Jim's Journal

A view of the Patapsco River at it meets the Chesapeake Bay. Please indulge me as I thumb out a few thoughts on my iPhone here…

Just a few minutes from the city of Baltimore at Fort Smallwood Park, I decided to take a few minutes to think about the weekend so far. I picked this place because it was nearby, but also because it gave me a view of the Chesapeake Bay as well as a bit of industry with the large Mittal Steel to the left. Watching the huge freight ships pass by (affecting the waves on the shore) and the sailboats nearby. The marshland behind me and the gentle lapping of the waves in front of me. This is a point in time in my life where I have been forced to look inward and make choices. Fearing mistakes I downloaded a copy to my Kindle Brilliant Blunders: From Darwin to Einstein – Colossal Mistakes by Great Scientists That Changed Our Understanding of Life and the Universe by Mario Livio.
to enjoy and to remember that the path to success can only come through taking chances, overcoming and embracing mistakes and failure, remembering where you have been but looking at change as a chance to grow.

You know I love Georgia, the mountains, the Chattahoochee river, the long summers – even the heat. But this is home to me.
Long walks in the woods up the Little Patuxent in Howard County as a child – coming upon an old house on a farm, not far down an apple grove where we would steal as many golden delicious as we could carry in our shirts, then a horse farm where my dog Rags (collie mix) would sometime get loose and corral them all up to the barn. Evening sounds of crickets and cicadas rising and falling with the natural rhythm of things.

Summer camp in Rising Sun where the Susquehanna river meets the bay – I learned to sail, ride horses, not be afraid and just play.
Sitting on the dock at any given harbor watching the ways of the water thinking about the history – from oystermen to farmers to merchants to founding fathers all passing through these waters.

The “city to the south” for the North, “to the north” for the South. It really does have Charm.

Goin down the ocean – a week of sun, fun and escape. The water wasn’t blue like the Gulf and the beaches weren’t surrounded by palm trees or golf courses – just houses and boardwalk and hotels and people.

Annapolis and the navy, the sailboats and the sailors – the Chesapeake Bay is unique to the world. The skipjacks, watermen and the people who support them, and they support. As I met friends at a harbor bar in Edgewater prior to my trip and then in Fell’s Point at pubs on a street 400 years old and I looked at faces I had never seen before, but that I knew.The features, the wear and tear, the knowing smiles and boastful yarns. All with a journey that involved triumph and disaster, love and loss, joy and struggle.

My mind always goes back to Chesapeake by James Michener and the characters in this book. He describes history through the families that settled here – they are still here.

The University of Maryland – a gift that keeps on giving not just the education, but the friends I made & I have to this day, the bowl games we went to with my kids who love the experience as much as us, and my beautiful wife who I met there and we share these terrific times.

And yes – my 30th AHS high school Reunion this weekend, super flashback, too many thoughts, memories I had locked away – that came rushing back as I looked into other’s eyes. This was my third and last high school, and the one I choose to say is my high school.That combination of friends, achievements and my last stand as a kid. Interestingly enough, I really don’t see these folks anymore (except on Facebook of course), but as with anyone in the past that was a part of your childhood, when you do see them it’s like it was yesterday. My wife Stephanie and I talked about it this morning, it really is a special time in your life, a place in time that can’t be duplicated – full of “remember when’s” and “I wish I had’s,” “I wish I hadn’t’s” and “I’m glad I did’s.” But most of all, the gateway to the people we are today: imperfect containers of experiences and potential. Almost everyone I talked to had a fabulous blunder or two, a wonderful story, a hint of vulnerability and an energy that proves their humanity. People amaze me every day.

shhh, listen