Heat

Wow, I am such a weather wimp. I lived in Florida for 30 years, but the summer heat is just about killing me. We went to the Dali Museum in downtown St. Petersburg yesterday, and then went to lunch at a pub on nearby Beach Drive, within a stone's throw of Tampa Bay. Just the short walk from the car seemed suffocating.

The museum (blessedly air conditioned, of course) was terrific. The art collection, while extensive, is small enough to be taken in in a single trip, and the architecture of the new building is intriguing, with its bulbous glass geodesic structure atop a concrete hurricane-proof bunker.

When I was a senior in high school I skipped school one day to go the Dali Museum, then in its former low-lying building. What a nerd I was. All my friends were at the beach. And then I got nabbed because I forged a note in my mom's name and the school checked up on me. (It was probably a bad forgery.) I had to pick up trash on the football field on a holiday morning. All in the name of art!

(Photo: The sun's reflection in the surface of the lake off the end of our new dock. Hot, hot, hot!)

Sawhorse

Just another photo from our recent trip to Michigan. We were in Fennville, going to dinner, when we walked past a retail space under construction. I shot this through the window. The light was beautiful that evening!

I'm just too busy to write much today, but the trip is going well. Spending lots of time with friends and family. Today is my mom's birthday, so we'll be off to celebrate. Tomorrow we fly!

Sounds

I miss a lot of things about home -- the smell of the sandy Florida soil after a summer afternoon downpour, the specific varieties of grassy weeds in the yard, the gray dawn light in my childhood bedroom.

For some reason on this trip I've especially noticed the sounds of home. For example, we have a pocket door in the hall that leads to my bedroom, which my parents would close every night after they put me to bed when I was little. That door makes a very specific sound. There's a little catch as you pull it from the wall, and the tone and timbre as it slides into place is always the same. (My parents never closed the door all the way, so I didn't hear the soft thunk it would make upon contact with the wall.) I closed that pocket door on Friday morning to let Dave sleep, and it struck me how familiar that sound was.

When I was a kid, I loved lying on the other side of that door and hearing the indecipherable murmur of the television in the living room. I knew my parents were there and I was safe.

At my Dad's house, there's a grandfather clock in the living room. Like most grandfather clocks, it chimes every quarter-hour and then bongs out the time on the hour. When my brother and I visited as children, we often slept on a fold-out couch about four feet away from this clock. Needless to say, it became a kind of love-hate relationship.

There are so many other examples of familiar noises -- the air conditioners, the squeak of the front door on its hinges, even the way the toilet flushes in the acoustical environment of my bathroom. These sounds are unique to my family home. I'm enjoying hearing them all again.

(Photo: A window ornament I bought my Dad and stepmother years ago, hanging in their dining room.)

Florida

Just a quick note, with a completely unrelated photo, to say we've arrived in Florida after a couple of days of driving. I always enjoyed road trips, but I can see how Dave dislikes them -- driving from Michigan to Florida was definitely a challenge in places. We endured an hour-long traffic jam in Kentucky caused by a truck fire, a downpour while driving on a winding road through the Blue Ridge Mountains, and I got super-frustrated in the heavy traffic of Atlanta. But we got to stop in Asheville to visit with an old friend and now we're back in rainy, humid, summery Florida.

The next several days will be full of family and errands until we depart on Wednesday. Stay tuned!

(Photo: Balloons in New York under the Manhattan Bridge, two weeks ago.)

Saugatuck

Dave and I had a small-town Fourth of July yesterday. We went to Saugatuck, on the shore of Lake Michigan, and spent the day browsing in little shops and watching the local Fourth of July parade. I'd spent the morning groaning about how boring parades are, but then I watched this one in its entirety and thought it was a hoot. So much for my preconceived notions.

The weather was spectacular. About 80 degrees, beautifully sunny. You couldn't ask for better. We popped into the local Tabor Hill Winery shop and bought a few bottles, and had a light lunch at Pumpernickel's, a restaurant on the main drag where we could see the parade from an upstairs patio.

This is our second visit to Saugatuck. When we went last year we had the dogs with us. This time we were able to walk and browse much more freely, though of course we missed our slobbery companions.

Last night on the way home, we met some friends at "Salt of the Earth," a restaurant in Fennville, for dinner. We liked the entrees -- I had lake whitefish with a corn and crab relish. But I give a big thumbs-down to my dessert, a modified S'more as big as a twin-sized mattress and waaaaaaay too sweet. The size alone was almost disgusting. Note to chef: Bigger doesn't always mean better.

(Photo: On the patio at lunch in Saugatuck.)

Western Michigan

Our purging activities have temporarily stalled as we visit Western Michigan, where Dave lived and taught before moving to New York in 2008. We're staying with his friend Annie and her family. They're terrific hosts with a beautiful house, and we're staying in their finished basement, which is nicer than any living room I've ever owned. The accommodations are quite plush.

Two nights ago we had dinner with our friends Kellee and Stephanie, as well as Kellee's boyfriend Brian and Stephanie's brother Neil. Stephanie, who like Dave attended the French Culinary Institute in New York and lived there for a while, made dinner.

Last night we grilled salmon at Annie's and ate on the patio by the pool with her husband and son, trading stories about our lives and our families. Apparently Dave's father had an episode yesterday with previously undiagnosed glaucoma, which we learned only by chance when we called to find out whether our furniture was selling. But he had an outpatient procedure and he's doing fine.

I went walking in downtown Kalamazoo yesterday, where I took some photos and had a good time, despite the fact that nearly every business was closed. (Not only Sunday but also Fourth of July weekend!)

I'm not sure what's on the agenda today. Maybe a little local road trip.

(Photo: Kalamazoo, yesterday.)

Past Lives

We spent yesterday unloading furniture from the trailer and moving it into Dave's parents' basement, where I photographed each piece and listed it all on Craigslist for sale. We also listed several items belonging to his parents. I'm handling all the listings and communication, to spare his parents all the spam and the headaches, and we already have several bites. If we're really lucky we'll get a few items sold before we leave tomorrow to visit some friends in western Michigan.

Dave dislikes this process more than I do. For me it's sort of fun to comb through things and purge. As I've mentioned many times before, I view it as a cleansing, an opportunity for a fresh start. But it can be tedious, and a lot of the stuff that Dave has stored here at his parents' belonged to his former partner, who passed away five years ago -- items as diverse as china and glassware, a huge record collection, office supplies and jewelry. Understandably it's harder for him to open up boxes and rediscover all those items.

In fact, we got a surprise back in New Jersey when we moved a dresser and found a hidden drawer. (Dave knew it was there but I had no idea, and I'd been using this dresser for more than a year.) The drawer was full of jewelry, identification and other items belonging to Bruce, his former partner. It was kind of like a visit from a ghost. We took the jewelry to a precious metals buyer and sold what was valuable, and I kept some European coins, figuring we might be able to spend them. I also kept a smooth, shiny pebble that probably had some significance to Bruce. I'm not sure why.

Still, we're moving nearly everything toward the Craigslist/future-yard-sale pile. What better opportunity to start fresh than moving to England?

(Photo: Shadows and reflections in our empty apartment, a few days before we left New Jersey.)