Penny Lane and Memory Lane

It has been nearly two weeks since my last blog post, mainly because I have been so busy.  After leaving Courtney and Billy's (and those sweet grandchildren) I traveled to Cleveland.  When I used to live in NY, Cleveland was pretty much known as the "mistake on the lake" (Erie that is).  I found the city to be quite nice with an enhanced water front, good places to eat and easy to get around.  Again, I stayed in an AirBnb which was convenient to the downtown area.  My main reason for going there was to visit the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame (therefore the Penny Lane in the title of this post), the second of my HOF adventures.  Growing up in the sixties and seventies, it was a fun place for me to visit.  Lots of memories of the British invasion and music that I had listened to on vinyl.  They had lots of video from concerts and memorabilia including guitars, Elvis' golden Cadillac etc. etc.  The saddest part of it is the number of talented artists who died untimely deaths due to the lifestyle of the genre or the inability to handle the fame and fortune or both (see Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Prince and Michael Jackson to name a few).  What a waste of talent (I know, some would disagree). 

In Cleveland, I also attended an Indian's (? Native American's if I'm going to be PC) baseball game as they were the hottest team in baseball after being in the World Series last year.  It's not that I am a huge professional baseball fan, but I am a fan of the game, mainly college.  And I like going to new stadiums, eating baseball food and watching the game in person, much more than on TV.  I was really tired after spending all day in the HOF so I left early and missed the most exciting part of the game.  Oh well.

The following day I drove to Buffalo where I went to medical school and did my residency.  I drove around to various places I lived and, most importantly ate my three favorite Buffalo foods there: Bocce Club Pizza, Duff's Buffalo wings and roast beef on a kimmelweck roll with horseradish and au jus.  Yummy, yummy, and more yummy.  I had connected with a guy, Frank, with whom I was a resident at the Children's Hospital of Hospital.  We had a great time at dinner that evening, catching up and reminiscing old times.  He also took me on a tour of downtown Buffalo which is making an incredible resurgence with old warehouses being converted into high end apartments and condos.  The following day he arranged a tour of the brand new Children's Hospital to which they are moving next month.  In addition, the medical school is moving from the main SUNY Buffalo campus 6 miles east of the city center to downtown where the Buffalo General, Roswell Park Cancer Center and Children's Hospital are all together.  The whole complex is very impressive and will serve the population of the Buffalo area well.

After the tour I went to Rochester where I grew up and did my own motor tour of the parts of the city memorable to me, the house I grew up in, my old elementary school and high school, the University of Rochester area where I attended for my junior and senior years and other familiar places.  I hadn't planned ahead enough to meet anyone who lives there and I was in a time crunch to get to Syracuse.  In Syracuse, I had dinner and stayed with a family whose son (or brother), M I cared for when I was a pediatric hematology/oncology fellow.  He had passed away the year after I got my first real job in Arkansas and we have remained in contact since.  His Mom (M's father died when he was 3 months old), three sisters and one of his brothers took me to a great Italian restaurant.  We had a wonderful time catching up, shed some tears over M and Debbie and reconnected in person despite the passing years that had changed our looks and our outlooks.

The following day I took off for Cooperstown to visit my third HOF, the Baseball Hall of Fame.  I really didn't know a whole lot about baseball history as I wasn't much of a fan growing up.  Throughout the museum though, they had lots of video screens with highlights of plays that made history like Kirk Gibson's pinch hit homerun in the World Series and an unassisted triple play.  They also had a running video of the "Who's on first, What's on second" Abbott and Costello routine.  The best part of the visit was meeting an elderly gentleman, Dick Hyde who was there with his daughter and her family and his wife.  They were taking him around in a wheelchair and he was commenting on players as though he knew them personally.  My curiosity overwhelmed my reticence to admit that I had been eavesdropping so I asked his daughter if he had played baseball.  Turns out he pitched for the Washington Senators back in the late 50's and had struck out Mickey Mantle!  He even has a Wikipedia page.  I sheepishly asked him if he would mind if I took his picture and he humbly agreed.  It was so fun to hear his stories and see part of the hall of fame through his eyes.

I spent the night in Oneonta and headed the next day to New Paltz where I went to undergrad my first and second years of college.  On the way I passed through a little town called Roscoe.  They were setting up for a little fall festival with a beer tent from a local craft brewery and smaller tents with crafts and jewelry.  I drove right past it thinking, "if Debbie were with me, we would HAVE to stop".  I got about a half mile down the road and said to myself, "Self, part of the reason for this trip is to get through some painful firsts."  So I turned around and went back.  I parked the car in the field behind the tents, locked it and began slowly heading toward the little festival.  As I approached I saw a group setting up a stage, probably for music, families walking around with ice cream cones, and older couple holding hands looking through the craft tents.  The further I got, the more difficult it was to swallow and my vision blurred as my eyes moistened.  I took one trip around, barely looking at the wares that were being sold and trying my best to smile at those I passed along the way.  After a trip around the area, I hurried back to the car, opened the door, plopped into the front seat and wept.  These firsts are difficult but in my opinion, necessary to the grieving process.  I'm glad I did it.....I think.

The drive through the Catskills was beautiful although the leaves weren't changing yet.  When I neared New Paltz, I stopped off at Minnewaska State Park.  When I was in college there had been a large hotel where I waited tables on the weekends and during the summer between my freshman and sophomore year.  The hotel burned down and I had heard they were going to put a Marriott there but the state of NY bought it instead.  Taking the winding road to the top of the mountain, I remembered each curve and switchback as I had traveled that same road many times.  The lake and surrounding rock formations were beautiful but the water wasn't nearly as blue as it had been.  I discovered talking to the "nature guy" that the pH had changed from 4 to 7 for some totally unknown reason.  At a pH of 4 no plant or animal life could live in the water and it was crystal clear and deep blue in color.  Once the pH went up to 7, plant life, then fish began to inhabit the lake changing the color to a greenish-grey.  I hiked around the lake and met several groups of younger people who didn't know the history of the park with the hotel and changes in the lake.  In talking, I would bring up my history with the lake 45 years earlier.  Hopefully, they enjoyed my tales as much as I enjoyed the pitcher's view in Cooperstown.

That night and the day after I spent with my roommate from college and his wife.  They had dated all through college and remain married.  S took me on a tour of the campus the next day including the dorm we lived in which was a pit back in the day but looks very nice now.  We had a great time talking about old times in school.  Additionally we talked about what has happened since school, our families, our challenges and our triumphs, our good decisions and bad.  S has kept up with a lot of our friends from back in the day and invited me to the next old guys' reunion.  I'm looking forward to it!

After leaving New Paltz, I drove to my next destination, Churchville, MD where my sister, Judy and her husband, Rick live.  We had a great time getting together again.  This is the third time this year we've seen each other and that's unprecedented.  Our time together was delightful and I got to spend time with both of them together and separately.  Not to mention, we had some delicious Marylnd crab cakes!  (Are you catching the food theme I'm throwing out there?)

In the midst of all this, the news came from Las Vegas about the terrible shootings on the crowd attending the country music festival.  Hearing the stories of the people who lost their lives caused me to grieve to the point of sobbing as I thought of the families whose lives were indelibly changed from that moment on.  I grieved for them and once again, those emotions laid bare the wound that was and is Debbie's death.  I believe my heart is forever tenderized to the sorrow felt by others going through tragedy.  It isn't that I think my grief is the same as theirs, it's that God has placed within me a grief tuning fork that resonates whenever I think about another person's loss.  In the story of His friend, Lazarus dying prior to his arrival onto the scene, Jesus saw the sadness experienced by his friends, Mary and Martha.  In John 11:33-35 it says "When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled.  'Where have you laid him?' he asked.  'Come and see, Lord,' they replied."  And in the shortest verse in the bible, verse 35 says "Jesus wept."  Even though He knew all that had happened and knew that He was about to perform a miracle resurrection, He felt such compassion for His friends' deep sorrow, that He wept.  Hopefully, I can be an open vessel to be used by God, not to miraculously save others from the circumstances in life that cause them to grieve but to come along side of others and meet them where they are in their sadness.  I'm not sure I'm ready for that right now, no one needs help from someone blubbering over their own loss.

Sorry for the length of this post, but it's what's on my heart today.  There are lots of pictures from all of this on Facebook that I won't repost here.  Right now I'm at Brittany and Andrew's for my last stop before returning home.  Then what? I have no idea!!!