Ellen Painter Dollar
We fill our walls here on Oak Ridge Lane not with fine art (we have neither the money nor the passion for collecting), but with things that speak to the life we have built together—posters bought on trips to Italy and California; a limited edition print of the Washington National Cathedral (I lived in the Cathedral neighborhood for seven years, participated in a Cathedral-funded year-long volunteer program, and we were married at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church on the Cathedral grounds); photos of the kids; professional photos of historic covered bridges and gardens here in Connecticut; a map illustrated with North Carolina’s lighthouses (my husband is a North Carolinian); a print of Norman Rockwell’s famous streetscape of Stockbridge, Mass.—a quintessential New England image. Next to our bedroom window is a framed copy of our wedding invitation, along with an icon-decorated cross given to us by friends when we left DC for Connecticut in 1999. I love being surrounded with reminders of places we’ve gone and what binds us together, most centrally, our faith and the vows we took on July 26, 1997. Typical of our kid-centric life in which both time and funds are mostly dedicated to them, we will celebrate (or rather, not really celebrate) our anniversary by working, picking up kids from camp, and throwing some burgers on the grill. Not exciting, but certainly representative.
(Note: So that I can finish up some writing projects that I owe various people and publications and get the family ready for our vacation, I will be taking several weeks off from blogging. Now and then, I will pop in to post links to things I have written that will be posting elsewhere.)
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