whether to go back to my surgeon about my would-be hernia, whether Stephanie should go to the conference in Las Vegas in July, etc., etc.

-- Perry

Big 24 hours

Friday Stephanie and I stopped at Old Loisville's Third Avenue Cafe, where Vincent and I ate after his last community college class in the summer of 2005. Soon after we arrived, an early North American music group started, eventually marking the second time we've heard "Simple Gifts" in the past couple of weeks.



Then it was on in the heat to Central Park and KY Shakespeare Festival's performance of "Macbeth." Last summer they did a samurai version of "Julius Caesar." The actor who played Brutus was Macbeth this year, and this year there was lots of black and red, with a kind of punk gothic motif. Standing out most were the three "witches," who were punk/gothic pole dancers of sort - very innovative.

We felt especially bad for them, as they wore long sleeves and tights in the heat.

Also memorable was Lady Macbeth - uttering here her "Unsex me" lines.

Stephanie and Vincent aren't quite a big as fans of Macbeth as I. I remember watching a very cool black and white Japanese movie version of Macbeth on TV in Tokyo - only I didn't know it was Macbeth - and then months later reading Macbeth - my first Shakespeare play - in 6th grade - with my British 6th grade teacher - and realizing it was the same story. "Bubble, bubble - toil and trouble." I thought it was cool. This version started with a disclaimer - a warning for families - as it included a particularly bloody scene I don't remember seeing before (although I've seen "Hamlet" on screen more than "Macbeth" subsequently). I also ran into my former supervisor and his wife, who are apparently staying down the street, as the play started. July 12 with Sarah - hopefully - it's "Romeo and Juliet," which Stephanie and Vincent have seen in read several times (including in Schiller Park)

The next morning on a walk with the dog we happened by a garage sale that was actually an art show and ended up with one painting. That's the artist - an Oldham County elementary school teacher by day - in the orange skirt.

Several hours of laundry and lawn-mowing later, I was a block away from Vincent's friend Samantha's house (he had stayed with his friend Sam Wright Friday night and came back after lunch - and essentially slept most of the rest of the weeekend) for an - as I expected - underpopulated Obama event - an organizing event that - as it turns out - was oriented pretty much towards Southern Indiana. Organizing for Change, the Obama campaign follow-up, is trying to mobilize support - and maintain volunteers and enthusiasm - for - in this case - health care reform - around the Obama health care reform principles - choice of doctors, lower costs, and health care access for all. We were asking Obama-leaning voters - with lists from the campaign in the fall - to officially support those principles (like signing a petition, I explained) and to participate in one of several National Health Care Day of Service activities next Saturday. I called several pages of voters in mid-afternoon. The only other people there - for an event that I have to admit was hard to find on the http://www.barackobama.com/ Web site and had an odd description - were the host - also calling - and a volunteer Organizing for Change staffperson from Southern Indiana - who I eventually figured out was the daughter of the principal of Stephanie's school - who I'd seen as ChiChi in New Albany High's "Grease" performance and as the director of the "Willy Wonka" play that the kids at Stephanie's school had put on a couple of months ago. We didn't help Abby out that much with phone calls - since there were only two others of us - as she was getting pressure to reach more people as well as facing exams and papers due at Indiana University Southeast summer school this week - and I did offer to help out with a (no doubt hot and humid) after work door-to-door canvass later this week and perhaps work with Stephanie to help out with a Children's Fellowship-type activity at the Jeffersonville (IN) health fair next weekend. Pictured below was our host making calls in his living room.

After a rendezvous in Target at Bashford Manor, Stephanie and I caravaned to the home of the children's and youth ministries coordinators for our church, for their open house/first birthday party for their daugther, Isabel. They had all recently returned from a church mission trip to D.C., where they narrowly missed running into the killing at the Holocaust Museum there. Stephanie (below - with Ian, the father) and I had to overdress a bit for the event that would follow.

Rachel - on her way to college in Chicago later this summer - drove up with her family as we arrived - and then she talked with Andrea, on her way with her youngest daughter to Canton, OH, the next day.

Ian brought in two cakes - one white and one chocolate (we brought home one piece each for Vincent, who missed this).

I didn't get a picture of Kate - who eventually blew the candles out for Isabel. But then Ian arranged things to cut the cakes (maybe Isabel can do this too next year).

In the background is one of Ian's IT colleagues at Louisville's Assumption High School and his spouse.

After a time, Isabel really devoured a piece of cake - although most of it went on her tray or in her lap (I nabbed some pieces of cake that made it onto the floor).

Isabel tried to lick the plate too.

Grandmother Marcia, a manager at the Presbyterian Center (and Kate's mother), talked a little shop too.

In two pictures below - standing behind Isabel - is her mother, Kate.

By day Kate runs one of Louisville's dozen or so neighborhood communities ministries, currently reeling from the recession and (slightly) from budget cuts. Never too far from technology (below) was Ian, looking at his Blackerry or whatever.

Andrea and Keith's youngest, Elise, was tired from going to the zoo earlier, but perked up later on during the party. (Mary sits in the background.)

From Kate, Ian, and Isabel's near Bashford Manor/Buechel, we caravaned to Linden, to a Chinese restaurant in the newly refurbished Westport Village shopping center, Jade Palace. Having feted Evelyn on her retirement twice earlier in the week, at the Presbyterian Center, I now joined Stephanie and a bunch of my other Center colleagues (plus church folks and others) for an amazing 10-course Chinese dinner - all free to us - where we took over the entire (large, one-room) restaurant. Evelyn, readers may recall, worked for 48 years for the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and a predecessor denomination. I first worked with her in a study of challenges that African American, Asian American, Latino, and other candidates for the ministry and seminary students/grads faced becoming ordained and connecting with pastoral calls. She has also worked with our local church as a member of the Mid-KY Presbytery's Committee on Ministry. Evelyn apparently planned the whole event, including deciding who would sit with whom at the round tables and a list of questions for the table "host" to pose for people to answer (kind of like at a wedding reception, where if you mingle you get to meet all kinds of new people: friends and family of the bridge and groom). James (with his spouse) was the owner and driver of some kind of limo or shuttle that obviously has taken Evelyn and many other colleagues to and from the airport (if not elsewhere) over the years. (I usually take the city bus.)

Vernon, a veteran of the Presbyterian Southern stream, also livened up our table. He told us about taking an airplane flight in southern African that could have turned into a disaster.

Loyda and Tony Aja both used to work at the Presbyterian Center. Aja is a lieutenant of Stated Clerk Gradye Parsons. Tony is now facilitator for Latino ministries and outreach for the Mid-KY presbytery. As part of the orientation process, I had lunch with Loyda during my first month at the Center. We sat next to them.

The soup (bowl half empty below) was great, but we sent half of it back because we were anticipating the nine other courses.

Baby bok choy was one of the highlights of the many other courses. My close-ups didn't turn out so well, until we got to the noodles.

Pardon the bad picture, but - at the table next to us - essentially the head table - Evelyn (lower left) sat for a picture while her grandsons, daughter-in-law, and son stood above her. I don't know who the woman to Evelyn's left is. But to that woman's left is Mid-KY Presbytery Executive Betty Meadows, who started us out in prayer.

We were one of two couples who left the restaurant parking even after Evelyn and her family. On the way out we talked with Chris and his wife. Chris had volunteered a little at the Presbyterian Community Center. His wife has been very ill during the past couple of years, but seemed OK Saturday. I missed a talk he gave about the terrible casualties associated with the end of the Sri Lankan civil war. The two of them represent a multicultural Sri Lankan marriage, since he is from the Tamil minority and she is not. He also talked about how he and his family narrowly missed death in the tsunami when they were visiting their home country several years ago and at the last moment decided not to go to the beach that day.

One more stop - blowing the 24 hours into 26 hours - after stopping at home to get the dog - was at church, where I updated our Guatemala mission prayer partnership bulletin board and Stephanie put up the Guatemala mission poster (below) we had worked on together.

Frisco helped us wrap up our big 24/26 hours in a fun manner as he chased us around the sanctuary including (finally) figuring out he could look for us by standing on the pews and looking over them. We also walked him for real outside (in the dark) around a hidden block near church that Stephanie had never seen.

-- Perry