It's 2012 - WOW!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!  Hard to believe that it’s 2012, isn’t it???

First and foremost…It is our intention that all you wish and hope for in the coming year becomes your reality.

We are writing to you from Asheville, NC, where we have rented a 2 bedroom 2 bath apartment (read: room for guests) thru August.  For starters, it is really fun to live out of a closet and drawer space – since we left New Mexico last March we have been essentially living out of our 2 small suitcases and one bag full of toiletries (requirements of this advanced age, we’ve found).  We were ready to “park” for a bit and had heard many good and wondrous things about Asheville and so decided to give it a test drive.  

After returning from Ireland on Oct 1, we spend a couple of weeks visiting folks on the east coast then flew to Salt Lake City, bought a car and headed east – with the autumn leaves in full glory, it was a great trip.  Our intention was to spend a month here then go south, west then north ending up in Northern California so we didn’t bring much of anything from our storage space (we have clothes, some art, a few rugs and kitchen stuff in SLC).   But, we found the Unitarian Congregation here with 800 members and lots going on; we found a large and active OLLI (Senior Education) at the U of NC and we found CarePartners Hospice Estate Sale Division (where we are now really active volunteers – worked 3 days last week hauling and selling stuff)…so, after 2 weeks at the Residence Inn we decided to stay awhile and found this brand new apartment within about 2 days. 

Since we couldn’t find a good furnished apartment we thought about renting furniture, but figured out that we could buy estate/used furniture and at the end of 9 months donate it back to hospice both saving money and supportinga worthy cause – we started with the most unlikely (especially for us) chair.

And we have gone on from there having a good time and supporting some great causes – it’s amazing what you can buy for next to no money!  Wish we had thought about this concept years ago…reusing is great for us and super for the planet!

Our future plans are unknown – but we have many possibilities all under discussion.

For those of you who keep up with our kids:  John and Sutton in Salt Lake City are doing great – John has returned to school – he’s at Iliff School of Theology in Denver ( http://www.iliff.edu/ ) doing a distance masters with the intention of becoming a Unitarian Universalist Minister, continues to run his web/data business & Sutton (bless her heart) continues as a Jr High art teacher and to develop her Mary Kay business – they are both very involved with their UU society and with their 2 dogs, Felix and Memphis who are a hoot.  Payson and Chris in New York City are also doing great – Payson is an entrepreneur at heart and has her fingers in several pies but at the moment focuses on consulting with other entrepreneurs on how to use social media in their growing businesses & Chris (bless his heart) continues to manage one of NYCs tall commercial buildings and play music, music, music – he’s a terrific guitarist.

 

IRELAND (a little travelogue – been meaning to add this to our blog to finish our postings about our 6 months overseas, but somehow it has never gotten done – earlier posts are at www.cooperstwo.org )   

We were there for a month – actually 30 days – and it rained on 29 of them.  Spent our first week in Ashbourne, just north of Dublin in the Boyne Valley – we really enjoyed the several days we spent in Dublin!  The architecture is a wonderful combination of old (as Trinity College) and ultra contemporary (as in the big financial company buildings).  We also spent a number of days while in Ashbourne, setting a pattern for the rest of the month – tracking down and marveling at ancient sites. 

tombs,

 

round towers  

 (there are over 80 on the island), 

abbey & castle ruins.

 

 The Boyne Valley is where Newgrange and several other Neolithic burial mounds are located – magical!!  http://www.theboynevalley.com/

 

From Ashbourne we headed south –

had the best crab of our trip (they reminded us of Florida stone crabs – yum!!) near Wexford on the water.

Our plan was to circle the island, which we did, putting over 5000 kilometers on the rented car (a diesel Vauxhall that got 40+ miles to the gallon – which was great as gas is about $8 per gallon). We headed across the southern end of the island and began our trip north along the West coast …It is just simply a gloriously beautiful country -  we drove around the Ring of Kerry, the Ring of Beara and, also a peninsula called “Dingle,” but not called the “Ring of” for some reason ;-)

Susan has always loved wool tweeds and when we got to Donegal we bought one for David from the man who wove the cloth…

 

 And, she got to sit in with a few folks playing "trad" music on drum, in a pub!

Once in the north we headed East spending time in Londonderry (these days most folks call it by its ancient name “Derry”) then on to Belfast which we really loved!!  The botanical gardens, adjoining the university is in a wonderful ‘hood – there is really good food and people are wonderful.

Here are some things that we never knew:

• · There was a Norman “moving in” in the 1100’s!  They stayed and mixed with the prevailing inhabitants.  So, many names that we think of as “Irish” are really “Norman” (i.e., all the “Fitz” names such as Fitzgerald and, the Butlers – who were the tasters for the Norman kings).·         Extensive settlements in the 3-4000 BCE years – there are stone age remains everywhere and in some areas (like the Boyne Valley) they are really dense.
• ·   Celiac disease is so common among the Irish that most restaurants (including pubs) identify Gluten Free items on their menus (David was thrilled – we found this to be the case in Scotland, too)

• ·   Ireland has lost 95% of its bogs.  And, it takes 5000 +/- years to make another one.  They appear to have been created by iron-age people clearing forests, lakes being filled with residue over time.  The Netherlands have used up all the peat in their bogs and so they are encouraging (even with $$) Ireland to increase the preservation of those that are left .  This has become a political issue as many people are attached to burning peat.  Although houses are now heated with oil/gas and cooking is done differently, the tradition of burning peat in the home is very strong.

We have tons of photos and many stories and if you come and visit we will be delighted to share them.

 We are at:  41 North Merrimon Ave #305 in Asheville, NC 28804

Home 520-326-1894 David 914-316-2553 Susan 917-273-9579

 We’d love to see you … they tell us it’s really beautiful here in the early Spring – the Blue Ridge Parkway is just down the road!

Again, Happy 2012 – we are hopeful that this is the year things will begin to turn toward a more sustainable planet with folks who can really live the concept of wholeness.  With onelove….. http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=one+love ,

S&D (& Bob - thanks, John)