Virginia Is For Families

Abraham Lincoln died on April 15, 1865.

And, purely by coincidence, we showed up at Ford’s Theatre where he was shot on April 15.  It was a cold and rainy day.  And I knew from the beginning that it was not going to be much fun.

Actually it started out alright.  Beth and I were standing outside the building in the rain talking with a lady who had just been to Baltimore and the aquarium up there.  I asked her if she had been to the new dolphin show.   She had been and she recalled  seeing the photos I took of the two birds and the dolphins.

But it was downhill (or sideways maybe) from there.  We went inside for a short program and when it ended we went across the street to climb some steps to see the room where the President had taken his last breathe and left this earth.

But somehow we got hooked up with Kip Pierson (see photo at Fords Theatre.org) and started walking around the area in the rain while he talked in some detail about the detective work that followed the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.  Because there are a number of buildings in the area that housed the players in this famous drama.

http://www.fordstheatre.org/

It was such a dreary, wet, cold day I really felt like we were transported back to that tragic  time and place.  Well, actually we WERE in that  place already.

So the heavens were weeping and I was getting wet and somber as well.

Later in the evening we returned to Ford’s Theatre for a show.  There was lots of singing and very little dialogue.  I’m in favor a musicals that intersperse their music with dialogue.  It tends to balance things out a little and this was, after all, not a concert.

But Beth loved it.  And some of the participants were very talented.  But I had restless legs throughout the program and was dying to get out of there.  I kept looking up at President Lincoln’s sitting area where he was shot and thinking ” This has been a trying day but I guess it was a lot worse for you Big Guy.”

The President had been in a jubilant mood earlier in the day feeling that the war was over and he had taken his wife for a carriage ride.  I can see him now as he shares his joy with her and hear the sound of the horses as they move on the pavement.   He’s talking to her about going back to Illinois to practice law.  And then he takes her to the theatre. . .

I felt like a slightly waterlogged, small person but I was glad we were there in the presence of such greatness. I feel like there is only one direction to go in this life. And that’s UP.

But sometimes it really seems like there is too far to go and too little time to actually get there.

Play Battle Hymn of the Republic

12-battle-hymn-of-the-republic

*

*

Here are some other photos I took that seem to me to reflect the American experience. Just click on the music and then the photo thumbnail for a slide show presentation.

As I said earlier we will be going up to DC in a short while and I hope to take some interesting photos. I took this one at the Washington zoo the day last fall I went there with my daughter and her family. I’m not sure what it’s supposed to represent but the colors are nice.

So I’m really looking forward to a vacation especially after a day like today. It rained heavily at times today.

It rained so heavily that you could hear it beating on the roof. And I started thinking about my calf muscles. Because when you get to be a fifty something year old person you are wary about your body parts. You wonder if they are sending you messages about the future.

Unwanted messages.

Several times in the past year I have been awakened at night just as one of my calf muscles decided to curl up in a little ball like a shoelace that has become a knot. And the pain is just indescribable.  And then  you have to stretch the muscle to fix it and that just increases the pain.

So I was lying in bed last night talking to my legs and asking them if they planned to start doing this on a more regular basis. Because that’s the way it happens with so many things. Restless legs. Headaches.

Whatever. You get a preview in your thirties and forties.  “Hmmm.  That wasn’t much fun.  Glad it didn’t last too long”.   But then as you age the little demons come back for another visit.

And this time they  decide to stay.

I pray to Jesus and all his friends that this does not happen with the leg muscles.

I would much rather think of the future in terms of visits to the zoo or the beach.  Or just sitting at home and watching American Idol.  Or any number of other things.

The future should be something we discover with pleasure and not pain.

I’m sick again.  But wasn’t I just laid out with something a few weeks ago?  This is a cold and a chest virus.  A few weeks it was a stomach virus.

The good news is we all should be in good health for the weeks around Christmas.  These bugs have been going around but so has the cold weather.  It seemed a lot like winter out there today even though the temperature was in the forties.

Don’t you hate a cold that gets into your lungs and makes you cough?  I hate coughing.  It keeps me up at night.  I just lay there and wait for that irritation in the throat to grow to a point where I have to get rid of it.  And then I cough and feel better for about a minute.

Cough syrup doesn’t seem to help much.  Sleep helps.  But how do you get to sleep with this cough reflex action keeping you up?

If I could just numb that area in my throat so I would not  feel the irritation growing.   HHmmm.  I tried spraying it with this spray they have for sore throats.  But it wouldn’t reach the right spot.   And then I thought about the small vibrator I use on my legs when I have RLS (Restless Legs Syndrome).

I just lay the vibrator on a pillow next to my chrome domium and turn it on so that it’s pressed up against the spot that brings on the coughing.

And I don’t feel the need to cough.   It is completely overwhelmed by the vibrator.  And then I go to sleep.

But the vibrator keeps going because it’s plugged into the wall and there’s nobody there to turn it off.  And it heats up the pillow.

So this is not good.

Something that has helped me on a more serious level to deal with severe coughing fits at night is the Conair Facial Sauna.  The hot steam does an amazing job of soothing my ravaged air passageways.  Last night, in fact, it saved me once again.   So I am adding it to the list of things to have around the house in case of an emergency.

I wish I could tell you about the facial spa part but that involves reading directions so . . .

Today I did a lot of computer stuff and didn’t have much time to think about anything interesting. Because setting up computers to work well is not very interesting in my book. It involves trying to figure out why the computer which is supposedly a perfectly rational being of some sort acts in such perverse fashions. It’s almost as if it  was. . . . .human!

And I was almost like Henry VIII. Drop it out the window and go shopping for a new one. But that wouldn’t be a wise move and Beth would probably start thinking I was getting too near The Edge.

Well I have news for her pretty self. It won’t be computers that send me there. It will be Restless Legs Syndrome. Ten percent of the population have this scourge? I doubt it. Because that would mean that at least two percent of the population are jumping out of windows every night.

And unless someone doesn’t think that is a newsworthy event we can safely say no! That’s not happening.

But I do have a new idea in my ongoing quest to find ways to outsmart Mr. R. Legs Syndrome. I am going to have a stand next to my desk and put a wireless keyboard on it. Then when the RLS starts up I can stand up and type away without bringing this insidious stuff into play. One of the reasons I started blogging was to share my experience and (hopefully) some helpful tips about dealing with RLS since so many people have or will have it.

I need to work on my new “seating” arrangement in the morning. Because right now I cannot even continue this post.

Night. Night.