On the final full day of the NCTE Convention in Boston, I gave myself permission to attend a half day and take a half day to explore Boston with my husband on his first visit to this iconic city. In 2005, I’d summered just 20 minutes from Boston in Milton, Massachusetts, where I’d stayed on the campus of Curry College doing research as part of a graduate degree program. I’ve visited a few times since, most recently in 2022.
So
much
has
changed!
Since the weather was cold and rainy and we were woefully wardrobe-unprepared, we decided to catch the Old Town Trolley tour and sit back and relax, listening to the history as we rode in the heated bus. I purchased tickets online and added them to my Apple Wallet, jumping on at Stop 15: The Boston Convention Center.
The sign doesn’t fully tell the story. You have to add the wind.
Thank goodness for a heated tour bus.
Faneuil Hall, one of my favorite places in Boston – I purposely didn’t edit the photograph, because I love the spaciousness of Boston and all the old bricks.
My husband had walked the Freedom Trail the day before, but the Old Town Trolley gave us a narrated history of many more landmarks.
We went in for a late lunch without a wait. We ate enough that we were too full for supper, and we shared our meal.
The Union Oyster House is directly across from the Holocaust Memorial.
Someone at our table enjoyed a Samuel Adams lager, sheerly for the nostalgia.
New England Clam Chowdah
When in Boston, one should sample the Boston Baked Beans.
We shared an Oyster Roll.
The Union Oyster House has its window decorations up, and I snapped a quick photo of this miniature replica of the UOH decorated for Christmas, with the Holocaust Memorial in the reflection of the window. This may be my favorite photograph I took on the tour.
Changing leaves
I believe my favorite part of the tour was the changing leaves. There’s nothing like New England in the fall, with all its vibrant colors and crisp air.
Boston’s Seaport District at night
When you leave town without enough warm clothes, you find a new sweatshirt to help you remember that time you ate in the nation’s oldest continuously operating restaurant……
Water Taxi from Airport to Hotel – in Boston Harbor -it’s the best way to arrive in Boston in warm months (note to self: it’s cold and windy on the water in November)
yesterday we came
to the big city: Boston
but our hearts are home
Nothing grounds me, pulling on my rural roots and centering my belonging more than putting on my sweatpants, wrapping up in a jacket, and throwing on my dew-proof duck boots for a walk with the dogs in November on the Johnson Funny Farm, one hour south of Atlanta, Georgia but as rural as Little Red Riding Hood’s deep woods with all the mystery. I smell the wet earth of morning wafting up from beneath the pine straw, see the falling leaves and misty haze through the thicket, and hear the lone woodpecker overhead, calling to us from the towering Loblolly pines. I’ll carry the country silence of my Sunday morning walk with the boys close to my heart all week as we travel. I’ll miss them, and I will pull up these blog photos below many times while I’m away. The one with Ollie trying to be a stowaway will bring tears by the end of the weekend.
I know that there is much to look forward to in the city beyond the NCTE Conference, where I, along with my writing group, will be presenting our latest series of books for teachers on Thursday. We’ll see the nation’s history unfold along the Freedom Trail if the weather permits, and from there, following the NCTE Convention, we’ll explore several New England states and share Thanksgiving Dinner at Plimoth Plantation as we see The Thanksgiving Story come to life on stage.
As we share in our love of travel, though, there is nothing that compares to coming home. To being home. To belonging, and to feeling the sanctuary of our space here in rural Georgia with our three rescue schnoodles – Ollie, who walks with his nose up, sniffing the air all around him, Fitz, who walks with his nose to the ground, sniffing what has been there before him, and Boo Radley, whose nose and eyes are always directly ahead so that he doesn’t miss a thing. It seems silly, really, to have to walk these boys on a leash in all this space, but out here we never know what wildlife we’ll encounter, and they are prone to chase everything from deer to cattle and donkeys that get loose from nearby pastures. We don’t take any chances.
As we fly out on this work conference and extended adventure, it is comforting to know that our return ticket will bring us right back where we belong.
This is what country folks look like when we take walks on the farm.
Noses: on ground, in air, straight ahead
A few sounds of the country
Ollie confirms that his people are leaving on a trip and looks for space to fit in
Sharing dinner before the conference frenzy begins (From L-R: Tammi Belko, Dawn Lanca-Potter, Kim Johnson, Sarah Donovan, Leilya Pitre, and Denise Krebs at Layla’s American Tavern, Boston)
Sarah Donovan and me – Sarah’s writing group at http://www.ethicalela.com saved my life as I struggled with grief over the death of my mother in 2015. And we’ve been writing ever since.
I may not be sporting a Rockport, Massachusetts t-shirt, but I do have this.
Every time I scrub dishes, I think of that cute little Sail Loft in Bear Skin Neck, and it takes me back to one of the most scenic United States towns I’ve ever visited.
The VRBO unit had one of these dish brushes in the sink, and I fell in love with it right there in the standing-room-only kitchen in that iconic New England coastal town that still plays steeple hymns at 4 pm on the church organ, probably to remind everyone walking around in this much natural beauty that it might be the closest place to heaven on earth.
Even before I left Massachusetts, I went online and ordered one for myself from Amazon. The Lodge. They may specialize in cast iron, but they make a mean dish brush, too.
As I scrubbed the two crock pots from yesterday’s Meal Train Mississippi Pot Roast and our own MPR dinner with cooked-on carrots and potatoes, I thought back to my walks through this quaint little New England town to take photos of the rocky shore, the sunrise seaglass hunt, the angel wings I found on White Wharf beach in one of the least expected places to ever find a pair (an unquestionable hello from my mother in heaven), and the little wooden boats that looked like they were sitting on glass as they were anchored like lone ducks in the water.
Common Threads 