Before:
Romance dominated the first half of 2002. Claire met her
new boy friend, Steve Jones, a London
resident on a trip to the beach in Mexico. As it’s cheaper to fly from New York
to London
than to
Austin, the two have exchanged several visits this year. Deciding that “surgeons
have no life, especially female surgeons,” Claire switched to anesthesiology
in July. She’s much happier now. (More)
In March,
Charles and Amy Willats announced their engagement, with the wedding planned for
July, 2002. According to Charles,
when he popped the question, Amy’s answer was simply, “Absolutely.”
Charles said that is his favorite word. We are thrilled to welcome Amy to the
family, and hope both can find jobs somewhere close to Austin. (More)
In early June,
Jim and Linda traveled to Colorado
for the wedding of Rosalind, our former foster daughter, and Greg Willbanks. We
managed a day and half birding in Rocky
Mountain
National Park, which included an incredible sight of a Northern Goshawk from a distance of
about 15 feet! We enjoyed Shreck with
Rosalind’s two kids, Dylan and Rachel, and her niece, Ashley, three cute,
special children. (More)
Charles landed a plum summer internship in
Washington
,
DC
, archiving at the
Smithsonian
Museum
of American History. So, over the Fourth
of July we gathered in the nation’s capital for a frantic round of museums
and memorials. Jim, Charles and Linda got a private tour of the
Museum
of
Natural History
, seeing the assortment of bird skins, including some specimens collected by
Darwin and Audubon! Claire arrived in time for a brunch with other family on
Saturday.
(More)
In August, Jim
and Linda went to Peru for two weeks of non-stop birding with John Arvin, an
acknowledged guru of Peru birding. After a quick visit to Machu Picchu, we spent most of the trip driving and birding along a one lane road that
crosses the
Andes
at 14,000 feet and descends to the Rio
Alto Madre de Dios. We observed the Andean
Cock of the Rock displaying at a lek, a total comic masterpiece of a bird.
The birds seen on the trip pushed both Jim and Linda over
the mini-milestone of 2500 species worldwide, leaving us way behind many of our
birding friends. (More)
The Day:
September 11, 2001
Jim and his cousin, Sandy Fowler, watched TV all day
between attempting to contact Claire and fielding calls from friends asking about
her. Jenny Salomon called in the afternoon to report that she had heard from
Jill, her sister, that Claire was OK. (More)
Linda, at work all day, ducked into the office of Barbara
Frantz, the business manager for the clinic, between patients. “What’s
happening to the World Trade
Center?”
“They’re gone.”
“Gone! What do you mean, gone?”
“Look,” Barbara said, gesturing at the TV screen.
Charles spent the day attending some classes, some TA
work, then went home, to watch the news.
Claire, when we finally heard from her, reported that all
operations had been canceled to prepare for the expected rush of patients from
lower Manhattan. Few came. We’re thankful Steve Jones came to visit for a couple of months
and provided needed comfort. (More)
After:
Normality is not a highly prized trait in the Hargrove
clan, but when the President asks you to just act normal, you have to give it a
try. In our case, that meant Thanksgiving in Galveston. We, including Dama, borrowed Tommy and Lizzy Hargrove’s ab/fab Victorian
house for the occasion. We feasted in
Houston
at Tiel Way before driving to the coast.
We continued the family tradition of computer-generated
animation, by seeing both Monsters, Inc., and
Harry Potter. We also dragged Claire
and Steve along on an expedition to the wilds of the
Bolivar
Peninsula, but let them off without the full rigors of birding. The weather was glorious;
the Sandhill Cranes, superb.
Despite the tragedies and uncertainties of the year, we
find ourselves in pretty good shape, with “advancing issues leading
declines” as they say on CNBC. We’re healthy and happy and looking forward
to the last palindromic year in 110 years, 2002.
After hearing a wonderful talk by Bill Moyers at the LBJ
Library, we are reminded of the importance of religious tolerance and strong
support for freedom and democracy. As survivors, it’s important to use our
remaining time wisely. As Moyers put it, “We have to use democracy to save us
from those who want to save us against our will.”
Parting thought, a quotation from Carlos Casteñada’s
1971 book, A Separate Reality, Further
Conversations with Don Juan. The brujo
Don Juan says to Carlos:
I don’t hate
anyone. I have learned that the countless paths one traverses in one’s life
are all equal. Oppressors and oppressed meet at the end and the only thing that
prevails is that life was altogether too short for both.
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