November, 2018

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Tuesday November 20. Giving Thanks

Tuesday, November 20th, 2018

After Easter, Thanksgiving is my most favorite holi(y)day, though I did not grow up with it. The Pilgrims sailed here from Holland on the “Mayflower”, I flew in on a prop driven Lockheed Constellation in January 1957, also from Holland.

I have much to be thankful for again on this special holiday. Once more in the aftermath of an apparent setback, this time last year’s shipwreck. I wrote in my previous blogs of the friendships I found here and the activities I enjoy here in this best kept secret hide away. Many of the new friendships were made in the church I attend here, Saint Charles, but the others are also mostly Christians from a variety of denominations. And it is an added dimension to be among, just like the Pilgrims, others who know where we can send our thank-you cards.

Last Thursday I met the cruising family Sefan and Keri Topjian of the “Aghavni”. https://www.sailblogs.com/member/aghavni/382528/

 

 

 

 

Van, the son is the oldest, at ten. We soon discovered a common thread, the importance of our faith. They grew up in Armenia and are Eastern Orthodox Christians.  Keri is home schooling the children and I noticed the same observation I made in my blog last year when I wrote about the Cruising Brats at the Shelter Bay Marina in Colon, Panama.  https://cometosea.us/?p=6224 They can talk with adults. They are going to have a fabulous experience. Be sure to check their blog regularly. This picture was taken on Friday on their departure for the Caribbean, Panama Canal, the South Pacific and beyond. On parting, Sefan prayed a blessing. What a heartwarming experience holding hands with this family. Another lasting long distance friendship.

Jeannine, daughter #3, will come tomorrow with my, visiting from Texas, oldest grandson Mark Leon and his wife and their two sons, to pick me up and spend the holiday with them in Chesapeake, Va.

To all my family and friends: “Happy Thanksgiving!”  

For the local friends, a reminder: I will sing in concert, choir and orchestra, the first part of the Messiah and the Hallelujah chorus.  Sat. Dec. 8 –  at Cokesbury- 2pm, Sun. Dec. 9 – at Hungars church— 4pm.

November 2 Dia de Los Muertos. And another Cape Charles Art-in-Fact.

Saturday, November 3rd, 2018
In my previous blog I extolled the virtues of Cape Charles as a “Small town big art”. This is about one of the locals who support the artists and enjoy decorating their lives with it. Robert, a good friend of Susan Kovacs, who I introduced in my August 18 blog, served a birthday dinner for Susan this week. Robert has been collecting paintings and prints from contemporary abstract and impressionists masters and artifacts from the countries he has lived and visited. This picture shows the birthday girl right front and a sample of three well known early 20th century artists. The birthday party and L.R.: Joan Miro, Kazimir Malevich and Alex Calder.

The birthday party and L.R.: Joan Miro, Kazimir Malevich and Alex Calder.

      One of Robert’s artist friends, for fun, “paint-shopped” him into a well known Edgar Degas frame.

Robert with the “shopped” Degas

The impersonator

the real Degas

                          My friends Clint and Patty returned from their three week visit to the Northwest last Saturday. I took advantage of the use of their vehicle to visit the Barrier Island Center  http://www.barrierislandscenter.org/read-me/    on Friday. This had been on my list since I first heard of it. “Fleetwood” left her marks on the beach of Godwin island right next to Mink island with my fateful shipwreck on June 23rd, last year. The center holds a treasure of  the rich history of these remote islands before they started being abandoned by their inhabitants after steady erosion. The initiator of this museum is my dear friend Thelma Jarvis Peterson, who I also described among the artists of my previous blog.

BIC

    I have joined a small choir directed by Lou Negretti. Lou is the machine shop operator who managed to straighten the wreck damaged rudder shaft and has done several other metal repairs for me. He is an outstanding director and accomplished musician and singer. We practice every Thursday evening and I sing occasionally at the Sunday service of this gorgeous old Hungars Episcopalian church. Last Sunday we sang at Hungars first and then, later in the morning, at the Christ Church in Eastville. The pastor,  Daniel Lee Crockett, is also an outstanding musician and singer. He is the base player in the video taken at our get together at Susan Kovacs’ home last August. Here is a link to the first time I sang in the Hungars Church. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYoUdyHndHU I will also sing in concert, choir and orchestra, the first part of the Messiah and the Halleluiah chorus. For my local friends this is the schedule: Sat. Dec. 8 –  at Cokesbury- 2pm, Sun. Dec. 9 – at Hungars church— 4pm. This evening we celebrated with the Latin American parishioners and their musicians the mass of Dia de Los Muertos (All souls), with a potluck dinner afterwards. So, with all these activities here in what, at first in a bird’s eye view, looked like a desolate wind swept coastal stretch, is happening to my sailing plans? June came and went, this week hundreds of sailors are heading out of the Chesapeake Bay to the tropical waters after waiting for their insurance coverage to allow them after the November 1st official end of the hurricane season. I waved good bye to a number of sailor friends. I hate to even make any more time predictions. It will be after Thanksgiving and Christmas. The wiring puzzle has really slowed me down. It is a very slow learning process. I ended up making a climb up the mast, last week, in vain because of the main battery switch malfunctioning during the effort.

Fleetwood’s Penthouse

If a professional carpenter would have made my cockpit hatch cover replacement with the time I put into it, it would have cost me a thousand dollars. Ahead of me is still the formica work, upholstery, cabinet trim, a new cockpit grate and companion way door, etc. God must have a plan for me, unless this is a conspiracy to keep me here. I take every day as a blessing and leaving here will be “partir c’est mourir un peu”.