july 6, 2014

Dear Everyone,

The 4^th of July has come and gone.  I skipped the Hinsdale parade, instead going to the dojo, where we have an annual memorial class in honor of Sensei Toyoda, who died on July 4.  I don’t know why we don’t celebrate his birthday, which happens to be November 8.  Afterwards, I came home, watched Argentina beat Belgium in soccer, had a nap, and then drove to Highland Park with Cindy and Nicola (Jasper was hanging out with some swim friends in Clarendon Hills) to have dinner at Northmoor, hosted by Barbara and Roger, and where we were joined by Harry and Arlene Feiger, and Vanessa, Evelyn, and Theo.  Vanessa and her kids had arrived at the club much earlier than we had, and occupied themselves on camels, ponies, miniature trains, bean bag throws, and giant hamster balls.  We had the usual excellent Northmoor cook-out of burgers, corn, ribs, shrimp, salmon, sausages, numerous salads, and deserts. 

We left shortly after dinner, and after a short sojourn at home, went south to Lemont, where Jami Walloch, one of my colleagues, put on an impressive fireworks display in his backyard with $600 of Indiana fireworks.  It didn’t take long for his purchases to go up in smoke.  Jami’s party had started in the mid-afternoon, and we were definitely the late arrivals at 9 PM, so we didn’t really get to meet any of the other people at the party, although I did spend some time with Adam Riker and Barb Krueger, two of the breast surgeons at Christ they give us a lot of business.  After the fireworks we had some home-made key lime pie made by Jami’s wife Caroline, saw Jami’s impressive tattoos, and went home.

I was pretty slothful on Saturday.  Jasper had swim practice in the morning; he left 15 minutes early so I could take him to Iaido (Japanese sword) class while I went to Tai Chi.   In the afternoon we watched Netherlands just barely beat Costa Rico in a shoot-out; Costa Rico played an excellent defensive game - - what the US tried to do against Belgium. So, I, and probably a million others, predicted Brazil, Germany and Argentina correctly as semi-finalists, with Netherlands a bit of a surprise.  I think Germany will beat the Brazilians, especially as one of their stars, Neymar, cracked one of his upper vertebrae in the last minutes of the game against Columbia. And I predict that Argentina will beat the Dutch, and will also beat Germany.

Last Monday Cindy and I drove to the Armitage/Halsted area to have dinner with an old Yale friend,  Rachel Toor, and her old roommate, Val Chang, Val’s 10-years old daughter, Ivy, and Nicola.  Rachel is a creative writing professor at University of Washington in Spokane, and the author of several books - - she is my second most famous friend, after Elizabeth Kolbert.  Rachel is also an accomplished marathon and ultra-marathon runner, and has a regular column in some running magazines.  Her latest book has just come out, it’s a coming-of-age novel; the main character is a teenager who takes up running after getting denied admission to college.  Anyway, if you’re interested, you can go to http://racheltoor.com/ . 

Val Chang went into finance out of college, but somehow found her way into the MacArthur Foundation, where she works on policy issues.  She vaguely knows Jonathan Leight, but he is on the money-making side, whereas she is on the giving-away part of the business.  Her daughter Ivy is pretty cute and precocious.  Val’s partner, Ian, was in Boston, so we didn’t get to meet him.  We ate at a tasty but noisy pizzeria, Stella Barra (http://www.stellabarra.com/)  near Val’s rehabbed condo.  Cindy and I remarked that this area has gentrified quite a bit in the last 25 years - - Cindy once lived a few blocks North of Val’s address, and at the time she was at the southern limit of safety.  I think the Pritzkers, Crowns, and others bought up a lot of this real estate and turned it around.

We drove Nicola back to Hyde Park, and on the way back to Hinsdale got caught by part of a strong storm.  Our electricity went out for about twelve hours, although I know some people in the area lost power for several days.

Love, H.