Send-off and take-off

On December 15, there was no turning back: the moving van came for our stuff, and we hosted our own retirement reception on campus.

"Tag sale, anyone?"

At the reception, we enjoyed a surprise agenda of entertainment by The Songbirds, of which I was a founding member, and The Nanci and Laurie (a.k.a. Rufus and Dufus) Show, a longtime Westfield tradition.

The Songbirds: Craig, Kelly, and Tom

We were sincerely moved by our colleagues' expressions of appreciation and good will. We were also suprised to learn that the college dining commons had been named for us -- an honor, or a hint that maybe we should have spent more time in our offices, or the library, or the gym. No, seriously, we are proud to be the only couple for whom a dining commons at the first public co-educational college in America to offer an education without barrier to race, creed or economic status is named.

Weather predictions prevented me from experiencing my official Last Day of Work on campus. A pending storm in the Mid-Atlantic caused us to change our plans for taking off. I spent Friday packing and cleaning, while Tim spent Friday wrapping up in the office and getting tearful affectionate hugs from attractive coworkers.  (Hmmm, what's wrong with this picture?)  Tim did pack the two cars, not an easy task with the amount and variety of stuff we--er, I--had squirreled away in our temporary apartment.  But they were NECESSITIES, like, for instance, my grapevine pumpkin that kept popping out of the car and rolling down the driveway.  But finally, with the heartwarmingly docile Maggie pressed into the cat carrier, we were off, one day earlier than our original ETD.

It took 8 hours to complete what should've been a 6-hour drive, thanks to bumper-to-bumper, stop-and-go traffic just south of NYC. Things have changed since the days of the old Simon and Garfunkel lyric, "....counting the cars on the New Jersey Turnpike...":  now, it is impossible to count the cars because there are too many too close together going alternately too fast and too slow wedged between too many semis. At one point, the intrepid Maggie managed to extricate herself from her transporter; though alarmed, feeling her nose on my elbow in the dark, I managed to dissuade her from sitting on the dashboard between me and the windshield. Luckily, she perched on the console next to me, in the manner of a loyal Golden Retriever, until we were able to stop at a rest area and re-insert her (more securely this time) into her isolation chamber.

We will miss the Northeast, but we won't miss the "commutes" between our Massachusetts and New Bern homes.

Fortunately, we arrived at our destination, the "pet-friendly" Comfort Inn in Salisbury, Maryland (highly recommended, very comfortable beds), just as the snow began. And so, we are hunkered down here during for my First Official Day of Retirement (Tim has some vacation days to use up before he's official, too) until tomorrow, when the blizzard will have dissipated. Truly a wonderful venue for such a momentous occasion.

"Our View"

Ah, the sunny South.