Bertram Inn and Conference Center, Aurora, Ohio

The wedding planning is officially underway! A couple months following our engagement and we have a date (September 2013), a photographer (Linczak Photography) and now a venue!

The date and photographer were fairly easy– the date was basically determined by the availability of the top three items of importance to us– venue, photographer and band. We knew we wanted an autumn wedding, but 2012 was out of the question. Even in January, everything was already booked out well in advance.

I personally don’t mind waiting until 2013 because I think the process will be much more relaxed. We can get some of the big things out of the way but then take our time on the details. I love planning everything ahead, so starting this fall I’ll get to work on some of the details so we both have time to review and give input, making the event a perfect evening of family, friends and fun that best reflects us. Also, we really want to pay for everything ourselves, and this gives us more time to save and pay everything off as we go along. I know that gives both of us peace of mind.

We both did a lot of online research regarding venues, and we were really looking for a few key attributes:

• Ceremony and reception at the same place
• Outside ceremony location with a reasonable indoor back-up location in case of inclement weather
• Overnight accommodations on site
• Reasonable distance from family and airports
• Able to accommodate 200 guests

Basically all of our family and friends are coming from out of town, and a good amount are coming from out of state. Brian especially thinks it’s important everyone can stay on site so the party can continue even after we leave the ballroom and so everyone can have brunch together the next morning. A good friend of his did that a couple years ago and it was really nice. No one had to worry about driving, and if you wanted to call it an evening early, you could just make your way up to your room. There is also less cost for us because we don’t have to worry about transportation to and from the site, between ceremony and reception locations, etc. Everything will just be in one place.

And that place is the Bertram Inn and Conference Center in Aurora, Ohio. What I really like about it?

• 13 minutes from our house
• Beautiful ceremony spot and back-up ceremony location
• Reception in the Hayes Ballroom (my mother’s maiden name–grandpa is excited!)
• Bar out in the foyer and tables/chair in the foyer and outside on the patio so guests can roam about
• Excellent food and option to move the party to the bar/restaurant
• Plenty of rooms for rent
• Free shuttle anywhere in the surrounding area for the rehearsal dinner and the photos between ceremony and reception

I am really looking forward to popping over this fall to see what others are doing with their weddings to steal some ideas of what works and doesn’t in the ballroom. In the meantime, I started pinning all of my ideas so I don’t forget anything.

Despite lots of online research and lots of site visits all over Northern and Northeast Ohio, the final decision really wasn’t that difficult. There just really weren’t as many places that met all our requirements as I initially thought.

Now that several things have been booked, I’m starting to feel like this wedding is actually going to happen! Looking forward to booking the band next!

Artsy in NYC

As I mentioned last month, I was able to sneak in a great professional development opportunity at work before our fiscal year is up in a couple months. My boss found a great conference, hosted by Ragan Communications, that focused on media relations, crisis communications and social media.

The conference was good—I tweeted throughout (see #raganmedrel) and took copious notes to share with my colleagues upon my return. I would have liked more on metrics and crisis communications—two areas I’m passionate about and can always learn more about—but there’s always next year!

In addition to enjoying the conference, I really enjoyed that the fiancé was allowed to go with me! I bought him a flight using my annual SkyMiles Companion Certificate and his work approved him working from our hotel room while I was at the conference so we were set.

After the conference, we tacked on a couple days to our trip so we could see the city. Here are a few photos from our time there.

Ferry ride by the Statue of Liberty. We were too late to get off both here and Ellis Island so we just snapped pictures and headed to Ellis.

Quick tour around Ellis Island, reading about the history and enjoying the old pictures.

At the fiance's request, we ate dinner at Katz's Deli and had the best pastrami sandwich and pickles. Amazing!

It was raining. We needed something to do. Need I say more?

We took a 15-minute free audio tour of Grand Central Terminal and then went to the Oyster Bar for lunch. Delicious! Kumamoto, I missed you!

We toured Radio City Music Hall and got to go under the stage, into the old powder rooms, to the VIP rooms and ended by meeting a Rockette!

We popped up to the top of the Empire State Building, despite warnings from workers that it would be hard to see much through the fog. We only had one day so there's wasn't a choice, plus it was still a cool view.

We wandered around Rockefeller Square while we were waiting to do our NBC Studio Tour. Fun listening to music and watching people skate!

We ended the night on the Top of the Rock to see the city lights. Beautiful and somewhat Gotham.

As always, we found an Irish pub where we could end the night

Other Takeaways:

• We barely made it to Nobu in time for our reservation thanks to a delayed flight that caused us to hit up our taxi downtown right at rush hour, but I’m glad we tried it. We had the sushi, sashimi and tempura, which were very good, but overall I would give the experience a B. Would not make a point to go again.
• The NYC Pass was a great investment. We got several times our money’s worth for the one-day pass. It was rainy in the morning on Saturday when we had hoped to do a lot of walking around, and it was great to have a whole back-up plan of indoor activities all free with our pass. It’s the only reason we did the Radio City tour, which was actually one of the better stops of our trip.
• Thanks to social media, I was able to tag places to eat that I wouldn’t have known about otherwise. Thus how we ended up at Pinkberry, which was wonderful. Facebook, twitter and Foodspotting have all completely changed how we decide where to eat during our travels. There is too much amazing food and too many incredible restaurants to try to waste even one meal somewhere mediocre.
• Mobile phones have likewise changed how we travel. We used Google Maps to get around NYC without a hitch!

Great trip, but I probably won’t be back for a while. Too many other places to see. What’s next on your list?

The first year we went, it took a little getting used to. We didn’t know where to go, we didn’t understand how the vouchers/passes/tickets worked, we didn’t figure out how to line up for stand-by films, and we didn’t know where to go to find the answers. We also (I guess I should say I, not we) picked a really horrific movie to kick it all off. It was a midnight showing (boo), it was REALLY long (second boo) and it was incredible dark and about cannibalism (resounding third boo). I still can’t get the images from that movie out of my head, and the fiance constantly reminds me of the poor selection. I will never live it down.

However, despite all of those seemingly bad experiences, there were a lot of things we really enjoyed about the first experience. First, I don’t care who you are, you get a slight feeling of superiority watching a film with sub-titles. You feel cultured. You can’t help it. We watched some animated shorts that first year, and they were excellent. We were really glad we stepped a little beyond our comfort zone to watch a series of shorts in other languages, and it was a highlight that drew us back for our second year.

The second year we went, I wrote a couple movie reviews in exchange for free tickets, and I did a much better job selecting films we would enjoy. I was able to get a program far enough in advance that I could read about the films, figure out which ones were playing when and then purchase vouchers ahead of time for cheaper than day-of tickets. We also understood where to go and how to line up for everything so we were less anxious about all of that as well. Much better movies and much better overall experience.

This year, I decided to take my participation a step further and signed up to be a volunteer. Early in the year I attended a one-hour Saturday morning orientation, and then leading up to the event I received ongoing communications about the online ShiftBoard we could log into to sign up for dates/times of shifts we wanted to work. It was very well organized, and I was able to get all three shifts (you are required to do at least three, four-hour shifts) on the dates/times I wanted.

For every shift I completed, I got two free vouchers, so I traded those in to take the fiance and one of my best friends to a couple shows. I had to travel for work during part of the festival so it was quite a whirlwind of activity to get the shifts  and viewings all in. The movies we picked were pretty good this year, but I didn’t feel very prepared. I wasn’t able to get a copy of the hard program ahead of time so I didn’t feel as prepared with my movie selections. The website is good, but it’s just not as good as having the hard program to go through and mark down movies and times ahead. Hopefully I can find some of the ones we missed on Netflix– I’ve had pretty good success with that in the past.

Overall, this year was the best experience yet, and I hope by volunteering I was able to help other people figure out where to go, better understand how the vouchers/passes/tickets work, figure out how to line up for stand-by films, and know where to go to find other answers. I hope I’ll be able to volunteer again next year.

If you’ve not been to the festival before, I highly suggest you go! I’ll probably be there so stop and say hi.

Brian and I decked out at the Cleveland St. Patty's Day parade

We had the most outrageously beautiful weather in Northeast Ohio this weekend, which was perfect for our St. Patty’s Day/weekend events!

The fiance was in Delaware all week for work, so I was non-stop running errands, prepping the house, outlining food plans and cleaning. I was exhausted driving home from work Friday afternoon, but it was so good to have him home and get down to all the final food preparation.

 The evening went by in the blink of an eye. We wanted to have both authentic and ‘Americanized’ food for our guests, so the menu looked something like this:

• Corned beef
• Cabbage and carrots
• Irish sausage
• Champ
• Parsnips with nutmeg
• Irish soda farls and jam
• Digestives
• Aero bars

A couple guests also offered to bring pasta salad, veggie trays, cupcakes, cake and other cookies so we had everything covered.

The spread!

Of course I picked up all the appropriate beverages, servingware and decorations, including the awesome hats we’re sporting here. (Awesome in so far as they were $1 each.)

Saturday morning was a final sweep of the house and then our friends arrived– some to carpool downtown for the parade, and another to get instructions for when to start heating the food since we were going to be cutting it close getting back from the parade in advance of our guests showing up. Although I know better, I told my family the actual time we wanted them to show up– meaning they were planning to be there about one hour prior to that time, meaning no one would be there. Minor glitch, and we were able to work it all out.

 The parade was just ok– I loved the bands and the dancers and some of the unusual floats, but I could have done without the 1,000 Girl Scout troops and the family/friends/neighbors/random acquaintances of the people in the parade who were all walking along in non-matching outfits on their cell phones as if they were dragged to participate in the event. Suggestion for future parades: be more selective in who marches. The parade did not need to last three hours, and we definitely didn’t stay that long.

Grabbing food in the kitchen and moving to the living room or back patio

On a positive note, the weather was beautiful, we had awesome seats and we were able to park and leave very easily, which was an original concern as we heard reports of an anticipated 300,000 parade attendees. Turns out there were more like 500,000 viewers, so we were lucky.

Saturday afternoon the party began at 4 p.m. and throughout the afternoon/evening we ended up with about 30 people.

We had a few relatives spend the night– it was their first time seeing our house– so we stayed up with them until midnight and then finally called it so we would be able to get up early the next morning.

Brian and I successfully pulled off our third St. Patty's Day party

Sunday at 7:30 a.m. I started the potato farls and by 9:30 a.m. more friends were arriving for Ulster Fry breakfasts. I found a shop in Parma called Gaelic Imports where I bought white and black pudding, and I bought my Heinz beans at Giant Eagle. The fiance made homemade bacon, I fried up the eggs and soda bread and we were set! The black pudding turned out a little dry, but everything else was fantastic.

We hosted two other St. Patty’s Day parties for our family and friends, but the event keeps getting better each time– more attendees, more authentic cuisine, more time together. This was also the first one we hosted in our new house so I have more ideas for how we can improve moving forward.

We couldn’t have asked for a better time or better weather– who would have thought we’d be in shorts on the patio in Ohio mid-March?

I’ll chalk it up to the luck o’the Irish!

New York, New York

Flight is booked, hotel is scheduled and conference is registered; it’s safe to say we’re heading to NYC! 

My boss puts a priority on our team attending professional development activities throughout the year, including one bigger trip if the topic makes sense. She encouraged me to look into the 3rd Annual PR and Media Relations Best Practices Summit by Ragan Communications given my focus on media relations for the university. The presenter line-up looks great and right on target with my day-to-day work. I think there’s a lot I can learn and apply to the efforts we already have underway. I’m especially looking forward to the presentations on crisis communications and metrics– two areas I’m interested in and have tons of the room for improvement. 

The beauty of this conference is that it’s a day and a half– just enough time to get through some excellent content but not so long that I’ll have trouble concentrating due to an overwhelming amount of information. 

The other perk is that I’m tacking on a couple days following the conference to see the city, and the fiance is tagging along. I do not take for granted that our jobs give us some flexibility and that on occasion we’re able to work remotely. It’s a huge perk and makes these sorts of trips possible. 

Although he’ll be working from the hotel while I’m at the conference, we’re looking forward to some great food the first couple evenings and then some site-seeing after the conference ends Friday afternoon.

We’ve both been to NYC before, but he buzzed through on his way elsewhere and it’s been more than 10 years since I’ve been there so we both have lots of catching up to do. 

On Friday, we’re going to try to see Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty followed by the World Trade Center memorial, Wall Street and the Brooklyn Bridge. We’ll probably just grab some NYC pizza to round it out. 

On Saturday, we’re hoping to head up to Grand Central Terminal for lunch at the Oyster Bar, and then spend the afternoon exploring the Top of the Rock, Central Park, Times Square and the theater district. We’re going to catch dinner and a Broadway Show that night. 

We just have the morning on Sunday, so we might fit in the Empire State building or just exploring the area around Times Square and our hotel. 

I haven’t done much planning so I’m open to suggestions– any places we should be sure to see/anywhere we should be sure to eat?

The Good Daughter by Jasmin Darznik

I borrowed The Good Daughter from a friend and with her recommendation, and I was not disappointed. Given everything going on in my life right now, it took a little longer than usual for me to get through it, but that’s a reflection of my availability and has nothing to do with the book’s ability to engage.

What struck me most about the book was not the plot line (daughter finds out her mother had a secret life in Iran that involved a marriage and daughter that the narrator never knew existed) although it was interesting to reflect on the mysteries of our parents’ lives before we were in the picture and what we do/do not know about them.

Instead, I was really interested in the role of the father (narrator’s grandfather) who helped his daughter (narrator’s mother) out of a horrible situation and into a way of life that ultimately set the stage for everything to come, including the marriage that led to the narrator’s existence.

The narrator’s mother’s first marriage occurred when she was 14 and was arranged, but the marriage fell apart as the husband became violent and abusive. Without any other means of protecting herself and her newborn daughter, the narrator’s mother left her husband to move back in with her family and seek a divorce. This sort of arrangement required her father to step in and pressure her husband to agree to the divorce, which he agreed to do. Although she lost her newborn– the eventual ‘good daughter’ in the process, as Iranian law required the father to acquire the children in the divorce– the narrator’s mother was encouraged by her father to return to school and eventually move to Germany to study to become a midwife.

Her father’s reasoning stemmed from the fact that his daughter would have no other means to care for herself outside his household; a divorced woman would not be able to remarry, and she would need some way to support herself. Although nothing about the situation was ideal, especially in terms of his reputation, he put many things on the line in order to get her back into school and on an educational path that would allow her to be successful later in life. While plans did not unfold exactly as he had planned, his support– in removing her from the broken relationship and supporting her re-introduction to the educational system and financially assisting these various activities– ultimately led to her meeting her second husband and having her second daughter, who wrote the novel.    

I will be the first to admit I know little about Iran’s culture, but the more I read, the more I was drawn to the book’s depiction of the many changes that took place in regard to women’s rights as it described the family and the narrator’s mother’s childhood, especially throughout the 1960s-1970s. The then presiding Reza Shah required women give up their Hejab and put an emphasis on westernizing the country’s culture, all of which affected the families in the book as well as the women’s roles in the household. The fact that the government supported western ideals was clearly significant in terms of the narrator’s mother being able to divorce, continue her education, travel internationally and receive financial, personal, etc. support from her family, especially the males in her family, to do so. However, it was clear that despite the many freedom’s associated with the attempts at westernizing the culture, not everyone, and certainly not all women were in favor of the changes.

This book has certainly inspired me to read more about Iran, especially in the years leading up to the 1960s-1970s and Iran today. Even more so as I won’t be able to travel and experience the country for myself anytime in the near future.

Once Upon A Time…

There once was a girl who dreamed of falling in love.

In preschool, she asked every girl in her class if they liked the boy in class she admired because she didn’t want to ‘steal him’ if someone else was interested. Love meant not hurting other people.

In elementary school, she wrote a journal in class describing how she imagined a boy sneaking up to a tree house where she was gently sleeping and kissing her awake. Love meant surprises and delight.

When she started going over to friends’ houses, she would play games to guess who she would marry, what kind of house they would have and what sort of car they would drive. Love meant dreaming and leaving some things to chance.

In junior high, she made friends with boys, thought about boys and watched her friends start ‘going out’ with boys. She wondered what it would be like to hold hands and smile secretly and pass notes back and forth. Love meant having someone else out there who loved you back.

She loved to read and the more she read, the more she was convinced that there was someone out there for everyone. Maybe she had to wait for now, but surely somewhere out there in the great, big world there was another person who would care about her. She wouldn’t always have to go to dances alone, or tag along with friends as a third wheel, or wonder what it would be like to be kissed. All of the waiting would be worth it.

At the end of eighth grade, just as everything was about to change—from getting contacts and a new haircut, to entering high school and making new friends—she met him. On her first terrifying visit to the high school to practice for her first marching band parade with the high school band students, she met him.

She was sitting quietly in a room full of shouting, laughing kids taking it all in, images of how high school was going to play out rushing through her mind when a tall, lean, bearded guy with a ponytail sat down on her lap and started asking her name. She was horrified—who would act like this? They didn’t even know each other!—and she was thrilled—a high school boy was paying attention to her! He was sitting on her lap and wanted to know her name!

The moment flew by; band practice started and everything settled down and everyone finished and went home. But she couldn’t stop thinking about him. She knew of him, but didn’t know anything about him. What grade was he in? Did he have a girlfriend? Would she see him again?

That summer flew by, and before she knew it, it was fall and time for band camp. And there he was. He was in her squad, she got to talk to him, she was going to get to spend the whole band season with him, and she was ready. She was in high school, and things were going to be different. Love meant being optimistic.

But she was a freshman. She didn’t know the first thing about boys. She wasn’t allowed to date. She couldn’t drive. She still considered love to be as bold as holding hands; as intimate as writing notes; as simple as stating, “I like you, do you like me?”

That innocence can be mistaken for immaturity, that exuberance can lead to infatuation, and that imagination and dreams can be shattered by reality was hard for her to understand. Love hurt people. Love didn’t behave nicely. Love was not easy. And love was not always returned. Sometimes people had enough of love. Sometimes they tried it and decided it wasn’t for them. Sometimes people wanted to have fun without strings attached. Sometimes they didn’t think they would ever be interested in love again.

She was lonely. She thought she was loveable. She tried distracting herself, but she couldn’t stop thinking about him. He left for college and left her behind with a few parting words, namely to become herself. To grow into the person she was meant to be, not for someone else, but for herself. To learn to roll on her own before finding someone else to roll through life with.

She was lonely.

But she grew up. She was smart. She left for college. She made new friends. She tried dating new people. And she still emailed him throughout the week and called him to say goodnight before she went to bed. And although he wasn’t interested, he usually wrote back and he sometimes picked up.

In the middle of college, everything in life started to change. She needed to get out. She needed to escape. She had always wanted to study abroad, and everything aligned to make that dream into a reality. So she packed her bags, kissed her friends and family goodbye and took her first plane ride alone on her first trip outside the country.

Her first weeks in Ireland left her empty, and she wasn’t sure what she’d done. How could she leave everything behind? How was she going to make it on her own? What was she trying to prove? But slowly she made new friends and they started to travel.

She drank her first beer, went to her first night club and danced in a ceili at midnight. She went to a play in London and climbed to the top of the Eiffel Tower. She ate haggis outside a Scottish castle and celebrated St. Patrick’s Day in Dublin. She visited Stonehenge and Bath, the Giant’s Causeway and the Waterford factory and she looked at, but did not kiss, the Blarney Stone. She read romance novels in a vineyard in Tuscany, took pictures of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, toured the ruins of Rome and attended the pope’s funeral.

She had become someone of her own accord. She made her own decisions and dealt with the consequences. She took care of herself and could make it on her own. She loved her family and friends, but she didn’t need them in order to survive. She had become her own person.

One day early on in her trip, she received an unusual package. Inside were a tape recorder and a stub from a concert she had attended what seemed like forever ago with that boy. She put on the headphones, pushed play, and heard, “This song goes out to a girl I once knew. I never told her how I felt about her, and she left before I had the chance. This one’s for you, babe.”

Her entire world turned upside down.

She listened to the tape over and over and over. She didn’t understand. It had been years and years since that long ago day in the band room when a tall, lean, bearded guy with a ponytail had sat down on her lap and asked her name. He had grown up. She had grown up. It was too late to go back.

She called her mom 3,000 miles away, resigned to the advice she knew would come, but her dad answered the phone. He listened, and his response left her dumbfounded. “Maybe he finally realized what he lost.” Love meant asking for a second chance.

She called the boy and asked him his intentions. “I just want to talk to you.”

So they talked. They emailed every day. She told him all about the people she was meeting, the classes she was taking and the places she was traveling. He told her all about living on his own, life after college and having a job in the real world. They emailed every day for three months.

One day, she read his email and was shocked. He wanted to come see her in Ireland. He could only come for a weekend. She was confused; she didn’t know what was supposed to happen, but she agreed to it. She outlined how he would fly over, what train he would catch and what platform he would end his travels and find her.

The day finally came. She left class and went and sat in a metal shack on the train platform and waited for the train. The train finally came and everyone pushed on and off and the train took off again. He hadn’t walked by. Maybe he missed the train, or his flight was delayed. She thought she would head back to her apartment and look up the next train schedule when she caught a glimpse of his reflection in the final train windows speeding by. She tore out of the shack, ran straight to him on the platform and jumped into his waiting arms. Love meant following your heart.

She had one of the best weekends of her life. They talked, they ate, they drank, they traveled, they explored. And late one night in a pub in Port Rush over the laughter of her friends and the noise of the band, he asked her to be his girlfriend. And she said yes.

She came home and finished college. He bought a house and started new jobs. He started traveling for work and would be gone weeks at a time. She got an apartment and started her first job. They lived an hour and a half apart and made the best of their disjointed, long-distance relationship. They explored the United States, they traveled to Mexico, they bought motorcycles, they shot hand guns, they argued, they experienced the death of loved ones and they got to know each other.

After six years, they finally came to the same point in their lives. They moved in together, they started new jobs, they dealt with horrible landlords, they traveled to Germany, they let a friend move in with them for several months and they bought a house together.

One day, the girl came across a festival taking place not far away in Canada. To her surprise, the boy agreed to go. They drove to Canada and explored wine country. They stopped at wineries, tried new food, and checked in to a room they rented above an Irish pub owned by a couple of guys from Northern Ireland. They dressed up and went out to dinner and came back to change so they could head out to see the city and ice wine village lit up at night.

They were just ready to head out. The boy called something to the girl. The girl went running out of the bathroom still making some final tweaks to her hair.

The boy was down on one knee. Love means sometimes your dreams do come true.

The End

This journey has a happy ending. And a whole new adventure is just now beginning.

Top Ten Lists

When I was in grade school, I remember making top ten lists with my friends. Top ten boys, top ten songs, top ten movies, etc. The order was susceptible to change at any moment, but the idea was popular for years. I still find myself making similar lists today–facebook asks for my favorite movies/books/etc., my significant other and I categorize which house projects need done in what order, my Friday nights often consist of me outlining what top few things have to be achieved during the weekend, and on, and on.

The idea of making lists, especially top ten lists, is also popular with the media. Through video, photography, illustration and more, any topic in the world can fall under some top ten listing for people to consider and debate. If we don’t agree with someone else’s ranking, we create our own.

Case in point, my boss recently forwarded me bing.com’s top ten videos related to travel. We have two main categories: Top 10 Worst Tourist Destinations and Top 10 Most Popular Tourist Destinations. There are others you can peruse, but these were the kick-offs.

The top ten worst seemed somewhat obvious given the current safety issues of the areas included, except for Antarctica. That one is actually on my list. I wouldn’t say it’s high on my list, but it’s there.

During my time at Kent State University, I attended a lecture by a visiting speaker, Dr. Jerri Nielsen, who lived with a team in Antarctica as the only physician on-site. I attended her lecture for my Intro. to Psych. class because there are a lot of psychology and sociology studies of individuals who live in Antarctica given the living and working conditions, the emotional impact of remaining in close quarters without much outside communication for at least six months, the body’s response to the continued darkness and location on the planet (the sun circles in the middle of the sky rather than rising and setting, etc.)– which leads to disorientation and memory loss– and more. Her lecture was fascinating. If you’ve not heard of her, you can check out her autobiography, Ice Bound, which details her time there, how she self-diagnosed with breast cancer and had to operate on herself with the very limited resources they had in the camp. Sadly, she passed away in 2009. I will never forget listening to her telling her story. I was inspired to see Antarctica myself one day.

The top ten most popular is not really disputable since it’s based on the actual number of visitors each country receives. I’ve been to eight of the 10– Malaysia and Turkey are still on my list. Turkey’s up there.

If I had to list my top ten favorite countries (based on the full experience of each place I’ve visited), it would look something like this:

1. Northern Ireland
2. Scotland
3. Germany
4. Republic of Ireland
5. Switzerland
6. The Netherlands
7. Italy
8. France
9. Czech Republic
10. Egypt

The next ten I hope to hit?

1. Turkey
2. Greece
3. Morocco
4. Norway
5. Sweden
6. Finland
7. Iceland
8. Australia
9. New Zealand
10. South Africa

What are your top ten in travel, whether it’s countries, cities, sites, or other? What are the ten places you hope to visit next?

The Paris Wife by Paula McClain

It seemed like everyone was talking about The Paris Wife by Paula McClain (who lives in Cleveland! Woot!), but I was hearing very mixed reviews. I am not a Hemingway fan so initially I was uninterested, but once I discovered there were so many differing opinions of the book, and once my friend suggested I would have lots of off-shoot reading based on the events and time period of the book, I decided I should give it a shot.

I loved it. I thought the narrative from Hadley’s point of view was well done– I felt sympathetic to her situation and developed a new interest in Ernest Hemingway. I thought the plot moved along at an appropriate pace, and I thought it had the right amount of setting description as they moved around the Unites States, Canada and Europe to many places I have been.

I didn’t have, and still don’t have, much knowledge of what was taking place in Paris in the 1920s, but I really enjoyed learning about the literary and artistic minds who gathered at that apex, especially from the viewpoint of an individual who was a part of the movement via her spouse, but an objective viewer of the events rather than an involved participant like so many others. The feminine point of view during this period was not only crucial to the story in terms of explaining Hemingway, but in highlighting how society was developing during the jazz era, and even leading up to that point. I was baffled that so many forward-thinking individuals were still considering relationships the way they did, and that the women/wives were discounted and discluded in many instances despite all of their education, strength and substantial support of their significant others’ aspirations.

I also found Hemingway’s development very interesting. While the book is historical fiction, it is based very closely on the true events, as they were recounted in actual letters sent between everyone in the book and known records of the Hemingway’s travels, etc. I had a loose understanding of Hemingway’s background from very basic research I was forced to conduct in high school when my honors classes required readings of A Farewell to Arms and The Old Man and the Sea, but I did not remember learning about his family– many of whom committed suicide– or about all of his subsequent wives. My knowledge was strung loosely around his involvement in WWI, the loss of his first love, and his passion for his work until the day he committed suicide. This book outlined how he got his start and all the key players, most notably his wife. Although I knew A Farewell to Arms was based on his war experience, I didn’t realize so many of his other novels were based on actual events in his life. The Paris Wife captures the creation of The Sun Also Rises as well as a number of other shorter works, and I’m now interested in reading them.

Reading about the Hemingways’ interactions with Ezra Pound, Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas, the Fitzgeralds, Sherwood Anderson and many others has inspired me to research more about the time period and the other writers’ works as well. I added numerous entries to my GoodReads account as soon as I closed the pages.

It also led me to reminiscence about my own time in Paris, and even Austria, Spain and Canada. The Paris described in the novel was different from most of the touristy aspects of Paris I encountered, but on the days we were able to wander and ramble off the beaten path, we experienced some of the heart of Paris, which I’ve included in the few random photos below:

The Tower

Architecture That is Alive

 

L'Opera

 

Hostels and Art

 

I look forward to learning more about Hemingway and Paris in the 1920s. I also highly recommend The Paris Wife.

I was watching a quick episode while I was getting ready this morning and one commercial really caught my attention. I actually looked forward to the next time it played so I could pay more attention. It started off, “People don’t make a list of websites they want to see before they die. They don’t fill photo albums with pictures from an online search…”

The commercial is for a Dodge Journey, but the message to me was much more. You can spend a lot of time dreaming about and planning the things you want to do in life, but the real experiences come from taking the time to actually do them.

Here’s to taking risks, having adventures and making memories.