Thanksgiving 2022

The last time we celebrated Thanksgiving in Iowa, the Pandemic was in full swing: school and work were both fully remote, vaccines were still a month away from being distributed to front-line workers, and only 272,000 Americans had died from COVID. As a result, we were the only ones that ventured to Iowa for the holiday (we celebrated with the rest of the clan via Zoom) and we did so by arriving a week and a half before the holiday and participating in school and work from the IC.

This year, the kids had in-person school through Tuesday and since Owen's now a junior and Nora is in their first year at a new school (and had a high school interview originally scheduled for Tuesday afternoon), we couldn't really leave early. But since most of the family was gathering (Kara had to cancel due to care for an ailing cat) and promises are promises, we headed out at 5:15 am EST on Wednesday morning to drive the 13 hours and 45 minutes and arrive at Grandma and Grandpa Z's for dinner.

After a night of visiting, eating and drinking, we woke the next morning in a frenzy to roast turkey, bake ham, make rolls, peel potatoes and fix a sundry of side dishes (Well, some of us did. Others spent the morning enjoying World Cup Soccer and various football games...). Around one o'clock, Pete, Jeannine and Bernie stopped by on their way to Jeannine's mom's to visit, fix a chair, and play the Zimmerman Family Memory Game (which includes such pairs as "Date Night," "Nucleus," "Fam Jam 2.0," and "Big Head").

After the Marshalltown Grady's left, we finished making dinner and sat down to the feast followed by pie and other sweets, and some adult beverages. Most of us faded quickly except for the Schaumburg Zimmermans, who rallied at their hotel for some hot tub time.

The next morning, it was fun family photo time before Dave had to leave for his flight to Colorado via Des Moines and the Schaumburg Zimmermans headed home. Once the house emptied, we took the opportunity to swing by the pond to snag some sweet corn and visit with Leanna and Grace (with a brief drop-in of Ken and Helen).

After celebrating festis lefteroveris with Grandma and Grandpa Z, we spent the night folding laundry and packing in anticipation of our two-day drive back. The traffic was light and the weather beautiful on Saturday, which probably should have convinced us to forge ahead rather than stopping at our usual halfway point in Maumee. But it didn't.  After an early dinner and bedtime, we awoke the next morning to pouring rain, fog and worsening traffic, which made the rest of the drive back less relaxing. Still, we utilized Wavze to avoid three separate accidents and made it to Katherine's by 3:30 pm in order to celebrate John's 79th birthday. Once the candles were blown out and cake consumed, we finally headed home at which point we declared Thanksgiving officially over and then crashed.

Before getting up the next morning for school and work...

(To see all of our Thanksgiving pictures, click here.)

The Scottish Play

Before Nora even started at their new school, they were already excited about the fall play and returning to their acting roots (which had kind of fallen away during the Pandemic). When they found out the play was about magic and madness and murder set in a post-apocalypse Scotland, well that was just the cherry on top.

So they auditioned (which involved reading scenes, improv, and reciting their resume, highlighting their extensive playwriting and acting experience, thanks to Camp Shenanigans) and were cast as Lady Macbeth. While it wasn't necessarily the role they would have chosen, they were pretty psyched to have a lead. It took a long time to figure out a suitable costume (we landed on Victorian grunge), learn their lines (and even longer to stop giggling through all the "milk" references), and the first performance occurred during a lock-down due to a nearby shooting, but the show much go on, so Nora and their classmates pushed through and did an amazing job.

And while Nora has announced that it was all exhausting and that they need a break from iambic pentameter, it was a great way for them to really get to know their new classmates and make some incredible friends – even if it did involve plotting their demise.

(To see all the pictures from the performances, click here.)

Yayoi Kusama

 

Noa's class at Sheridan has been studying the artist Yayoi Kusama this year. They studied her artworks and drew their own portrait study of her as well. One of the advantages of going to school in DC is the wealth of museums here, and conveniently One with Eternity: Yayoi Kusama in the Hirshhorn Collection just happens to be here right now. We discussed this convenient fact with Noa's art teacher at our student-led parent-teacher conference, and he agreed they just had to organize a field trip, and even better invited Elaine and I to join as chaperones. Sadly Elaine had a conflict at work that day, but I was able to join. 

The kids had a wonderful tour guide who helped them explore Mark Bradford's Picket's Charge, Laurie Anderson's The Weather installation, and many other interesting artworks. The highlight of course was the Yayoi exhibit, with the Pumpkin, the Infinity Mirror Room—Phalli’s Field, and My Heart is Dancing with the Universe. Now we'll just have to find a time to get the Elaine there to see it!

Halloween Ends

We were pretty excited about Halloween this year as COVID had abated and Nora and Owen planned and assembled their costumes months in advance (going as the 11th and 12th Doctors, respectively). But Nora never coordinated trick-or-treating with their friends on the Hill, and Owen's plan fell through when his friends decided to go to a party instead. Given that no one at school understood who Nora was (not a lot of Doctor Who fans at Sheridan, apparently), Owen decided to hang out with Duke friends after school, and it was raining, it wasn't surprising that the kids decided not to actively participate in the door-to-door aspects of Halloween this year, and instead opted to watch Doctor Who as a family while occasionally handing out candy. But it was a little bittersweet.

See, next year Owen will be a senior at Duke Ellington and, if things go well, Nora will be a ninth grader there too. Since classes at Duke don't end until 5:00 pm, chances are the pair will decide (again) to hang out with friends after school on Hallow's Eve, in lieu of coming directly home. That means that much like this year, we won't have any kids trick-or-treating in 2023. It also means that 2021 was the last year we had kids participating in those activities, which we didn't realize at the time.

As the reality that Owen will be heading off to college soon and just how quickly both kids are growing up sets in, we keep experiencing final moments without realizing it at the time. And while I guess this makes for less emotionally fraught moments (which I'm sure the kids appreciate), it also makes us a little nostalgic for all those days and Halloweens of yore.

Though on the plus side, we'll always have Allen and Brad.