I’m about to start getting ready for my day. I have conference stuff this morning including a field trip to a museum, then we will hit the road to head home. I can’t wait to see Isabella. She’ll probably spend the first hour telling me how displeased she was that I was gone and how happy she is that I am back. She’ll demand attention and lots of petting. I can’t wait. I love that little girl. It’s going to be a long day. It’s been a long week with a lot of disappointment, but the week is almost over. I’ll be back home soon, but for now, I need to take a shower and get ready for my day.
Even with the disappointment I know we have all felt this week, try and have a wonderful weekend! I’m taking a friend car shopping tomorrow, and it will be so nice spending the day with her.
I’ll be at the museum today. I have to go to the dentist first to get a permanent crown to replace the temporary crown that I got a few weeks ago. After that, I will be at the museum. I have a few meetings and a few things to wrap up before I am out of the office for the rest of the week. I leave tomorrow for a museum conference in Newport, Rhode Island. I’m looking forward to this conference because I have always wanted to go to Newport. The city is most known for its Gilded Age mansions built by many of the nation’s wealthiest families as summer “cottages.” Newport is described in Edith Wharton’s novel The Age of Innocence, was featured often in the A&E Network television show America’s Castles, and most recently a summer vacation setting in the HBO series The Gilded Age. I will have tomorrow afternoon to explore the city before the conference officially begins on Wednesday. I already bought tickets to see The Breakers, a Renaissance Revival mansion, and Marble House, a Beaux Arts mansion, which were both built by the Vanderbilt family. As part of the conference, I will also be visiting a couple of museums in the area and listening to a lot of presentations.
By the way, if you are wondering, I have a neighbor coming to check on Isabella, and I have some cameras set up so I can check in on her. My neighbor checks on her food, makes sure her self-cleaning litter box is not stuck, and plays with her a little bit. I don’t have him feed her the wet food she likes because she won’t eat it if anyone besides me feeds her. I’m not sure why she is so finicky about who feeds her, but it’s a waste of the wet food to try to feed her. She’ll get wet food and lots of love when I get home. She doesn’t like being by herself and is always very happy to see me when I get home. I wish I could take her with me, but that’s not feasible. She’ll be fine, and I can check on her to make sure everything is okay.
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Also, please go vote BLUE tomorrow if you haven’t voted already. I cast my ballot last week since I would not be here to vote tomorrow in person. Even if you are in a state where the result is a foregone conclusion Kamala Harris needs every vote she can get. She not only needs to win the Electoral College but also enough individual votes to provide definitive proof that she won. Trump will declare victory regardless, but the proof needs to be indisputable. We cannot let a wannabe fascist back in the White House. It’s also not enough to just vote BLUE for president, but we need to win majorities in both houses of Congress.
Yesterday was the one year anniversary of major flooding in Vermont. Also yesterday, the remnants of Hurricane Beryl came through Vermont, and we are once again dealing with widespread flooding. For the most part, it doesn’t seem as bad as last year; however, in the small town where I live has three bridges washed out. Last year, my town was lucky and did not have the flood damage seen in much of the state, but all roads leading out of town were closed for several days due to flooding.
According to the local news and the Vermont Department of Transportation, my usual route to work is closed this morning due to “multiple washouts.” I have an alternate route that is currently not closed (as far as I know) though it was closed last year due to flooding. So, it looks like I’ll be able to get to work. Rest assured, I will be careful, and I will not drive through water over the road way. If it looks sketchy, I will not risk it.
It’s amazing that exactly one year later, we are experiencing some of the same flooding as before. Anyone who does not believe in global warming and its impact needs only to look at places like Vermont. Floods used to be rare in Vermont, now they are yearly. Hurricanes and their remnants rarely reach Vermont, yet we’ve seen major flooding numerous times over the past year alone. July and December of last year and July again this year saw major flooding in areas of Vermont.
I am packing this morning for my trip. I’d have liked to have packed last night, but circumstances prevented it. With the wet heavy snow we have gotten in the last 36 hours (more than a foot of snow), I lost power at my apartment. I have emergency lamps to use and some candles, but I had hoped the electricity would be back on by this morning. It’s been out for nearly 24 hours, and there no estimated time for repairs. I have to go pick up my rental car between 10:30 and 11 am (the university requires we use rental cars for longer trips), so I’ll get packed and head out in a bit. I hate leaving Isabella here without electricity, but a neighbor will check in her, and I’ll be sure she has plenty of food and water. I’ll be back on Sunday. Surely, we will have power by then. I hope we have electricity back before I have to leave. Nothing is going as planned.
I’m so glad that I’ll be going back home today. I’ve enjoyed this conference (except for the one session yesterday in which I found the woman incredibly insulting). I like getting together with people I don’t get to see often, meeting new people, making new connections, and visiting a place I’ve never been before. I enjoy learning new techniques and strategies to better do my job. Yet, I’m still ready to be home.
I usually enjoy staying in hotel rooms, and while this one was mostly fine, I’ve stayed in better and more comfortable hotels. So, I’m ready to see Isabella, sleep in my own bed, and enjoy the comfort of my own home. It will be a long day today. I have sessions all morning, a luncheon to attend this afternoon, and a 3+ hour drive home. I’m sure I’ll be exhausted when I get home, but at least I’ll be home.
Now, I smell the bacon cooking downstairs. I can’t believe that on the 7th floor I can still smell the bacon cooking all the way up here, but then I have a very sensitive nose. That being said, I’m hungry, so I plan to shower and get ready for the day, then head down for breakfast.
Is it just me or does everyone feel like they look their worst when looking at themselves in the bathroom mirror in a hotel room? I don’t feel that way in other mirrors in the room or any other mirrors anywhere else. However, I always feel like the mirror in bathrooms add 10 pounds, sort of like the cliche about cameras. I mean it could be the cliche about cameras and the bathroom mirror phenomenon give more accurate portrayals, but I hope not. Anyway, that’s my random musing for today.
My conference is going really well. Yesterday, I went to a session about hosting drag shows in museums, similar to drag story hour at libraries. One of the speakers was from the Museum of Science in Boston, and he talked about their program Coleslaw’s Corner. Coleslaw being the name of the drag queen who hosts the events in their planetarium. They do about three a year and look really fun.
The other thing of note from yesterday was that I went to dinner with some of my colleagues from three other Vermont museums. We had a great time. There were three women, one who I know very well and another who I’ve met before. The other two men are both gay, so that was also a plus to last night. Both are exceedingly nice and also at least a dozen years younger than me. Still, it was a really fun night.
Tomorrow, I will head back home. I’m not particularly looking forward to the drive back after nearly a full day of conference events, but I will be glad to be home and back with Isabella. I was able to “sleep in” until 5:30 am this morning. I’m about to shower, get dressed and go down to breakfast.
I’m in Portland, Maine, this week. You would think that without Isabella, I might be able to sleep in a bit, but no, my body is so used to waking up between 4 am and 5 am that I still woke at the same time (I may take a “nap” before I go down to meet my colleague for breakfast.
This is my first time in Maine. I’ve been to all of the other New England states, except Maine, so I can now cross that off my list. My colleague had to be in Kennebunkport yesterday afternoon, so I dropped her off and drove into Portland to familiarize myself with where our hotel is and have lunch. I had some really good Thai food. There are a surprising number of Thai restaurants in this city.
I decided that I’d go back to Kennebunkport to wait for my colleague to finish her event. I’d planned to visit a few museums, but yesterday was Election Day and the one museum that was open is next to the town hall, so there was no convenient parking. I decided that while here, I’d drive to the beach. There were signs everywhere for “Beaches,” so that’s what I did. I’ll be honest, East Coast beaches are not that beautiful when compared to the beaches along the Gulf of Mexico where I grew up going to the beach. However, while it may not have been sugar white beaches, it was nice. I enjoyed smelling the salt air and hearing the crashing of the waves.
I have to make a quick trip down to Boston and back today. It’s a three hour drive down there. I have a meeting to attend, then I’ll be driving back. I may stay and have dinner just to try and avoid Friday rush hour traffic out of Boston. It’s supposed to be a beautiful, sunny day for a drive. I much prefer driving on sunny weather than in rain. With a sunny day also comes heat. It’s supposed to be 90 degrees in Boston today, whereas here in Vermont, it’s supposed to be 83 degrees. No matter what, it’s going to be hot, and it’s going to feel hotter because of the humidity. Weather, travel time, etc…I hope this will be a productive meeting.
The need for connection and community is primal, as fundamental as the need for air, water, and food.
—Dean Ornish
I’m leaving on my retreat today. I thought this quote was somewhat apropos for the type of retreat I am going to. The retreat is designed to disconnect from social norms and reconnect with nature. We will be engaging in workshops like art, body movement, and photography, as well as rituals, trance dance, and fire ceremony. I really need this getaway, and I am going to make the most of it.
I have realized that I need to get away. I have not taken a vacation just for me in nearly four years, i.e., before the pandemic. I have had so much on my mind recently, and it has not been good for me. I am thinking of going to a gay men’s retreat for a weekend in June. Have any of you ever visited Easton Mountain Retreat in Greenwich, NY? If you have, let me know what you think. It is described as:
Easton Mountain is a community, retreat center, and sanctuary created by gay men as a gift to the world. Through workshops, programs, and events, we provide opportunities to celebrate, heal, transform, and integrate body, mind, and spirit. We offer our land, rich in beauty and wisdom, as a home to a community that extends beyond the land. We are a worldwide fellowship of people enriched by our connection to Easton Mountain. This fellowship is a force for positive change in the world. Read More
Their Summer Splash Weekend is billed as a weekend to “get out of your mind.” Here is an excerpt from the description: “This weekend, we invite you to come to Easton Mountain to get out of your mind, to stop using your brain’s logic, forget about social standards and stop using words to try to understand the beauty of being a human and explore the primal self.” Honestly, this sounds like something I desperately need right now.
Although I know myself well enough to realize I will be nervous going to something like this and knowing no one else there, maybe, that is exactly what I need. The whole thing sounds fun and liberating. I need to get out of my head. One of the workshops is “The Liberating Power of Pride,” a reflective discussion focusing on what pride means, what it means to liberate ourselves from heteronormativity, and discover who we are as gay men in the world today. As someone who took a long time to be comfortable in my own skin as a gay man, and something I still struggle with, maybe this will be a bit therapeutic.
I need to learn to be more confident as a gay man. I worry too much about what others think of me or if I am going to accidentally offend or annoy someone. I do not expect a weekend gay men’s retreat is going to give me the self-esteem I need or to make me comfortable in my own body and show the world my true self. All of that takes much longer than three days. I have been working on it all my life, and I don’t think we ever fully reach it since we will always be our own worst enemies.
Furthermore, where else am I going to get an all-inclusive weekend away for just a few hundred bucks. I’d love to go up to Montreal, but that gets expensive, as is any number of other possibilities around here. What I know, though, is that I need to do something for myself. I spend too much time worrying about things that are beyond my control, feeling guilty for things that I either did not do or couldn’t do anything about.
So, if anyone has ever been to one of the weekend retreats at Easton Mountain, please let me know what you thought.
Joe
The Closet Professor 