At Home

When I think about "Us," the first thing that comes to mind is this photograph taken at
El Rancho del Obispo, The Bishop's Ranch ("A place where lives are changed"), near Healdsburg, California in the early seventies (yes, the nineteen seventies), long before we were married. I think Margaret was 16 or 17. At the time I was a Franciscan in Life Vows. We knew from the beginning that we were soul-mates, but Margaret already knew of our future life-together. It never occurred to me it was even possible until that day in the summer of 1980 when my father asked, "What about that girl in California?" And as they say, "the rest is history."

So what do we do all day?

Margaret works: she is the Rector of St. Mark's Church [Episcopal] in Richmond and as of Monday after the First Sunday in Advent 2007, I have been working part-time five days a week in the office of the First Presbyterian Church in Richmond but continuing as the haus-man and Margaret's volunteer private secretary.

And then there's Wittgenstein, or "Witty." We live with him; he does NOT live with us. We called him "Little Guy" for the first few months of his life because he was so small [15 pounds and emaciated] and we always talked about "the little guy," and when people saw him they always said, "Hi there little guy," so as he seemed to be known as "the little guy," that's what we would call him. On the other hand, as everyone should have their own Name, we decided that our first dog Olaf was a saint, and our second dog Clio was a goddess [actually the muse of history which at the time we both were studying], this one should be a Philosopher, and since my favorite philosopher was [and still is] Ludwig Wittgenstein, that was the right name for "Witty." Another "coy" photo of Witty can be seen here and here again.