Nashville - 18 months later

What a trip! We left as Dr. and Mrs. after having married in a very intimate ceremony that served to formalise that which we had been living. We are home now and having been encouraged to get back to the blogging here you go.

June 22 - It was a small and quiet affair at Jan and Jenny's (our dear neighbors) home with food made by me and Jan and Jenny. We had nice champagne chosen by Adrian - it was a rose that matched the flowers and my dress. Jonathon, Jan and Jenny's son, helped with video and set up and driving us down in the rain so as not to mess our pretty shoes. Our marriage celebrant, Margaret Pallet-Frame wore black and her orange lipstick matched her orange fingernails - not sure about the toes. We had edited the ceremony to suit us - a bit or two about the children (all 5), about our past loves and our hopes for the future. It was all done in about 30 minutes which suited us both fine. Johnny Cash and Willie Nelson sang and we were quite pleased with the whole event. Being married was not important was how we both felt prior to the decision to take the next step. In fact, that piece of paper, the ceremony, the ritual, has given a depth and a richness to what was already incredibly powerful. We are happy and content.

 
August 1 - On the way home I wrote -

We are in the air now heading to LA from Houston having had an uneventful jaunt from Nashville to Houston. I am sad that we are getting further and further from family and friends as the moments pass. I look forward to our next visit and wonder if it might be sooner rather than later.

 It is a wonderful and simple life we have in New Zealand. It is far away from our lifetime friends and our crazy and wonderful family, both Lamballes and Richardsons. The things we were able to do - play in the pool with Maddie, play golf with Timi, play golf with Harry, pick blueberries with Mama, dinner with the docs, a family reunion of sorts, wings and beer with all of our dearest. Three visits to the Melrose Pub for hot wings and cold beer, lots of mexican food, American hotdogs, cheese grits - we ate our fill! Every day was full of great times and we made great memories, Adrian's first ride in an American muscle car. That is another post in itself!

We are so grateful for all the folks who showed us such generous, true Southern hospitality, for the effort that people made to spend time with us whether it meant flying in to Nashville, driving up to Nashville for the day, changing plans to accommodate our crazy schedule. It was wonderful to see the people with whom we worked on a daily basis. It was as if we had not left 18 months ago. So sorry that Kim was not around when we were there - we will have to spend lots of time together when next we visit! It seemed like we were going to have lots of time there - three, almost four weeks seems like a long time - well let me tell you it is not! It flew by! We were so lucky that we were able to stay with my sister, housesit for some new friends with a wonderful dog Beau, and then end our stay at Mama and Daddy's. Perfect! We are hoping to find a house swap for next summer so if you or anyone you know wants to come to NZ, let us know!

 What we hear on the news and read in the papers about America is depressing and embarrassing and discouraging. All places, like people, have their strengths and weaknesses unfortunately the media focuses on the weaknesses. We all make good and bad choices. We all judge when we are guilty of the same faults as those we are judging. Having been away for 18 months, I have seen with a perspective that I had not previously been afforded. There is great excess. It is a big country and we have gotten wrapped up in the stuff - cars, homes, the perceived success of ourselves and our children. We have lost sight of balance and modesty and humbleness, being frugal. We are a generous people and we are kind and basically very good. There are all sorts in all places and we get what we give, I reckon. It is a wonderful place with lots of choices, lots of really wonderful people, diversity and wide open spaces. I wish they could show on television across the world all the wonders we experienced while we were there. That is the America that I love.

We are lucky and maybe a bit crazy to have made the choices for change in our lives. To have packed a few suitcases and a bag of golf clubs and moved our family of four to another country across the world sight unseen - crazy! I am so glad we did. We have seen things and grown in ways that we never would have staying in our comfort zone of the home we had always known. I miss the day to day with friends and family and I am so grateful for technology that allows us to travel the miles by phone and internet at anytime. I missed the kiwi accent, the song of the Tui, the flowers always in bloom in this mild climate, our bed and my pillow. I have two homes now, how lucky am I!

weekend at Pukawa

What a relaxing time we had.  It is about 2 1/2 hour drive to the western shore of Lake Taupo, specifically, to the town of Pukawa.  Adrian's colleague very generously offered us the use of his bach (pronounced batch, holiday home).  It is on a hill with a large deck and nice views of the lake.  We arrived late enough that we missed the sunset but loved the stars!  The milky way, Jupiter, a sliver of a moon, Orion's belt were all putting on a glittery show for us.  Restful night for all of us and an easy start to Saturday.  Perfect weather.

 

A walk to the shore, a swim in the lake, picked up plenty of pumice for lovely feet, lunch at a winery - the Floating Rock - and back to the batch for sunset, evening meal and more stars.  Relaxing.  Rejuvenating.  A change is as good as a rest, certainly.  Saturday was a walk around Lake Rotopounamu (say that three times fast, I struggle with one time) and a great relax in the hot pools (explained below).  Finally, lunch and cleanup at the bach and home by 5:30.

Taupo is a crater lake.  Here is some more info from Wikipedia - Lake Taupo lies in a caldera created by a supervolcanic eruption which occurred approximately 26,500 years ago. According to geological records, the volcano has erupted 28 times in the last 27,000 years. It has ejected mostly rhyolitic lava, although Mount Tauhara formed from dacitic lava.

The initial event 26,500 years ago is the largest eruption and is known as the Oruanui eruption. It ejected an estimated 1170 cubic kilometres of material and caused several hundred square kilometres of surrounding land to collapse and form the caldera. The caldera later filled with water, eventually overflowing to cause a huge outwash flood.  

Underwater hydrothermal activity continues near the Horomatangi vent,^[6] and nearby geothermal fields with associated hot springs are found north and south of the lake, for example at Rotokawa and Turangi. These springs are the site of occurrence of certain extremophile micro-organisms, that are capable of surviving in extremely hot environments.

now that's the way to pull a boat!

this is volcanic venting (not unlike some of mine ;-))
 so we only got close with the telephoto lens...

the lake around which we walked - lovely lake and terrific weather

dog hitching post at the winery
thinking of Daisy and her family...

xoxo

Planes, trains and automobiles...

So glad to be home and in the routine - it is comfort.  Having been away for about 3 weeks being in the throes of loads of laundry, bare pantry, spider webs, kids on bikes, neighbors popping in to say hey, finding chargers and electronics, GLORY.  Love the travel, really.  I long for it when we are here but I am so glad to come back to base.

We left for Sydney - what a great city - vibrant, busy, handsome gents and scantily clad women - something for everyone!  Did all the tourist things - the opera house, ferry to Manly (named because the men there were manly!!), too scared to do the bridge walk.  Darling Harbor with the largest rubber duck art exhibit just for FUN! Enjoyed an afternoon at Fort Dennison with a re-enactment of a battle with those ugly Americans. This is my new favorite city!  You are right Jeff!

brush fire from the train

Indian Pacific train to Adelaide for some really hot weather - the hottest we have been since August in Nashville 18 months ago!  The train ride was special - dining car, seeing emus and kangaroos grazing in the outback, rocking during sleep (or trying to sleep).  Stopped at Broken Hill and went to the mines.  Great experience.  We saw a brush fire from the train and cried for all those affected - what a tragedy.

Adelaide was nice - slower and easier - then to Melbourne via the Great Ocean Road.  Three sisters, 12 apostles (only 9 showing we reckon). Robe was a stop on the way and was one of the highest points of the trip.  We met the nicest couple where we stayed in the basement (with a veranda and path to a private beach, lovely antique furniture, wine and snacks and all the fixins for breakfast) of their home.  They are retired farmers (cattle, merino sheep, etc.).  Spectacular home and we wish we had been there for a week.  They invited us for wine and had an incredible view of the sea from their deck - what an amazing night.  The second woman we know named Tessa, and her husband Chips - fine folks!

On the way enjoyed a winery visit in the McLaren Vale, a market for bread, fresh fruit, olive oil and olives, cheese - nice picnic!  Saw lots of folks biking along the GOR - I have great respect for them, what a workout.

Finally to Melbourne for a bit of tennis, Australian Open - saw Serena's defeat, heard Azarenka (irritating!), was surprised by Andy Murray.  Melbourne Cricket Ground for Sri Lanka's defeat of  Australia in the cricket - I am trying to understand the rules but it was really fun - high energy fans doing the wave, hitting around the beach ball.  The Melbourne museum and scienceworks were terrific with a surprise Hot Rod Car show thrown in.  Let me not forget the Australia day parade.  It was called the parade of people and lots of different people there were.  FUN!  Accepting bunch, those Aussies.  It seemed to us that there was very little bigotry and that people were just accepted.  Live and let live.  We really like that.  The children are seeing people of the same sex, of different colours, of very different ways living life.  Accepting and loving, that is the way to do it I reckon.

Adrian had a very successful conference, learned a lot, saw some friends, made new friends, crossed off a few things on his list of to do's.  The floods came to Brisbane and then Sydney just before we left - what a country of extremes!  Crazy stuff... Sturdy folk...

Home we are to the same and nice surprises.  We have a new path to Jan and Jenny where we like to have coffee or wine and a good long chat, through the back garden so we can sneak back and forth at our leisure.  There are new ducks - a mama and five babies - hanging out in the yard.  We came home to a lovely birth announcement - Welcome gorgeous Sutton McCoy!  We are sending our best thoughts to a friend and colleague in Nashville - Chris B. we are thinking of you...   So glad that Amy J. and new baby are doing well, welcome beautiful Alexander.  Congratulations Hayden!

Dinners with kids, meals with parents, wine with friends, dancing with the girls, chatting in the break room, conversation and banter with colleagues, these are the things we miss. We are starting to develop those things here but it does take time.

Tell the person you are closest to how much you love them.  Share your sweetest thoughts and curb the others.  Life is short and precious and full of many wonders.  Watch for them...

Adventures abound no matter where you are...

Sydney harbour bridge

three sisters

aboriginal art

aboriginal art

must be a girls' trip saying! actually at a bowling alley bar in Sydney.  See, FUN!

Luna Park, Sydney

Cathedral, Adelaide

fruit of the vine, McLaren Vale

made from wine barrels 

Obelisk at Robe

Twelve Apostles

tandem biking the GOR

what a view!

Serena taking a minute before Sloan took her to the limit!

what a life!

Happy!

waiting on the bus all day...

1st baby King penguin born in Australia hiding on dad's feet

Hot Rod car show parking lot - love the truck Richie, what about you??

all in on the Australia day celebration.

Steve M.,  you would have loved it!

parade

parade winner, I reckon!!

xoxo

Merry Christmas!

Ours will come and go before most of you will have yours.  Merry Christmas!

I have never thought that I would do a Christmas letter but this is one I guess - oh dear!

We are busy keeping old traditions - baking is delivered to our neighbors - and making new traditions - we will be having a bbq on Christmas day!  There are folks at the hospital that are away from their homes so we are hosting them for burgers and sausages on the barbie - FUN!  I cannot let go of the Christmas brunch meal though, so we will share our egg casserole, sweet rolls (not as fine as mama's), and an introduction to cheese grits with our new dear friends Jenny and Jan.

Jenny is in her 80's and is quite a spitfire!  We get along just fine.  Sometimes we have a cup of tea but more often we have a glass of wine!  I found a bag of lettuce on my front porch from her garden yesterday.  I shared some really nice mango with them.  Love good neighbors!  I am used to that from home - Peggy, Len and Jeannie, Becky, and more.

Our first year has been so wonderful and not without some struggles.  The travel and the new friends, the new, easier way that we think about things, the movement - exercise and earthquakes - have all been factors in the success of this year.  Adrian is happy with his work!  He enjoys the walk to and from work!  He is reading and studying journals of Radiology, teaching the up and comings, taking on a leadership role - who'd have thunk it?!?!  The trips we have shared - New Zealand, Australia, Spain, France!  Facetime is great when someone answers!

AND

It is really cold and drafty in the house - no central heat, no double paned windows, food cost is HIGH!  Choices are very limited.  There is no Chex cereal for reindeer food! Who knew that coriander is cilantro? corgette is zucchini? stinky french cheese is not available everywhere?!?  Skype and Facetime can have a bad connection when you really need to talk to your mama and daddy!

All that being said, we talked tonight about how hard it will be to leave.  We talked about our original plan had us leaving now.  We are glad to be staying.  We really love it here.  We also really miss our families, our friends - Adrian NEEDS a golf game with Harry and the boys! I long for the ease of sharing the day to day with my lifelong girlfriends.  An Indian meal with dear friends, Timi's porch for heart-felt conversation, dropping in to hug mama and daddy, dinner with kids at Nero's - we miss all that!

The world has not ended and it should have by now.  I do not think anyone can foretell such events so we dismiss that just like we dismissed all of the election talk.  This is the place to be if you do not want to be yelled at by the media in regards politics, or anything else for that matter.  Nice to be able to turn that off!

Merry Christmas to each and everyone of you.  Either you are close by and we can hug your neck or you are further away and we can send you big hugs and kisses, either way, xoxo...

so thankful

We have had our first pumpkin-pie-free Thanksgiving and we lived through it.  We quite enjoyed it really.  We opted for a roasted chicken - turkeys are big and really expensive! - and we enjoyed an apple crumble for dessert.  We all thought it was just fine!  We love the internet even more as we were able to be with the Richardson side of the family for their pre-meal celebration - we laughed with Maddie, saw the sun in Anna's hair, saw the love in Richie's eyes, had a cyber glass of wine with dearest Peggy, chatted with Jack and Colson - go Coast Guard;-) - spent some time on the porch with Daddy, talked with Mom and Aunt Jacque in the kitchen!  What could be better than that!

We have been enjoying some sunny, windless days as spring comes on.  I have even been hot!  There are still times of chilly, windy days and cool nights but we are all feeling the lifting of the winter blahs.  It is really strange to see all the Christmas decorations in the shop windows with summer clothes and sandals.  As far as I can tell the weather in Nashville is about the same as here right now with the strange warm weather there.

Grace had a fun birthday with a party for 18 of her friends/classmates.  They played capture the flag in the backyard and decorated Christmas ornaments.  Hard to imagine that it has been 10 years since she arrived - she is a lovely young lady and is thriving here.  I am loving watching these girls grow...

We are coming up to the one year mark and as most of you know we have opted to stay on for at least six more months, more likely another year.  Now that I am getting used to the price of things being high, I can only say that this is a great place.  Life is easier, the pace is slower, there have been so many benefits!  There is so much to be thankful for...

sheep racing!

We spent Sunday in Fielding (about 15 minutes up the road) at the Manawatu A&P Show (I have no idea about the A&P, maybe agriculture and pigs, who knows??).  Anyone remember Fair Park back in the day?  A county fair is what it was.

There were championship pigs! goats, chickens, alpaca shorn and not, ostrich parents with their wee babes and their eggs (one equals 26 hen eggs!) quiche for days!  We watched boys on motorcycles jump with two spectacular crashes - no serious injuries, just limping.  There were helicopter rides, old pump engines and tractors (Dad, you would have loved it!).  Something for everyone.

alpaca, cute but get too close and they spit!

trucks, tractors, monster trucks, ferris wheels!

There were hotdogs, fries, cotton candy, ice cream - fair food! Families with their lambs on a leash.  Puppies for sale.  Horse riding competitions - jumping and dressage. Sheep racing with gambling!  We bought an arm band for $2 in the color of the outfit our jockey was wearing.  If that sheep came in first, you were the proud owner of a new coffee cup.  We were hoping for green or blue but, alas, yellow came in first - must have been hungry as there were pans of food at the finish.  We had never seen that before!

getting ready for the big start

just before the crash!

Then the main attraction - bull riding - ok, i know, this is a small town in New Zealand - there are no big towns really - but who would think that the bull riders would have just come back from Vegas and the PBR Championships.  They knew how to ride a bull!  The bulls were wild - snorting and kicking and bawling and putting on a show... The bull riders were holding on and waving their arms and climbing the rail to get away from the horns.  It was terrific!  We will be following the circuit!

Then for the intermission show there was mutton wrangling.  What, you ask, is mutton wrangling??!!  It is sheep riding by children between 6yo and 12yo.  We did not get the girls registered in time to participate but they are quite keen to do it next time.  There is a corral of sheep and kids and the kids get on their backs and hold on tight!  The gate is opened and out they come like a shot.  The kids either fell off or slid around almost under the bellies of the sheep - that lanolin in the wool makes for a slick ride, I think.  What a hoot. We were all laughing and hollerin'!  Real entertainment.

I have told you some of the differences but here is another - Kiwis do not holler!  They are quiet and buttoned up in every sense of the word.  I like it.  I like the calm and peace and reserve.  I also, as some of you know, like to holler.  Well, bull riding just needs some good ole hollering.  So I did.  Well I sound different, they notice.  I can get loud, especially when there is a cowboy riding a bull - how can you not SHOUT!  By the end of it they were hollerin' with me!  Ride 'em cowboy!

Prince Charles and Camilla will be in Fielding in the next week or two - the best Farmers market is there and they are interested in visiting the stockyards too.  Sorry they were not here to enjoy the Manawatu A&P Show... Very glad we were.

Boo! only in the States!

Our first Halloween in NZ, a success by our standards.  We were warned not to get our hopes up - It is an American thing - is what we heard.  Many people do not participate in Halloween.  So we modified our expectations - we did not think about big trucks loaded with costumed, over-candied children riding on hay bails.  We did not think about yards decorated with skeletons and cauldrons smoking with dry ice, spooky sounds coming from darkened doors.  We thought instead about spending time together and bringing a bit of home here.

As it turns out many people do not participate in halloween.  There are printed signs that have a picture of a pumpkin with a big red line through it.  There were many signs that said - No Halloween here, Thanks.  (Always polite).  One lady even opened the door, saw the children in costume, slammed the door, locked the door, watched us go from the front window! WOW!  How about that for culture shock.  They are private people.  they are people with religious beliefs that do not include Halloween.  Who knows why but Halloween is, in fact, an American thing.

The wonder is we had a blast!  Kelly, my boss, good friend, confidante, guide in all things NZ and Australia (she is from there) - invited us to go through her boxes of costumes she had made - we had great success - and to go out with her children.  Her son James was very excited and invited other children.  There were seven children when all was done and they looked great.  They had fun.  They used their best manners even when people were not participating. We picked up other children from school that we knew and another mom joined so I had a chance to get to know her better.  We found homes that were decorated (not by American standards but there were skeletons!).  One lady had forgotten to get candy (can you imagine forgetting?!?) and gave the children grapes from her fruit bowl!  they were safe to eat...

We came home with small bags and bellies full of candy, better knowing our friends. That is success in any language!!