Sunday, September 11, 2016

Races With Emily

In the last few years, Emily has gotten into running and entering races. Last fall, September 2015, she signed up to do a half-marathon in Zion National Park.  Norma, Brian and Whitney decided to join her in doing that half, but I wasn't sure about traveling all the way to Zion's to participate in a half-marathon, but I noticed there was one right in our backyard--the Smoky Mountain Half-Marathon.  As I spoke with Emily about it on the phone, she said that if I sign up for it, she would be terribly tempted to join me. It was to be in a few short weeks, but I signed up and she did, too!

I walk a lot, long and often, but after signing up, I was anxious about my ability to do a half. I'm really glad Emily did it with me. As I started the race, I was so tempted to stop and take pictures because the path was so beautiful, but thought I'd better not--if I was to finish the race in the time allotted!  About half-way through the race, I realized "I got this" and was able to push myself to go faster.  And what a feeling of accomplishment when I crossed the finish line! It was something I had not anticipated!


After the half marathon, we raced in a couple races held at Tennessee State Parks.  Below you can see us at Rock Island State Park.  Note we both placed in our Age Division! And Roland is a wonderful cheerleader for us!  Thanks for coming and supporting us. And, Emily, thanks for encouraging me to step out of my comfort zone and participate in these races--I love Tennessee and running these races races with you made me some mighty fine memories.


Sunday, March 20, 2016

All the Beautiful of Walks in Lovely Knoxville!

I originally added this post on March 20, 2016. But this evening (April 19, 2017), I saw that all the pictures and the script had disappeared! All that remained were the comments made.  Here's an attempt to recreate this post. I loved taking walks in Knoxville. There were so many lovely trails and places to go. When I lived in Belmont West, I never really ventured out of the neighborhood for walks. But Treymour Village was a very small neighborhood, so I ventured out. And such beautiful sights there were to see!


The dogwoods in spring at the walking trail near the Farragut library.

Same place, different view.
                                    


The three pictures above were taken at the path near the soccer field that is across the street from the dog park.  The view of the lake always beautiful, but always different. It's amazing that I could enjoy this view in solitude so many times. 






The pictures above were taken on a trail right next to the dog park. I loved walking on this trail. These pictures show it during different seasons.

This picture was taken as I was walking on Westland, very near to our home. It's hard to imagine all the traffic that was behind me as I took this picture. It's so pastoral--but in the upper left corner you can see the telephone wires.

Just a short walk from our home was a loop that could make me feel I was in the country. 
This picture was taken in a neighborhood not far from Treymour Village that set on a hill. It's a mountain view, but only because I aimed the camera high--leaving out the homes.
                                 
This, too, was taken at a popular park with a walking trail located in Farragut. I'll have to come back when I remember this park's name and insert it!

This picture was taken at a park one exit south of our exit. There was trail here, too. The lake was always a favorite of mine.





The three pictures above show one of my favorite walking buddies. How blessed we were to able to find such beautiful and exciting places to go for walks together. And I always felt blessed when other family and friends would join me, too.

Sunday, March 13, 2016

Roland Begins his Transition into Retirement!

February 29, 2016 was Roland's last day of employment at the University of Tennessee. Since then we have been celebrating 32 years of service to UT and enjoying some new found flexibility in our lives.

After Roland came home from UT on that last Monday at the office, we sat down in our living room with an envelope our children sent us. Inside were thoughtful notes of love and appreciation from each of them. It was touching and we shed a few tears while reading these letters. Also they sent us a total of $1,250 to be spent on a trip.  We have often talked about going to Maine during Whale Season, but Whale Season is the end of August, right when the school year at UT begins, so it was something we weren't able to do.  Perhaps this year it will happen.  With other plans for the remainder of the year, it's difficult to be certain. Thankfully, we can be flexible.

In the evening, our friends Cindi and Corbet Curfman took us to dine at Bonefish Grill to celebrate Roland's retirement. They have been such good friends for many of the years we have lived here in Tennessee. There we enjoyed Bang Bang Shrimp so Roland can say "he went out with a bang!". We don't often get an appetizer when we go out to eat, but at Bonefish, the Bang Bang Shrimp is a must.

Us with Cindi and Corbet on the left and on the right we see Roland enjoying the Bang Bang Shrimp!
We had made plans to explore and hike along the Tail of the Dragon and Cherohala Skyway for the next few days. However, because of a weather forecast of thunderstorms and a request I received from Delton Gerloff on Monday to send him pictures for a slideshow the department would be showing on Friday at a reception in Roland's honor we decided we could be flexible and revised our plan. Tuesday, we planned to vote in the primary, get the pictures to the University and enjoy a trip to the Nashville Temple.  Once more our plans needed to be changed. Then on Wednesday and Thursday we would do some hiking. But lines were long at the polls and when voting took about three hours, flexibility was once more the theme of the day. Instead, after voting, we headed off to Nashville and spent the night in Lebanon. In the morning we completed our trip to the temple and enjoyed a session. It was now noon and we had planned to take a hike in one of the beautiful state parks between Nashville and Knoxville on our way home. We stopped at Longhunter State Park and found a hike and as we were exiting the car to go hiking, Roland discovered he had left his Tilley at the hotel. There would be no hiking without a hat on Roland's head! Thankfully, we had not gotten as far as Lebanon, so we drove on to the hotel and decided that since there is a really nice state park, Cedars of Lebanon, we would visit that one instead and hiked a pleasant trail called "Hidden Springs". By now it was a little later in the day, and perhaps the Tilley wasn't even necessary! But we enjoyed the hike and found the hidden springs. I'm so glad we were able to complete this hike!

One of the hidden springs.
The second hidden spring. Who knows?? There might be a third--but is hidden better!
Roland on the trail in his handsome Tilley. He's lookin' mighty fine on his second official day of retirement!
Enjoying the good life--hiking on a weekday!?
 We spent Thursday at home and kept busy tending to various responsibilities. Roland made a trip to the University. A friend of mine's brother had just died and she asked me to come over and help her pack to travel to the funeral.

Friday was the day of Roland's retirement reception at the University. Emily drove over from Nashville to share this time. The event was a memorable tribute to Roland's UT Career. Students, faculty and staff were all gathered to share the memories and the good food.

Several colleagues spoke and shared experiences revealing Roland's character. There were four stories in particular that I want to always remember.

Two were experiences Jim Larson shared.  He told of a car trip that he made with Roland to West Tennessee. On the return trip home, with Roland at the wheel, a deer carcass was lying in the road. Roland was following a semi truck and trailer and the semi's clearance allowed it to drive over the deer. Roland then saw the deer carcass, felt there was no time to check and switch lanes and made the quick decision to speed up, get momemtum and ram the carcass. Jim was more than just a little surprised! He felt his decision on the road reflected Roland's style of making decisions and acting. "Quick and full speed ahead!"

The second he shared was an experience Jim had with Roland and Burt English early in Jim's career at UT.  Roland has been a caring mentor for many of the faculty and students. Jim said that his style has changed over the years. Roland was nicer now than he was back then. Early in Jim's career at UT, before he was tenured, as the leader of a project with Roland and Burt, Jim was summoned to the Dean's office because the Dean had received several phone calls from irate farmers about a survey they had mailed out. He asked Roland and Burt to go with him for support. Roland and Burt were confident the research was well designed and useful. Nevertheless, as the three of them waited for the Dean in his office, Roland said to Burt, "I'm sure glad I have tenure right now. Aren't you?" Burt agreed that he wouldn't want to be untenured in a situation like that. What a fun memory!

Kim Jensen spoke of Roland's service as the Director of Graduate Studies for the department. He worked with a committee to select the students from those who had applied. He often would stick his head in her office for her input. She had been impressed over the years by his desire to have agreement among the committee members and the solidarity it helped to bring about in the department.

Among the things Burt English spoke of was what a fine professor Roland was in the classes he taught. Burt used a letter he wrote as an outline for his comments.  From the letter: "Roland has had a huge impact on our graduate students. I believe that his discussions with them about Economic Theory have made them far better economists than they would have been had he not been here. Did you know, Roland taught the students twice a week Monday and Wednesday from 3:40 to well when he got done. When he gave an exam, he would stay up in his office until he finished grading them. I am sure this took him at times well past 9 pm. The exams would be outside his office the next morning when the students got to campus. That is dedication." I can attest that many times it was after midnight before he got home. The students who were present at the reception were openly appreciative of his kindness and support.

Roland received several gifts from the department among them a framed beautiful print of the Smoky Mountains. We have loved and enjoyed the Smoky Mountains for the past 32 years and this gift is treasured.

We are so grateful for the blessing of living in Knoxville and Roland's position at UT. What a wonderful life we have been able to live among the good people of Knoxville and UT! We have loved the hiking, exploring and recreation here in the Appalachian mountains. They have provided so many of our family's activities and memories. I am personally grateful to be able to have shared all the experiences we've had together and am soooo proud of him!
We're so grateful for our health, family and life together and we've got sooooo much to look forward to!


















Wednesday, February 17, 2016

Maui, Summer 2014

These are pictures taken on the trip we went on with Brian, Norma, Will and Sierra.  For Christmas 2013 they gave us tickets for a trip to Hawaii with their family. What a treat that they would invite us along!!  Once more, I'm posting the picture taken on my I Pad as my I Pad traveled with us to Hawaii. We begin with meeting up in our condo.  Greetings include exchanging Hawaiian t-shirts. After delays and have a night stay at the airport in Honolulu and it was pure pleasure meeting up.




Taking selfies with the ipad.

 Below Brian, Will and Norma pose in the shirts they made before traveling.  Unfortunately, Sierra didn't wear hers that day.  I thought I'd be able to get a picture of them all later in their shirts, but it never happened.


Views of the beach near our condo below.  These pictures were taken the first evening of our stay.







Our First Day of Travel on Maui










Taking a break and eating papaya at a roadside stand.  


The biggest Banyan tree in the world.  Located in Lahaina.




Below are pictures of our trip to Mount Haleakala
Travelin' up the mountain--temperatures are cooling down!


This mountain has a name, but three years later can't remember!!  But isn't it beautiful!?


Now we're traveling by foot to see another view of the mountain.



These are called silver swords.  What interesting flora--perhaps unique to Mount Haleakala.

Another view of the silver sword.  Its more evident why it has that name in this picture.

Below are picture of Mount Haleakala Crater and the family enjoying this beautiful place.

Norma's lookin' FBI or CIA.

Why did we pose like this?? I don't know! I can't remember! But I do know that we felt very clever : )

Below are pictures of a Chinese celebration that we enjoyed.  It's fun to experience different cultures that influence Hawaii.
Cute little girls dancing!

Cute Norma and Brian dancing!


More dancing!


I couldn't pass up this opportunity to learn a Chinese dance! I'm the Caucasian in the khaki pants and black jacket.


The following pictures are a day of exploring some ancient Hawaiian ruins.
Sierra is ready for adventure wearing her multi-purpose bandana!

Posing in front of ancient wall.



It's so interesting to see the yellow flowers growing in the black lava.


Look at what the water did to the lava--made a whole right through it!

Discovering together.


Making our own artifacts and taking pictures.


What do you think they found?  An eel!!

Searching the tidal pools for sea creatures.


Searching, searching . . . 

Still searching . . . 

Close up of searching in close quarters.  Must have found something to share with each other!


Below are Sunday's pictures.  Since Norma and Brian met some  really niceTongan folks at this ward on their last trip to Maui, so we returned to the same Tongan Ward this trip.

Sierra lent me her black and white kukui nut lei to match my outfit.

We were invited to dine with one of their old friends, and this is some of the spread--fish and so much more! We were so surprised! He treated us real good!


Such a nice guy.  He was also a craftsman and carved decorative fishing hooks from bone.  He does a lot of contract work and also has a little stand in Hana where he sells some of his things.  We visited it while there, and both Sierra and Will bought souveniers from him.
Below are pictures we took at an arboretum we stopped at on our way to Hana.
We were curious and wondered what these hard blueberry-looking fruit might be.


Can you find the toad in this photo?




These trees are soooo tall!


It's s-o-o-o-o-o  t-a-l-l!

Posing on the bridge. I can't help it--I just have to say don't they look adorable--like the Bobbsey Twins!  However, their stories would read a little differently.

Here's the view from the bridge.  Roland, Brian and Will went down to explore while Norma, Sierra and I explored along the road.

What a beautiful place.  Love the black sand of this beach, but its hot and the sand is really more like rocks!



Below are the pics of the luau we went to in Lahaina.  We got to go at a greatly reduced financial cost because Brian and Norma endured a timeshare presentation.  Roland and I played at the beach with Will and Sierra in their absence.  Who got the good end of that deal!!?
Happily waiting in line to enter the luau.

The photographer (Brian) of the picture got playful and found a way to make fire escape from Roland's hat.  

Maori face paint.  The look of a fierce Maori Warrior.  

Two fierce Maori warriors.

She's smiling!  Even with her tongue sticking out.  So much fun!

Watching the pig get placed in the imu.

Kalua Pig baking in the imu.


Enjoying the luau feast.

Will captured the sun going down at the luau.  Love this view!

Sierra and I take a hula lesson.  So glad she had a red muumuu to wear.  She's got talent!

After the performance, we got to meet some of the performers.

We had a wonderful time in Hawaii with the Provo Roberts.  When we left Hawaii, we had to part ways so that they could return to Provo, while Roland and I returned to Knoxville.  Love these memories!