Kwanzan Cherry trees are blooming

After a mostly cool and damp spring, we had a sudden onset of a few days of hot summery weather. The 32nd annual Woods and Lakes Run seemed like the hottest ever. Susan and friends were great helpers with the water station and guiding the runners at the trail intersections on the course. It's Monday now and it seems like the Kwanzan cherry trees that dot our landscape and that are abundantly found along my commute through Parsippany are suddenly flowering. The old Kwanzan in our yard that Laura much admired is blooming and Laura's memorial tree is just on the verge. Every year Laura would worry that the cherry tree in our yard wasn't going to bloom. But it always did.

Photos: Kwanzan cherry blossoms up close; baby Laura and our family in 1995 with our cherry tree behind; a view of the old cherry tree. Click once on photo for larger view.

Woods and Lakes Run then...

For maybe twenty years, we've been associated with our local annual 10 K race, the Woods and Lakes Run. That goes back before cancer, before children.
Except for the year that Laura was diagnosed, we always helped as race workers. The girls were part of it from a young age. With the 4th Saturday of April this weekend, it's time for the Woods and Lakes Run again. Once more I'll remember how Laura used to help at the water station with Susan all those years and how we enjoyed the picnic for the helpers afterwards on the shores of Crystal Lake.

Every year, about the second week of April or so, the phone would ring in the evening around 8 or 8:30. I always knew who was calling. It would be Steve Pottash the race director confirming our participation running the water station and the Tourne volunteers. This year Steve didn't call. For last September Steve had died. Steve the fitness trainer and perennial cyclist had made an appointment with a cardiologist but it wasn't soon enough. Steve will be remembered this Saturday at the Woods and Lakes run.

Photos: Susan and Laura at their water station post; after the race, Susan (left) and Laura, with bag of popcorn, on the shore of Crystal Lake.

trip to Boston then Montreal

Photos: From last weekend's trip to Boston for the admitted student open house at BU and then an excursion to Montreal.
Susan after the Study Abroad presentation at BU; scenes in Old Montreal, including "Chez Suzette" where we had a cheese fondue; Susan was delighted to find a store specializing in cupcakes!

Signs of spring

Tears falling in NJ for Erin

Erin Buenger (June 20, 1997-April 9, 2009)
NJ friends of Erin are deeply saddened. Tears kept springing all weekend whether I was in Boston, in Vermont or in Montreal. Please click here for article about Erin (you may have to click on close welcome page in upper right hand corner to get to the article.) If you check google news and enter Erin's name, you will be able to see the televised story.

A visit to New York

Yesterday afternoon, Susan and I went to NYC to meet up with the Hanson family, in town for the weekend. We met on the steps of the Museum of Natural History and together toured the Hall of African Animals, one of the Dinosaur Halls and, the special exhibit, the Butterfly Conservatory. Inside the warm and humid vivarium, about 500 butterflies of various species flitted about among the pink flowers of pentas plants and sometimes chose to alight on the outstretched hand of an eager child, or the head of an unsuspecting adult. I think it was enjoyed by all and we were so glad to see Ellen and the kids.
Photos: Yesterday, in the Dinosaur Hall; and reaching out to the butterflies in the vivarium ; and looking back to June 2006, Laura with the Hanson family in Brewster, Mass.