Mt. Sinai, on the North Shore of Long Island, New York

It’s 8 in the morning and Ginnie’s house is quiet. She and her husband Keith have left for work. I’m doing laundry and drinking a cup of coffee in their kitchen, which has all these windows. Their house is surrounded by trees on all sides – it is a very wooded area and squirrels are playing around the bird feeders. Yesterday when we arrived there were many different colored birds at the feeders but this morning it is quiet and only the squirrels are scampering around. It rained all day yesterday. It’s raining this morning. It was raining when we woke up in my brother’s apartment in the city and raining as we packed up the car and drove to Brooklyn, over the Manhattan Bridge, for a too-brief visit with my friend Elizabeth (maid-of-honor at my wedding). On the way to The Island, we stopped to have lunch with her. She lives in a section of Brooklyn called Park Slope, which has undergone a renaissance in recent years with the beautiful old brownstones being restored and renovated. The Brooklyn Museum is in this area just across the bridge from Manhattan and it has become quite a fashionable area to live in. She promises to visit in Italy and we going to hold her to it.

The drive out here was a stressful one, as the rain was really quite heavy the entire trip. We were advised by everyone to leave the city early and not get into rush hour traffic which I am told can be a real nightmare, especially in bad weather. We listened to that advice and arrived here around 4 in the afternoon, unscathed but pretty tired. Ginnie and Keith fixed us dinner and we sat and talked about our plans and their lives and arranged to have dinner with her parents and Bob’s Aunt Gloria tonight. I’m trying to reach the other friends and family I’d like to see in these next two days and just trying to relax and take it easy. We hope to drive out to Montauk Point also if time permits – that’s the furthest point on the Island and a trip we made a few times before we were married, in Bob’s little Austin Healey Sprite that I was so fond of! We’ll pass Wildwood State Park where he vacationed as a kid, and Sag Harbor where my family spent a few wonderful weeks in summers when I was small. Lots of memories are there in these far reaches of Long Island.

These past few weeks have gone by very quickly. I am a bit overwhelmed by all that we have seen and done and have not quite digested it all yet. I feel very much in a gray zone at the moment, between the leaving (lasciare – to leave, in Italian) and the going (partire – to go) literally standing on the edge of the cliff, peering over the edge, toes dangling. The great adventure lies beyond. One hand reaching back, the other forward. I had this quote by Mark Twain up on the board in front of my desk at P.S. Studios – “Twenty years from now you will not regret the things you did, but you will regret the ones you didn’t do. So let go the bow lines, sail away from the safe harbor, Dream, discover, explore.” Those were the words that have motivated us. We’ve left the safe harbor. We are dreaming. We are ready to discover and explore – excited beyond belief and scared to death! We are really doing this. Isn’t it wonderful? Are we insane?

Keep in touch,
Rosemary & Bob