Theme Thursday: Recess (LIncoln Road Mall, Miami Beach, Florida)

(Linking up with inimitable Cari) Other than ice water, iced lattes are my all time favorite beverage. Soy milk and Splenda with it, please. To enjoy an iced latte outside the Sterling Building in Miami Beach, one of my all-time favorite places, on a sultry August day put me pretty close to paradise. (Check out the bookstore that serves these babies)

re·cess  (rss, r-ss)

n.

1.

a. A temporary cessation of the customary activities of an engagement, occupation, or pursuit.

b. The period of such cessation. See Synonyms at pause.

2.      A remote, secret, or secluded place. Often used in the plural.

3.

a. An indentation or small hollow.

b. An alcove.

Tonight: Palm Beach Lake Trail

Tonight's walk. The photo doesn't begin to capture the beauty of this walk, called Palm Beach Lake Trail, along Lake Worth Lagoon in Palm Beach, Florida. 

Tonight, my husband and I were among the few walkers/runners/cyclists on this four-mile stretch of flat pavement that weaves between Palm Beach Lake to the west and mansions hidden behind enormous hedges to the east. It was mostly us and the salamanders. I'd like to return on another visit to Florida and do the whole 8 miles round trip.

Seven Quick Takes for Friday: Trumpets, Sardines and Vacations

1. Well, it's Friday night as I write this. I am home alone, just me and the dog. Better late than never, eh? My husband and our older son are in Princeton, where our son has chamber orchestra rehearsal. Our younger (trumpeting) son is with dear family friends at Montclair State University, listening to the MSU Symphonic Band and the MSU Wind Symphony. Our friend's son is a trumpeter at MSU!

This Moment: My Parents' Backyard

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

If you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' here for all to find and see.

Theme Thursday: Sky

Thanks to Cari for hosting these themed photo Thursdays. I took this picture early Saturday morning in my parents' backyard in Florida.

In Which The Man Drinking Green Tea Asks For Our Prayers

This afternoon my parents and I, tired from a visit to the Norton Museum of Art, stopped by the Starbucks in Boynton Beach. It's a favorite haunt of my mom and dad, who retired to this corner of Florida many years ago. We settled into three comfy chairs in the back of the cafe.

A man in his thirties, dressed in a black shirt, black pants and black shoes, settled into the fourth of the four chairs. He was small and looked a bit nervous, a bit out of his element. He put down his computer case and went to the counter to pick up his green tea. Who could imagine that 30 minutes later, we would know much about this man and that he would ask us to pray for him?

On Never Making It to Disney

I write this from the second bedroom of my parents' house in Florida, where I am visiting for a week. I snapped a shot of the view from my window earlier today. Lovely. The sweet mother of three of I sat next to on the plane was stunned to learn that this is only the third time in 20 years I have visited my parents here. And stunned to learn I never have been to Disneyworld, and that our children have never been either. "Never?" she asked, with her eyes widening.

She and her husband were taking their three children to Disney for the second time in five years. I have no clue if they simply have a much bigger family budget than we do or if they are living with credit card debt or if grandparents are footing the bill, or whatever. That is not the point here. The conversation made me think about the choices my husband and I have made throughout 20 years of married life, choice other families don't make, or haven't had to make. The conversation is helping me reflect on my vocation.

We made a decision early in our marriage to not use credit cards ever. And we haven't. This means we only go on vacations that we can afford, with money that is sitting in our bank account. We also decided to build our family budget, including our mortgage, with the assumption that only one of us would have a fulltime job. And for most of our marriage, only one of us has. Most of the time, that person has been my husband but there have been times, prebabies, where that person was me.

We made these choices because we didn't want the pressure of affording stuff we didn't actually need to control our lives. We wanted our marriage and our children to be the centerpiece.

This is why coming here, alone for the first time in a long time, has been so exceptional, so unusual. Even when one of us has had the rare business trip, we have tried to have the other, or at least one of our boys, come along.

And so as I reflect on the soon to be ending season of having children at home,  I have no regrets. We never made it to Disney, but I cherish the time we have spent together as a family, and all our handmade adventures.