My first day in Seattle - Research Meeting

September 19, 2013 (5:48 AM PDT/8:48 AM EDT)

I have arrived safely in Seattle and have a while of pre-dawn quiet to whittle away in my host’s home before I can start making morning noises. It seems like a good time to catch up my blog, which is woefully behind.

I have traveled here to meet with Melani, Denise, and Caitlin: 2 professors (engineering) and 1 graduate student (psychology) who have been my collaborators on this research project which is occupying my sabbatical leave. I have been working with Melani for nearly 7 years now, and she brought the others on board later. Although we attended the same conference 2 years ago, and had brief meetings there, and submitted a grant proposal together a year ago which involved daily email or skype conversations, this is our first extended, face-to-face meeting in 3 years. I am hopeful that is will give my research “juices” the same kind of creative bounce that it did then, so that I can have a much more productive year working on my own on the east coast.

I spent Wednesday morning packing, with Helen as my helper. Jeremy was working from home so I tried to keep both of us out of his hair. At 12:30 we rode our bikes up to the school and picked up the 3 older ones. (They have an early release every Wednesday.) After 3 weeks of this, I have noticed that the sidewalks are flooded with kids walking home each Wednesday, which still catches me by surprise since there are almost no walkers on the other days. I am curious as to whether this is a warm-weather phenomenon that will soon end, or a parents-at-work phenomenon that will continue through the school year. It is nice to see more activity, but it does make riding bikes home a bit difficult. The sidewalks are really too crowded for the bikes, and I am not comfortable with the kids on the road. It was Meg’s (her chosen name for this year) suggestion that we walk on Wednesdays from now on, and I am considering that seriously.

When we got home, I had a short time to eat lunch with the kids. James was kind of funny – he wanted to know the exact time I was leaving, then took off across the street to where his school chums meet every Wednesday for lunch. He left their party a bit early so he could come say goodbye to me. He was the one I had been least concerned about leaving for four days, of course, so I was a bit startled when he asked to walk me over to the train station. As we waited on the platform, he didn’t say too much, but did mention several times that he was really nervous about how the next few days would go. He has always been a pretty independent kid, and far more so since arriving in MA, so this was unexpected. It was a good parenting reminder to me – both that he is still 12, and that he holds a lot inside. He is often stewing on something that he won’t let on about. I tried to reassure him that even though Jeremy has been out of the day-to-day parenting loop for a few months, he is more than competent to care for them all.

Travel was relatively smooth, yesterday. I had a 6:35 PM direct flight from Boston to Seattle scheduled. To avoid having Jeremy negotiate the drive through afternoon traffic with all the kids in tow, I elected to take public transit. Since trains into Boston are a bit sparser in the mid-day, I caught the 2 PM. (The next choice, at 4 PM, would be cutting things a bit too close for my comfort.) I really enjoyed the train ride, along and past the route where Jeremy commutes each day. Although I have driven into Boston many times with the kids, this was the first time that I saw the trip from his perspective. I am so used to always knowing what daily work life is like for him, because I share it, that this has been a strange interlude of sending him out the door into a strange, unknown sphere. Thus, I found it very comforting to finally see what he experiences and talks about each evening. The train is actually quite pleasant (at least in the uncrowded afternoon) – it starts out through forests and nature preserve areas, then through the inner suburbs, and finally the views change to the gritty parts of Boston itself. (Not that the areas are necessarily gritty, but the views from the train tracks are.) I then had a short walk through North Station to transfer to the T, where the Orange and Blue lines brought me to Airport Station. Thus, after 1 hour of travel, I was waiting for the free shuttle bus over to the terminals.

It took another hour to check in and get through security. I couldn’t believe the line for security. I was very glad that I had elected to take the earlier train, as I would have been sweating it otherwise. As it was, I could enjoy people-watching instead. I struck up a conversation with the young woman behind me in line, who turned out to be a high-school senior at a Boston-area boarding school. She hailed from Oslo, Norway and her parents had sent her (and before, her 2 older siblings) to 2 years of U.S. boarding school to finish their schooling, so that they would supposedly have a better chance of admission to U.S. colleges. She was on her way to visit two colleges so that she could decide which to apply to with Early Decision, but as we talked, it came out that what she really thought she wanted to do was go back to Norway for school, and she didn’t think her parents would like that. She was also nervous about her traveling. Obviously air travel was not new to her, but she said that in the past, her parents would arrange everything, get her to the airport, and then her school picked her up. This trip, she had to arrange it all on her own, starting with getting to the airport from her school, and she was clearly a bit overwhelmed.

When I pulled out my Ziploc bag of liquids for security inspection, she started a bit and asked where I had gotten it. 

“Do you have any liquids or gels in your carry-on?” I asked her. 

“Yes, but where do you get the bags?”

Aha. She knew of the requirement for the bags, but apparently someone else had always helped her pack before, so she didn’t know where the bags came from. I gently pointed out that one had to go to a grocery store and buy them. However, this didn’t seem very helpful as we were already in the security line. I was so happy to (for once) have my natural hoarding tendencies pay off. I reached into my suitcase and pulled out a spare for her. (I had left one in there from my last flight so that I could be sure to find one, then forgotten and packed a new one for this trip.) The look on her face indicated that was the best gift I have given anyone in a long time – and the price was right.

Unfortunately, air travel can never be completely smooth. I soon learned that my flight was delayed 2 hours. Still, this was not as devastating as it might have been. Coming from a major airport, I had a direct flight, for once, so no connections to miss. Also, the reason was crew rest time, so the delay should be fairly precise and not drag out into the continued delays and eventual cancellations that have sometimes plagued me in the past. (Apparently, I should pay more attention to local news. There had been a fire at the airport the day before, in the refueling area, which delayed a great number of flights. Thus, the crew on this flight was late the day before, and was still catching up on mandated rest hours the next day. I am all for a well-rested crew, so what could I complain about?)

Of course, arriving on the west coast 2 hours later is unappealing from a jet-lag point of view, but it was manageable. I slept an hour or two on the plane, and arrived at Melani’s home by midnight (3 AM for me), but still got another 5 hours of sleep before my own clock nudged me awake for the day. I think I should be in decent shape for a long, productive day of work. Speaking of which, the sun is up and I hear Melani starting to move about the house, so I think that I will get on with that day. Let the work begin!

Plymouth!

Friday, August 30: Plymouth, MA

Today was Free Fun Fridays! at Plimoth Plantation. How could we pass that up? (Yes, it really is spelled that way. The town is Plymouth, so the museum chose the alternate spelling to differentiate itself. They felt free to do this since spelling in the 17th century was not yet regularized, and this spelling was often used.)

About a 65 minute drive from our home is a living history village (a reconstructed 17th century settlement with interpretive actors in costume and character to interact with; a living history 17th century Native People homesite, a reconstructed Mayflower sailing ship, a reconstructed grist mill, and the ROCK. Given the huge admission price savings, we were not the only ones to think of doing this today, and the museums were very crowded. Still, it was a nice day, and we had cleared all of it for this trip, so we could just take our time and enjoy.

We started at the Grist Mill shortly after 9 AM. It is certainly the least famous and least-attended of the various historical sites, but I actually really enjoyed seeing the engineering up close. John enjoyed trying to use the huge mortar and pestle to grind corn faster than the giant stone mill could.

We then took a pretty half-mile walk along the river to the harbor, where the recreated version of the Mayflower is anchored. The ship is partially furnished, to give an idea of the size and placement of items, but I still can't figure out where they put all 102 passengers down in that hold. (Later, I was to learn that they also crammed into that space a full complement of furniture for each family, food stores, animals, and more. It certainly makes Noah's ark seem more literally feasible!)

We briefly enjoyed the views of Plymouth Harbor - the ocean is still a novelty for us. Then we strolled along the boardwalk at the beach to Plymouth Rock. Today, it is a large enclosure with a small rock at the bottom, about 12 feet down in the sand. The rock is about the size of a small dog. There is a national parks guide standing there giving the same speech over about every 45 seconds. According to him, the rock was once large enough to be a landing dock, but souvenir-hunters over time chipped at it and carried most of it away. 

M. took a turn at the camera. She managed to catch us in a truly candid moment.

 By now, it was lunchtime. We drove three miles down the coast to the Plantation, where we waited for a parking spot (yes, it was a busy day) then ate our picnic lunch in the car. Then, we moved on the Wampanoag homesite, where Native Peoples share about the history of their people.

A demonstration of making a dug-out canoe by burning and scraping the insides.

Next was the craft barn, where artisans create the artifacts used throughout the museum. Margaret was particularly taken with the pottery wheel, and begged to return over and over again. Helen, on the other hand, thought weaving was the best, because she got to do it herself. The photo below does not do justice to the way she beamed when the woman handed her the shuttlecock.

Finally, we walked on to the English village. The view from the Block House (2-story lookout/fort/assembly hall/church) down to the ocean was lovely.

We spent several hours ducking in and out of houses, looking at the vegetable gardens, meeting the rare breed livestock, trying our hand at kneading bread dough, and more. 

Margaret really enjoyed hearing the interpreters singing in 17th-century style.

.The timing worked out just about right. As the park closed at 5 PM, we were all just about ready to quit, in any case. We drove into town and found a restaurant with gluten-free pizza for John. Helen enjoyed sitting between John and Margaret so that she could easily eat from both of their pizzas. The kids did great at a place with tablecloths - they all even tried a bite of Jeremy's salmon and my roasted beet salad. (They didn't all manage to swallow, of course, but they tried it!)

Finally, we returned to the Plantation for one last event. The Plimoth Players run a Shakespeare repertory theater in August, so we were fortunate to catch the last showing of Much Ado About Nothing. I was surprised to see that the theater was so tiny. There were 55 seats, arranged in 3 rows around a corner, with the stage making up the other two sides of the box. We sat down late (general admission) so got the last row - but that was still 3rd row. 

We had checked out several "Shakespeare-\for-Kids"-type versions of the play from the library, and I had read one of these to the kids during the drive. Still, even though this gave them a basic plot summary, I was amazed at how much they could follow what was happening. For 2.5 hours, they sat still (more or less) and paid attention. They giggled at appropriate times. They strained in their seats to better see the actors. Even Helen, whom I had assumed would fall asleep instantly (having missed her afternoon nap), followed along closely until well into the 2nd Act. Apparently, good old Will really is timeless. 

When we pulled into home at 11:30 that night, even James was asleep in the car. Truly, we wore them out this time!