Notes from Seattle

Quotes that took me for loop when I heard them!

"I need to charge my cell phone" -- Mom, as she came home after picking me up from the airport

"I bought it on eBay" -- Dad, after I asked him where he got the putter I'm borrowing for golf tomorrow

I also have to comment on the significant proportion of fans at the Mariners/Red Sox game I attended last night. Can there be such a large number of expat New Englanders in the Puget Sound region? I couldn't believe the sheer number of Red Sox paraphenalia being worn throughout Safeco Field. I must also mention that I found Red Sox fans to be particularly obnoxious, even moreso than Yankee Fans. Something must have changed upon winning the 2004 World Series that has given members of the Red Sox Nation them this sense that they can be more "in your face" than before their big victory. It seemed as if every time the Red Sox team did something positive, they all started pointing at us Mariners fans. Could it have been as childish as them feeling better at the expense of our unhappiness? It sure felt that way. In the end, the Red Sox fans had to be bummed by the fact that the Mariners swept the series 3-0.

The Senator's Wedding

There are people in your life that somehow you pick up along the way, just by random chance and they stick. My friend Kathryn K. (her last name is the same as an influential US Senator in the 1950's) introduced me to her friends as someone that she inherited from a previous relationship (I was a friend of her ex). My friend Carlos came down from Seattle to attend the wedding as well, which was held at the Brazilian Room in Tilden Park located high in the Berkeley Hills.

The ceremony was a combination of a traditional Jewish ceremony (chupa and broken wine glass) and a Laoatian ceremony, since "the senator" had spent a couple years living in Laos. One thing struck me as wise and it was said by Rabbi Jane. She said that many people think the longest journey is the search for the right partner. But, she in fact dismissed that claim. Instead, the longest journey is the one in which each person makes themselves whole and ready to accept another person fully into their lives. That hit home because I am well into this long journey and doing the hard work that is needed to be a person that can contribute and not be a detriment to a partnership.

Weddings are moments of reunion, celebration and acquisition of wisdom. "The senator's" wedding certainly fit that bill.