Dorrier Underwood

I have taken the garbage and recycles to the road for the Monday pickup, lots from a weekend full of visitors here for William's walk for curing Mitochondrial disease at Freedom Park followed by submarine sandwich picnic named submarines I guess because that is what the sandichese look like, one long baguette filled with meats, cheese and tapande and olive oil. Sometimes I feel a kind of deep sadness And today I have it Not always provoked But yet and still There is the deep love I have for my grandchildren I have been with for the last 2 days William, 4, of course jerking looking around smiling laughing pausing listening eternally floppy and our surprise child never knowing how much we take healthy strong children for granted and never knowing how we can deal with this again and again. When we first heard of mitochondrial disease we looked on the intranet and the first sentence was “a form of dementia,” I don’t look on the intranet anymore. Deep love Deep love...

The island world of Haiti reeks of its culture, drips with sharing and community, at least to the casual observer riding in a van on the narrow, hilly streets.  On every corner, beside every wall, there are red, green, yellow umbrellas that shade the men and women who sell clothes, cooking utensils, hardware, shoes, art, drugs and whatever a group, a family, might need. Large numbers of dress shirts, golf shirts, women's blouses hang from the fences, along side flip flops and athletic shoes attached to boards. They barter among themselves, cook together, sit together, carry water together. From my window in the air conditioned van, community seems palpable. And yet. That group may not associate with the group right beside it, I'm told. There's an unwritten code of how business is done on the streets, in plain view. There is no electricity, no running water, so they carry ice to the group, chip it on the street and use it quickly in the heat...

I love Paris, all about it – cafes everywhere, beautiful old buildings that have stood the test of time, glamorous people, how French makes whoever speaks it lips pucker, small streets, the Seine, the Eiffel Tower, people kissing everywhere, Notre Dame and being moved when Nancy lit a candle, writing here in a chair in front of a sidewalk café while Nancy and Doug go “one more place,” the sweet air, it never seeming to get dark, street noises outside the window, our tiny hotel room, the size of the Louvre, the Musee D’Orsay, art books, the way people look and dress, that it is possible at my age to go to Europe for the first time, that I can work and travel with my work colleagues, that I can have a job that I love that makes this possible, that I am fortunate beyond words. Diet Coke is Coke Light sans calories, my surprise that Nancy wants to shop, that I can stop when I need to, even if I don’t want to stop, and Nancy and Doug can get that. The world seems bigger here, yet the car...

Nancy Dorrier said, “Answer all my voice mail messages and emails, even if it’s to say you got the message and will respond at a certain time later.” I was so afraid of bothering her, wasting her time. She gets so many communications. Suddenly I remembered setting up rooms for events and experiencing the exhilaration of getting things handled, one after the other, whether I was on the set-up team or leading the team. There was not enough time to discuss the philosophical implications of anything or even to present options. We moved fast. “Set the chairs two center rows and two wings, three-foot aisles, 150 down and 20 stacked.” “Got it!” “Fill the water pitchers.” “Got it.” “Water pitchers complete!” “Empty the wastebaskets.” “Will do.” “Wastebaskets empty!” “150 chairs down and 20 stacked! What’s next?” It was as if the acknowledgments of messages received and jobs completed pulled the leader forward and with the leader the team, shooting for better and better results. There wa...

As we again celebrate the birth of our nation, I think of how unlikely it was. By "it" I mean our nation. A bunch of men got together and declared that we are free of governments that do not allow our participation. And that all men are created equal. And that we have rights not from a king but from God. They got a guy to write it all up in a word doc, which at that time was just some big piece of paper, and then they all signed it. And what they said was in present tense. Not the day after the war all men are equal, not we WILL be free if all goes well. No, they said WE ARE FREE, now, right now. That is the power of a declaration. I make a declaration every year in Late June. I put out a sign that says a parade will occur in our cul de sac at 9am on July 4 th .  I do not check with anyone, ask permission, call the town or the HOA. I made the sign, it is my sign and it says... I don’t check to see if others will be there, or if we should move it to Saturday instead o...