"Shop the walls first!"

I used to be able to keep track of life. COVID changed that. The past two years feel like a time warp. Like we lost two years or experienced those two years in a parallel universe. How many times have I used the phrase "pre-COVID" in my normal conversation? "When did that happen?" "I don't know...sometime pre-COVID." 

I don't mean to imply that the virus is gone. Many are still testing positive every day. But not nearly so many are dying, and whether that is because as the virus mutates, it loses strength or because science blessed us with effective vaccines that provide at least some protection against the new variants, I don't know. I'm just so grateful.

One clear consequence of this wretched virus is that many of us missed seeing our extended families for way too long. This is true for both Gerald and me. Neither of us saw our original family for over three years. That changed for Gerald two weeks ago, when we traveled to Everett, Washington to visit his mom, sister, and brother. Here are the four of them:

It was a short trip, just two days. Gerald's nonagenarian mom, Violet, enjoys walking as much as I do. We took several walks around her condo and then down on the waterfront. The weather was nearly perfect the first day and absolutely perfect the second when the rain I ordered finally arrived. I'm hoping my 25-year dedicated walking regimen serves me as well as it has Violet when I'm her age.

That second day we also got to visit Gerald's brother and sister-in-law, Glenn and Monica, at their home, where Monica's incredible artwork lines the walls. "Shop the walls first," she suggested, as she generously let me choose several pieces to bring home to add to the two others she already gave me. I think there's a name for this art form, and I think someone even said it while we were there, but I can't remember what it is. Anyway, I LOVE it, and this time I got to share it with Shulamith. Here is her daughter, Kennedy, with the piece she chose for her room:

Here are the two I kept for myself, one for the entryway to our home and the other for my half bath:

COVID changed our lives so much. Some of those changes were positive, as we learned to find joy at home and as we grew to recognize all the "fluff" we could live without. Ironically, it brought us together in many ways, while it separated us physically. But it also left many grieving for lost loved ones and fearful for the future. I didn't lose anyone close to me, but a friend of mine lost her beloved father. It's critical that "post-COVID" (if that time ever comes), we don't forgot the relentless spread of this virus; its random, unpredictable effects (You may have no symptoms at all, but you may die); and the millions who are left grieving.

I'm thankful life is "normal" enough that we were able to visit Gerald's family. 

But where are the tulips?

It was hard to know where to begin. As we navigated the winding path through seemingly endless fields of tulips in an array of vibrant colors, we asked ourselves, "Where should we stop?" Searching for the best photo spot, we finally landed in the middle of a giant field of bright yellow tulips, with another to the left filled with deep red ones, the perfect contrast for our pictures. Systematically, we placed one kid after another in the middle of these glorious flowers and shouted, "Say, 'cheese,'" as we used our analog camera to capture the beauty of both the tulips and the children. 

This was an annual tradition for many parents who lived in the lovely Skagit Valley in northwest Washington. We were there 11 years, and I have albums of pictures of my children sitting in tulip fields to prove it. One day I'll cross off the item from my never-ending, mental to-do list that says, "Organize physical pictures and scan the ones you want to keep to digital files." One day. Meanwhile, maybe I can find you a generic picture. Yes! Here you go...

Last Friday, a few of us headed down to the Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point, near Lehi. I'm not sure what I expected, but memories of the Skagit Valley tulips clouded my reality. 

"But where are the tulips?"  

A bit of hyperbole for sure because, yes, there were tulips, imported ones. They lined the walkways and this waterfall, and they were definitely pretty, just not quite what comes to my mind when I hear the phrase "Tulip Festival." 

Still, it was such a fun day, with perfect weather and even more perfect company. Here are Shulamith with Kennedy and Theodore, followed by Amanda and Jane and me.

I'm forever spoiled by the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival, and one day I'll return to see it again, but for now, I'm grateful for this smaller scale, but still lovely, option.

OMG, we finally found our drugs?

They say the olfactory sense is the strongest and most memorable. I agree.  Before our trip, Shulamith and I had never spent time in a city where marijuana is legal. Walking the streets of NYC took me right back to my college days, when I had to hold my breath while walking through the halls of my dorm. Gotta love the 70s! That smell is so distinct, haha, and so gross.

As we've discovered before, outside of Utah where Diet Coke should be the state beverage, it's sometimes a challenge to find. I mean you can always get bottles or cans in grocery stores, but we prefer fountain Diet Coke in styrofoam cups. In NYC, there's a Starbucks on every block (and we went there one morning for some yummy hot chocolate), but not a single Swig or Sodalicious anywhere. So you can imagine our joy when Shulamith spotted a 7-11 just a few blocks down from our hotel! I worried they might not have fountain soda, or worse, that they might have only Pepsi products. But hallelujah (!) look what we found our very first morning:

Not styrofoam, but we'll take it. We carried these with us as we sought out a good breakfast spot. You always hear about New York style bagels, but I thought the hype couldn't be real. I mean nothing could beat Einstein's, right? Wrong. At a place called Pick-a-Bagel, we feasted on the most giant, chewiest bagels, both sweet and savory. We each ordered two and couldn't finish them, though we definitely tried. The next morning we considered finding a different place to eat, but wound up right back at Pick-a-Bagel. So good.

Our best dinner was on Isaiah's recommendation, which is not surprising. In his world travels these past seven years, he's become quite the food connoisseur, especially with Asian cuisine. Ramen is his favorite, so he insisted that we go to this Japanese Ramen bar. All they serve is Ramen, and you don't speak to anyone. Instead you fill out a form to "Customize Your Ramen" (level of spice, noodle texture, pork and garlic options, levels of saltiness and richness) and are seated at a bar that faces a wall with an opening at the bottom, just large enough to slide bowls underneath. You slip your form through this opening, and the people behind the wall (whom you never see or hear) slide your bowl of Ramen to you. Apparently this dining style is common in Japan and is designed to accentuate the experience as you focus on the Ramen, rather than on people. It was lots of fun and truly the best Ramen I've ever eaten.

We also ate a delicious Italian dinner, spaghetti with carbonara sauce. Like in all the restaurants we went to, we felt like we were the only ones not drinking alcohol, and the servers seems rather confused when we requested Diet Coke. At one place, they didn't even have normal soda glasses, so they brought us our Diet Coke in these:

In the entire restaurant, we could see just one other table drinking soda, and these people also had 4 or 5 kids with them, so we made a stereotypical judgement that they must be members of our church, haha.

As this post comes to an end, so does this series "Terrianne and Shulamith fly to New York City to see four shows in three days." I won't lie; that's making me a little sad. It was such a wonderful trip in every single way. I can't think of anything I'd change. You, Shulamith? Thank you for being the best travel companion and best friend in the whole world. 

Until next time, "Give My Regards to Broadway!" We will be back!

I wanna see their sweat!

This is what my mom always says when she buys seats for shows; she likes to sit right down in the orchestra section just a few rows back. I agree! If I'm gonna pay to see these performers, I wanna be close enough to see their sweat. So that's what we did. 

Before we left, when friends heard about our trip, they would ask, "Are you gonna see any Broadway shows?" to which I'd reply, "FOUR!!" They were usually surprised by that, but you see, that was our entire purpose for going. I mean what else would we even do?

Since returning, the most frequent question has shifted to "Which was your favorite?" Shulamith says she can't decide because they were all so different. This was her first time in NYC, and she says she is now ruined for any other theatre. Nothing will ever compare. I think she'll change her mind about this at some point, but I get it; nothing compares to Broadway. So which was my personal favorite?

Best Broadway Musical of Terrianne and Shulamith's trip, the nominees are

Wicked

Hadestown

Phantom of the Opera

Dear Evan Hansen

First, I must say that all four were fabulous. But really. They were incredible, and when Shulamith says she can't choose, I totally understand. I had seen both Phantom and Wicked previously, but these two productions were the best ever. The lovely young lady who played Christine in Phantom held the audience in the palm of her hand with the strength of her voice and honesty of her emotions. Elphaba in Wicked held me in the palm of her hand; I have no idea about rest of the audience because I was too focused on her amazing timing and natural physical comedy to notice. Ahhhh, she was so good! 

After opera (Phantom), show tunes (Wicked), and jazz (Hadestown), the pop music of Dear Evan Hansen was a fun change. And the kids were so talented. My favorite scene was near the beginning when Evan and Jared draft the fake emails to prove that he and Conner were BFFs (with deceased Conner in the background singing his emails back to Evan). Yes, the subject matter is tragic, and yes, we feel that poignantly in the scenes with Conner's parents, but this particular scene with those three boys is genius-ly hilarious.

And the Tony goes to......

Hadestown!

Without question, my overall favorite was the story of the young lovers Orpheus and Eurydice, narrated by Mr. Hermes, who seems to delight in telling the tale over and over, as many times as it takes to get it right. Could that be the plight of humanity? Always trying to trust, always hoping to stay strong, but always failing as "doubt comes in." Hmmm. Shulamith thought the ending was sad, but I'm not so sure. The idea of do-overs, grace, is a central gospel principle and also key to understanding the way the myth is presented in this show. I actually loved the ending. I also loved how I identified with pretty much everyone, even Hades, trying so desperately to keep the status quo, to keep his wife Persephone for the six months he has her, and ultimately, to keep his "little songbird," possibly the only light to enter Hadestown in a very long time. I'm not a super fan of change either, Mr. Hades.

Ironically, Hadestown was definitely an afterthought for us. We had chosen and bought tickets to the three other shows, before I asked Emily if she had any inside scoop on current Broadway productions. She said she'd heard several different people rave about a relatively new show called Hadestown. "Let's just add it!" I told Shulamith, without much thought. Thank. You. Emily! Whenever it tours here, grab those tickets fast.

One more installment yet to come in the series "Terrianne and Shulamith fly to New York City to see four Broadway shows in three days." Stay tuned!

Out of a Paper Bag: Installment #2 of "Terrianne and Shulamith fly to New York City to see four Broadway shows in three days!"

My spouse, our five children, their spouses (the two who have them), and any of my close friends will gladly testify to the fact that I have no sense of direction. Truth is I couldn't find my way out of a paper bag. One night I left the temple after serving on the evening shift, and wandered the parking lot for 30 minutes before texting Shulamith and Eli to report that I could not locate my car. "Don't worry," I texted. "I'll just keep searching. It has to be here. I just wanted you to know why I'm still not home." Eli and Amanda were just about to jump in their car and come rescue me, when finally, there it was: my car. Parked exactly where I left it six hours earlier.

I never know which way to go, and when I choose, 90% of the time, I choose wrong. The struggle, as they say, is real. So you can only imagine my apprehension about riding the NYC subway. Eeeeeek! When my mom and I were in New York, she paid for us to take Ubers or Taxis everywhere, but Shulamith and I wanted to save money, and Isaiah assured us we could navigate the subway just fine. By that he meant Shulamith could do it; he knows better than to think I could. I mean just look at this mess:

Like all maps, it resembles a package of cooked Ramen noodles thrown down on a page in random chaos. Meaningless. But Shulamith attacked it like a boss. Thanks to her, we owned that subway, riding from the airport to our hotel on Times Square, from our hotel to the 911 memorial and back, and finally to the airport to fly home. She read that Ramen noodle map but was better assisted by the marvelous Google Maps app, which told us exactly where to go and what to do. 

Besides those longer excursions, we did what she and I like to do best: We walked! We are known throughout our neighborhood housing development and our ward (which are basically the same thing) as the girls who walk all the time. Our favorite walk in NYC was the morning we walked to Central Park. It was every bit as lovely as I imagined, trees blowing in the breeze, people strolling along with their dogs on leashes, seemingly unending trails of pavement. We wish we could walk there every day.

I couldn't find my way out of a paper bag, but we found everything we needed and more. Stay tuned for further installments of "Terrianne and Shulamith fly to New York City to see four Broadway shows in three days."

Shorter posts, solid clickbait, and pictures!

Based on my purely anecdotal and fully non-scientific research, readers tend to prefer shorter posts and those that include solid clickbait and at least one picture. It's true. Based on my stats for both page views and longevity of interest, posts with those three elements are always the most popular.

That's why, as I debated ideas for how to share our recent NYC trip, I decided to break it up into several shorter stories. And to add pictures. And to pay close attention to that oh so critical clickbait in the title and lead sentence. 

If you are reading this, my strategy worked (at least for this first installment of "Terrianne and Shulamith fly to New York City to see four Broadway shows in three days!").

To start out, I've decided that the most successful trips happen when the people involved are compatible travel companions. For Shulamith and me, this is definitely the case. To illustrate, many travelers prefer to wake up early in the morning and get right out there, in order to squeeze in the absolute most out of a day. We are not those people. We love to wake up leisurely. We lie in our beds, take a few seconds to open our eyes, and breathe. Eventually, we grab our phones and reconnect with life just a bit, while eating various pieces of the candy stash that lies on the nightstand between us. Then, with a click of the remote control, we open the blackout blinds to a spectacular view of the city:

We do get up and out eventually, but there is no rush. Then, after a fabulous day of, well, everything (!), we return to our room. But not before seeking out and buying a delectable dessert to eat while lying in our beds, sipping Diet Coke, and enjoying the same view only the night time version:

One night we had these amazing cookies from a place called Levain Bakery. Just one cookie was like a full meal; they are at least an inch thick! I had oatmeal raisin, and Shulamith had chocolate chip. Mmmmmm! The next night, because we waited so long to get our bedtime dessert, we struggled to find something still open that wasn't ice cream, which would melt before we got back to our hotel room. We wound up with cookies once again, this time from a different place. We brought back several different kinds, and they were all fine but nothing compared to Levain.

So there's your short post, those of you who don't like to read anything lengthy. Stay tuned for more installments to come, including reports on more food and drink, transportation, and my personal take on the four shows!