Christmas Letter

“Oh there’s no place like home for the holidays,” is how a seasonal classic song begins. The last several years I’ve been wondering what that word “home” means—or more to the point, where should I be to find Christmas? Home invokes thoughts of family, but Christmas speaks to larger themes—the birth of the Christ child and his gifts of hope, justice, and love. Do we celebrate more completely or more fully with our family? Then, who is our family? When I was a girl, we gathered in large groups of people who shared the same parents/grandparents. Christmas meant parties with these beloved ones, sharing food and conversation in those magic moments before Santa came—or relishing a turkey dinner after the excitement of opening gifts on Christmas morning. The years passed and the families expanded, moved to different towns, and they no longer gathered at this time of year. The nucleus of Scott, Charmi, Shreve and me joined Grandma, Gramps, and Glenn, attaching to our Christmas celebrations good friends who became honorary aunts and uncles to replace those living in other states. Even when Gramps died, we maintained this family circle as Charmi and Shreve went to college and on to adult lives in other cities. Christmas meant parties in Sonoma, California. In 2004 Charmi and JJ married, Shreve joined Candice in Canada, and Grandma and Glenn moved to Texas to share Jensen Christmases there. This year, seven of us will again gather in Sonoma—from Hollywood and Toronto—to share Christmas. We come with our anticipations based on our happy memories of the past, tempered with the problems of cross-continental travel, wondering what effect jet lag will have on little River, worrying that too much rain will adversely affect our reunion.
So I ask my questions again: Where do I find Christmas? Where is my home? Who is my family? In the Bible I read, “God’s will is that we cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; defend the fatherless, plead for the widow” (Isaiah 1: 16-17). Jesus says, “Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister, and mother” (Mark 3:35). “People will come from east and west and from north and south to sit at God’s table” (Luke 13: 29).
This year, then, as I collect my thoughts to share as I wish you all Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, I apologize for rambling (do all teachers talk too much?), but I want to tell you about my world-wide family. Not only do they come from north and south, east and west, but also they practice God’s will. There’s Bill who takes care of Calle del Arroyo so we can spend so much time in Gainesville. There’s Shihfen who is taking care of our cat Smokey just now so we can be calm while we are here in Sonoma. There’s Thomasenia who supports me as I struggle with seemingly impossible tasks on my way to the doctorate. There’s Fatma, Emily, and Kristin who let me mother them a little. We have new friends who have lived in countries all over the world, some who have taught in universities and who teach us yet. We are blessed with friends at the University of Florida and United Church of Gainesville who supported our choice of President Obama in our search for justice and good. Because we have lived in Gainesville, we have connected with Americans of many backgrounds and from many states. We have friends from Turkey, Taiwan, China, and Nigeria. We have friends who speak different languages, whose skin is a different color, who worship God differently, and who have made a home with a member of the same sex. We are all one family, one people under God. This Christmas season I celebrate that reality and pray that the coming New Year will make love and peace a reality for the entire world, and not simply my small community.
Love, Joanne

Visiting the Fugelsangs

Here's the Fugelsang family on the fortieth anniversary of Jack and Peg. See JJ and Charmi, Jack and Peg, Paul and Laney, and Brian.
Many of Charmi's wedding guests came back to Florida for this event. Charmi is telling one of her stories here.
We saw another side of Palm Coast on this visit. Peggy's brother took us on a lovely boat ride up and down the canals. This was the day after Tropical Storm Faye left. The clouds remained. Since we stayed in Palm Coast a couple nights, we missed the worst of the storm here in Gainesville.

The Niagara Peninsula

The vineyards reminded us of Sonoma. We tasted some very good wines.
It's always nice to see Niagara Falls.
We always remember the fur traders and their canoes when we are by this river.
The little town of Niagara-on-the-Lake reminded us of two of our favorite places to be, Sonoma, and Ashland. We stayed four days and saw four plays--Mrs. Warren's Profession by GB Shaw, Little Foxes, After the Dance, and Belle Moral, by a living Canadian female playwright. It was a lovely interlude of cool weather before we went back to school and hurricanes.

Toronto trip

Here he is, at thirteen months, always a keen observer and always with something in his hand.
Notice the carefully laid-out broccoli flowerettes, soon to be moved to the floor by this little diner.
Sunday outing for Toronto families and grandparents.
This little moving piece of rubber is River's dance floor.
The new back yard. The castle is a favorite place.
River shows Daddy the mailbox.
The left side of this house (semi-detached) is the new three-story (plus basement) home for the LaFramenta-Levine family.

Spring days in Sonoma

Lunch at the Swiss Hotel with my mom and Margaret.
Scott picked up every leaf from the ground in the vineyard.
Lunch at the Sunflower Cafe with Leslie, Cheryl, and Linda.
Three of the many deer that graze on our plants.
Dinner with Donna, Me, Virginia, Marilyn, and Alice--class of San Rafael High, 1960.
Trying to cool off on a visit to Sausalito--it was 95 degrees and still June!

Part 2 of a cool May week

There is my summer action: Human Learning on line. It is interesting, albeit I do get tired of sitting.
While I end my day with mindless television (here I can control the remote!) I have been knitting some more infant socks, for all my friends' grandchildren that are born in Canada.
Here is the newly created housecat Smokey. After an incident with a ferocious mammal, either raccoon, cat, or fox, that initiated an infection, he is staying indoors. Scott misses his company outdoors, but he has already lost his winter coat and it's cold out there.

Foggy Memorial Day in Sonoma

Here is my date for the evening. He is taking me to see the film "The Visitor" down on the Sonoma Square. (Sunday: it is a good film)

Looking through the trees in the garden, one sees a gray sky. This is a photo of the morning fog, but not the cool breeze that accompanies it. It's 62.4 degrees outside, and a few degrees warmer inside the front door. This afternoon we are invited to a picnic. The sun is expected to shine. I certainly hope it does.

Asian UF students in SF and Wine country

Sonoma Valley roses behind Shih-fen, Qing, and Scott
Shreve's San Francisco store.
Artesan Winery sits atop one of the hills surrounding Napa Valley.
Joanne in the warm breezes overlooking San Francisco Bay and the Golden Gate.
Japanese Tea Garden
The famous bridge is a lot tougher to cross than it used to be.

A Day in the Life of Joanne

The bookbag, fully loaded, that is blissfully on a chair in my office instead of on my back.
The empty lecture hall where I will take my Final STATS test on Thursday.  Most seats are empty during our lecture.
Scott works on his Portuguese while I am struggling with Statistics.
Scott and I eat lunch in the courtyard.
This is where we meet every Monday, in Thomasenia's office, for strategy planning and coordination of our projects.  Kristin is the newly minted PHD on the left, then Emily, a "candidate", and Thomasenia, soon to be full professor.

Buried in my statistics

The bus lets me off near here, near the lecture hall where I try to make sense of Statistics. Sometimes I think I could be reading the phone book with greater understanding, but it two weeks the semester will be over. This could be good, as long as I don't have to take the next semester. I have a lot of respect for statisticians. They have made a very tight system that encompasses almost every possibility and yet they are able to equivocate: "It appears that. . ." "The evidence appears to say that. . ." "There is strong probability that. . . " All we have to know is which case applies to which particular method. As long as something can be made to offer no change, there will be a formula we can use. My, this almost sounds like I know something. The doc student, Joanne

Texas Trip

We had a lovely trip to San Antonio, to visit Grandma & Glenn, Steve & Lois, Christopher, Aimee, Noelle, Robert, Brynn, and Steven--as well as the five cats.  It's very interesting to be part of their lives, especially the musical treats, like the Dixieland Band rehersal (above) and Steven's music recital (below).  There there was Glenn's eye infection, the lost (and found) hearing aids, and getting the walker into and out of the car.  Grandma had a very good week and Glenn's health was restored.  The children are darling and the cats give Grandma something to watch and worry about.  We enjoyed seeing both Old San Antonio, including tea at the Mad Hatter's, and the New (very fancy) Shops at La Cantera.  We ate wonderful meals and bought lots of new clothes.  All in all, a great vacation.

The night before daylight savings time began, we were treated to a delightful meal at the home of my friend Shih-fen, so we (Scott, me, and other international students) could meet her friend Ruth, now of North Carolina, but heading to Chico, California in the fall.  What a wonderful meal and such delightful company!  Pity that we had to get out of bed at 2am to drive to Jacksonville to take the plane to San Antonio.

Lions and Lambs

March came in like a lion, with tornados, thunder, lightning, and three inches of rain in one day.  We are headed off to Texas for our Spring break and Scott is still worried about whether or not to cover the plants.  This hardy Hibiscus should be OK, but there's the poor little bougainvillea that bravely put out new leaves.  It will not be happy with an overnight temperature of 31.  It'll be good to put statistics out of my mind for six days.

The first picture was supposed to be the lower one.  It refers to my new project--a weekly observation at Duval and 5 teacher interviews.  At least I don't have to transcribe the interviews.  Thomasenia is part of a team studying how fifth grade African-American girls position themselves as learners of math and science.  We will be following them throughout their middle school years.  The classes I watched Thursday were so exciting--science experiments with the girls enthusiastic and ready to modify their vocabulary to use the language of science.  Would that every American school child had a teacher that believed they could learn anything and taught them that way.

Hope the Spring transition is good to all of you.  Love, Joanne

Sunday again

Looks like this will be a weekly post, for now. This has been a wretched computer week, two days off line and two hours with the Apple people to show me how to integrate my old information (one user) with my new computer (other user). I feel as though I am personally two people (maybe that's apt, after all), with my severed OS. It is forcing me to arrange my photos. Good thing Spring break is coming.

Charmi and JJ were here for a lovely 24 hours, and I add pictures of our favorite spot for new visitors. This is Paynes Prairie, home of migrating birds, buffalo, horses, and alligators.  I think Charmi said that there was a way for you to join my Flickr photos, but for now I'll try to add the pictures, like Charmi taught me last week. This week was their first (fourth) wedding anniversary, and Scott and I savored the memories of friends and family here with us in Gainesville. Love, Joanne

Mom Cooking Breakfast

Taking a Mom Break

Charmi and JJ dropped by to give us a break from school and remind us we are parents as well as pupils (I am told that pupil is an old-fashioned word) for the weekend.  She has promised to tutor us enough to be publishers on the World Wide Web.  I love reading and viewing An Urban Tale, so am making my own.