Hi! We are back from our week in southwestern Wisconsin, the rolling hills of the driftless area of the state. It is picturesque, lovely farmland that was not flattened and planed by the glaciers, as was the central part of state where we live. Being in an unfamiliar place opens my eyes and returning home, I still have new eyes for what I haven't seen for a few days.
My sister is a long-standing constant in my life. She represents continuity, from the moment I first saw her through the car window, a tiny baby in my mother's arms, to yesterday. And just as my wife is the pillar of my life, my brother-in-law is the pillar of my sister's life. Both couples have been married more than 50 years.
The Bethel Horizons camp is owned by the Bethel Lutheran Church of Madison, WI. Lynn has been there many times since the place emphasizes pottery instruction and practice. Because of her connections to previous sessions in the pottery branch of the camp, Lynn received a mailing that one of the managers and some others were arranging a Roads Scholar-type activity. They wanted to have an experimental run to see how it might fare if they ran the event later as an Roads Scholar/Elderhostel offering.
There are green rolling hills, lovely farms, a night sky filled with visible stars, and lots of deep quiet. One surprising aspect of the event was that the four of us were the only members of the whole group who were outsiders. The others know each other both from events at the church itself but also as members of the Bethel hiking club, whose members have traveled all over the world together. That turned out to be an excellent and fun aspect of the event for us, since the Bethel hiking club members are quite friendly, social and accepting. They are a lively, merry bunch.
We made mugs and wall pockets (sconces) but Lynn and I agreed that our mugs and my sconce were not very high quality, and she scrunched them. That is, she balled up the clay and returned it to the clay supply before our pieces had dried. That is a common fate in clay studios when hands, or humidity, or the lack of it, mar a piece. We visited some cheese makers and attended a play, "The Recruiting Officer", put on by the American Players Theater. That play was the most popular show in the 1800's.
Nearby areas had torrential rains a few days before and we feared it would be a rainy week. But the weather was stunningly perfect.
