"If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium..."

Hi everyone,

Here's the brief version of Val and Mark's summer schedule:

May 25: fly to Boston

May 25 - 28: Visit Ben Scribner and his partner, Corinna

May 28 - June 2: Visit Hilary Rantisi, long-time friend of Val's.

June 2 - 5: Bus and Bicycle to the Sirius community (http://www.siriuscommunity.org/welcome.html) near Shutesbury, MA, for a 3-day weekend visit.

June 5 - 8: Bicycle to the Agape Community (www.agapecommunity.org) near Ware, MA, for a 4 day visit.

June 8 - 12: Bicycle and carpool to former Guidestone Farmer, Rebecca Lay-Speisman at her new farm job near Ashfield, MA. Sleep, eat and garden! Oh yeah, raw milk too!

June 12 - 17: Bicycle and carpool to Mike Loerch, long-time friend of Mark. Mike lives in Manchester, NH.

June 17: Fly to Kansas CityJune 17 - 19: Visit Dan Pearson, AFSC friend of Val's. Bicycle around KC, find some BBQ tofu.

June 19 - July 4: Bus from KC to Lamoni, Iowa, Then bicycle to the Guests and Strangers Catholic Farm Community in Maloy, Iowa. http://directory.ic.org/records/?action=view&page=view&record_id=1713

We'll be there 2 weeks, meeting Betsy and Brian, their community and land.

July 4 - 5: Bicycle and train back to Denver.

July 5 - 10: Get a taste of the city again, see family and friends. Go to the wedding of Bassem and Saira, great people!

July 10: Fly to Chicago, bicycle/bus to train station, amtrak train to Elkhardt, Indiana, carpool to Joyful Farm community, near North Manchester, Indiana.

July 10 - 24: Visit with Cliff Kindy and other families at Joyful Farm community, garden, find shade.

July 25 - August 6: Travel to Pittsburgh and visit Val's elders and cousins; then travel to Youngstown to visit Val's brother and nieces and nephews; then travel to Cleveland for Mark's family reunion.

August 7: Travel back to Denver

August 7 - 12: Another layover in Denver.

August 12 - 16: Medicinal Herb Workshop at www.Earthknack.com in Crestone, Colorado.

August 17 - September 7: Back in Denver, preparations for wedding.

September 8 - 10: Wedding at Sylvan Lake State Park.

That is as far as we've gotten. We're planning on either creating an online blog or post notes on our travels and the people and communities we visit. You can always contact us via email or our voice mail number.

Love to you all, Val and Mark

Greetings from Boston!

Hello All,

This is our virgin posting, from Medford, Massachusetts. Mark is getting ready for bed, and I just wanted to write a quick note to let you know we've finally created a blog! We will post more in future days about our adventures, big and small, on the Road to Community!

We arrived Thursday evening, and were met by our dear friend Ben Scribner. He and his gorgeously smart mate Corinna shared their warm hospitality, generous friendship, cool and interesting friends and exceedingly yummy food with us for three days. Corinna could rival Mark's sister Jen in an Iron Chef U.S. competition. We had good adventures with them which we will share in future posts. Now we're cosily ensconced in the home of Hilary Rantisi and Paul Beran. Hilary is my beloved Palestinian "little sister". We first met in her parents' home in Ramallah when she was 15 and I was 19; we've now known each other half my life! She has grown into an older and (slightly) more mature of the wondrous girl she was when we first met, but she has always been really old and really funny and young. Not so mature as to be boring. She is feeding us very well though she refuses to believe it. Paul, her charming and equally brilliant hubbie of four years, is, alas, in Cairo. We had a good but all too brief visit with him Friday night before he left to take 35 students to Egypt for an intro to the Arab world.

Mark is tired and wondering when I'm coming to bed, so I shall sign off now. More soon...Love, Val