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HAPPY BIRTHDAY NUMBER TWO...


(Go ahead, I dare you, you know you want to.... these pics are forced by the corporate fascist types who have taken control of Blogger to be this tiny... that means if you want to see them in all their true glory you gotta click on them to make 'em bigger... just do it... you'll feel better)


When you ask Sam, "How old are you?" he quite happily holds up his fingers in the time-honored tradition of two-year-olds. Watching him do this, I see him as part of a long line, stretching back to the beginning of time. Maybe not that far, but close. Sam is both unique and part of the world's DNA at the same time. And his life has been so extraordinary, and has brought so much joy to so many, that celebrating his 430th day of life seems somehow both not enough, and not necessary.

Yesterday, for example, I took him with me to the eye doc's office. My eyes hadn't been checked for too many years, my vision was clearly deteriorating, and we knew it would be a long exam. So I had a bit of a concern that it might be too much for Sam. Ha. Whenever Sam walks into a room, in this case a waiting room and an exam room, everyone in the room brightens. He makes their day. In the exam room, Sam loved all the eye equipment, the gadgets, and couldn't get enough of making my chair (with me in it) go very high up, and then down. The young intern who was examining me, far from asking Sam to stop, had trouble keeping a straight face and finally had to stop the exam to catch her breath. As we were leaving she said that Sam's visit had made her day. Those were the words she used. About a half hour later, after being fitted for new glasses, Sam was walking down a hallway with me (as I was hunting for a bathroom), and a group of three white-coat folks stopped talking to each other and simply stared. "Oh my god," said the first one to get his voice back, "he's beautiful." Then the three started talking about how come there was never a camera around when you needed one.

That was on Sam's 434th day.

But a birthday does allow family, friends, and neighbors to acknowledge as a group how happy and fortunate we are to have Sam in our lives. And this one was special because he was sharing it with his best friend, Bodhi (here seen licking his finger after tasting the S&B birthday cake, with Vanya eyeing it eagerly as well).

But I get ahead of myself. To get to the birthday spot, in Fort Tryon Park, Sam decided to ride on the John Deere tractor that his insane Auntie Deb and Uncle Adrian sent to him. Covered with balloons. He somehow managed to get where he was going, and included a quick stop for a photo op with parents and Sonja's best friend, Amanda. Dad had to do most of the work, since Sam is still working out the pedal concept... During the ride, and at the party as the day was getting cooler, Sam wore a jacket given to him (I think) sometime last year by Uncle John and Aunt Desiree, that is finally almost but not quite fitting him.

Damn, isn't Sam just too beautiful for words?

Ok, where was I... The party spot was found, the food laid out, the territory claimed, and the flag raised.

Along with the John Deere, the other vehicle popular among the party folk was a red push car, here seen ridden by Femka, and pushed by her Mom, Alisa.

Hey, can you guess who provided Sam with that car? Gee I wonder who it could have been.

Yep, the crazy Brits.

The John Deere, however, was the clear favorite: here we see Gabe pushed in the tractor by an extraordinarily hardworking Simone. I love that pic.

And this one of Paul: Dad, Sam, and the cake.

At about this point in the proceedings, my camera battery died and thus, with humble apologies, there are no photos of the blowing-out-candles variety. Josh, Bodhi's Dad, says he's got some photos and maybe I can add them here, and fill in the gaps.

But I do know that Sam loved the cake, a blueberry marvel, exquisitely created by Bodhi's Mom.

And that was his b'day. After the picnic we went back to the house and Sam opened a few of his presents. One of them made a particularly dramatic impression on Sam: his favorite Bob the Builder character, Scoop. A gift from John and Desiree. What is it with Aunts/Uncles and giant vehicles? Is it something in the blood?


p.s. After the excitement, Sam needed a good restorative pose.

[tip: click on the photos to see larger, and the highlighted words for more photo]

A WEDDING INVITATION

You are cordially- and enthusiastically- invited to John and Desiree’s wedding next summer, to be celebrated on the beautiful island of Mljet in the Adriatic Sea, off the coast of Croatia.

At least, that’s the plan. We’re gonna do our best to pull this off. John and Desiree will take care of the first part (the actually getting married part; always an insane and courageous act) and Mary and I will work on the second part.

So this information is two-fold: first to announce John and Desiree’s engagement (on a Blog? How post modern!), and second to get an idea of how many folks might be interested in coming.

The date: This is gonna be hard to nail down, but it will have to be nailed down within the next couple of months. It'll definitely be Summer of 2005. Late June is my preference: great weather, reasonable prices. Things get more expensive in July, and even more expensive in August (when the entire continent of Europe is on vacation). But then some folks reminded me that all the world seems to graduate at the end of June, making traipsing off to the Adriatic somewhat problematic.


The place: The Island of MLJET is situated in the southern part of Croatia, west of Dubrovnik. According to the Croatian tourist board (disinterested parties, eh?) it is “the most beautiful island in the Adriatic.” A large portion of the island is a a National Park, which prevents overdevelopment. The Park features two deep bays which are called lakes due to their very narrow passages to the open sea (Veliko and Malo jezero/ the Great Lake and the Small Lake), and lush and diversified Mediterranean vegetation. Trust me, it’s beautiful.

Croatia’s natural environment remains wonderfully pristine, with clear water, and little development. Italy, its neighbor on the other side of the Adriatic, has a coastline that has become, according to one Croatian we met (of course unbiased) “one long tourist strip mall.” Unfortunately, the reason for this state of affairs is directly related to the terrible war: with tourism and other coastal industries crippled during the war, the coast did not suffer the environmental degradations of overdevelopment. I have a hunch they’re going to make up for lost time, so now is the time to go. Thousands of tourists have been thinking the same thing. Tourism more than doubled last year, and is expected to increase at that fevered pace next year. Most of the tourists we met were either Brits (see Transportation, below) and Germans. All said that this was the hot place to go right now. Ah, Mary and I just do so live on the cutting edge, don’t we?

Transportation: I just checked on Travelocity and round trip flights to Dubrovnik are about $450 from NYC. You go from here to London, ($300) and then a straight flight down ($112). Those cheap round trip tickets from London to Dubrovnik are a big reason why we met so many Brits down there; incredible price. Mary and I paid $100 for the plane fare from Zagreb, Croatia’s capital, to Dubrovnik, one tenth of the distance from London to Dubrovnik. Who knows how long these great prices will last. But they’ve lasted for a couple of years now, so the odds are fairly good. From Dubrovnik you catch a ferry for the ride to Mljet (about thirty miles offshore). You can bring a car on the ferry, but you’d be better off simply renting a car on the island ($30/day, including gas).

Accomodations: The village of Soline, where the wedding dinner and party may happen, has four apartments and we think seven rooms with private baths. Here's the family's website, see if you can figure it out.

Approximately 3 miles from Soline is the only hotel on the island, the Odisej. Mljet, according to legend, was where Odysseus (Odisej) spent his seven years trapped by the beautiful Kalypso, and crying in an ocean cave every day for his lost Penelope (or so I’ve read). We were very pleased with the hotel. We paid $120/per night for a double which included private bath and balcony and, most important (for my lean wallet), two full all-you-can-eat buffet meals each day. The dining room overlooks the harbor where, every day, there were different cruise-yachts parked.

So why Mljet? And why Soline, in particular? And why the monastery?

Soline: It all started with lunch. Easily one of the best we’d ever eaten. Everything (fish, cheeses, salads, wine..) was home grown or caught offshore. And prepared spectacularly. In our after-lunch glow, Mary suddenly decided this would be a perfect spot for John and Desiree’s wedding dinner. The Srensen family, who run this little home restaurant, have built a nice gazebo-like structure over a series of tables that could probably hold forty or more. Mary went to talk with the matriarch/cook, Ms Srensen, who thought a wedding sounded just fine. Soline is a very small village; few hundred people at most, at the height of the season. So I figured we should simply rent the whole village. I'm diligently looking into it now.

The Monastery: On an island within the largest lake (ah, an island on a lake on an island on the Adriatic), is a 12th century Benedictine Monastery. It unfortunately was trashed during the war (we could never find out by what side; people don’t like to talk about it), and needs extensive renovations, but the grounds are stunning. We were immediately attracted to a stone causeway stretching out over the waters. It seemed a natural. A perfect place for a walk down an aisle. We have absolutely no idea if it’s possible to get formal permission to use it, and we’ll be working on that, but hey, people are allowed there. We would just be a big group of people, two in good clothes, who happened to wander by...

And lately, John has mentioned an interest in a marriage on one of the cliff tops.

Mljet (other bits and pieces):



In the lakes the water temperature was perfect, we could nap while floating on our backs, and enjoy our wine in the most beautiful of waters.

Like all the Adriatic Islands, there are few sand beaches. Mostly rock (bring cheap rock slippers). But the rocks are perfect for lying on, for sunbathing, for picnicking.

One day, we rented a mini and drove down the spine of the island to hunt down the one sand beach, planning to make a day of it. One nice thing about hard-to-reach places is that when you do get there, you have it all to yourselves. Magnificent beach in a magnificent little cove. All for us.

And the snorkeling.... And the drives along the cliffs with the villages clinging to the sides and and and

All in all:

COME!!!!!




The thought of John and Desiree getting married on the island where I and Mary- 25 years after our own wedding- finally had the honeymoon we could only dream about back then, is something hard to put into words.





E-mail your thoughts/recommendations/questions/rsvp's: kvanatta2000@yahoo.com