Shortly after my last post, I took a spontaneous trip to Michigan for a long weekend in mid-June. There is a tradition amongst my college roommates to get together one weekend each summer for a reunion. We had been throwing around dates for a while this spring, and nothing was really coming together yet. Then in May, someone suggested an early-than-usual reunion this summer in mid-June in Michigan. This was in part because we had just learned that one of the girls, our good friend Janet, had been diagnosed with cancer. It seemed like a good idea to get everyone together for a fun, relaxing weekend. The girls all started making their travel plans, and I took a shot in the dark and looked up flights. It turned out I could get a semi-decently priced flight with great connections. I decided to go for it, especially because all of the other girls were planning to be there. It's just not that often that all 8 of us actually make it to a reunion! I kept it a secret from Janet and surprised her by showing up on that Friday night at her boyfriend’s birthday party. We spent the rest of the weekend at our friend Carolyn’s cottage in Chelsea. It was so fun and I’m so glad I could be there to spend time with my girls. Janet felt great while we were there, and continues to fight her battle with a positive attitude and a smile. Please keep her in your thoughts and prayers. While in Michigan, I also got to spend a few days with my mom and dad, and Lauren came up from Chicago with Milo and Anabelle. It was a fast trip, but a great one overall.
When I returned to Italy, Tyler's friend Lars was here visiting for a few days from Germany. He got to see Cosenza, they went to the beach, and we had some of our friends over for a big BBQ. After his visit, we prepared for the arrival of our good friends the Pawlowskis in late June / early July. Tyler met them up in Rome for a few days while I stayed back to work (boo!). Then they all drove down here and spent about a week in Calabria. We showed them around Rende-Cosenza, took a few trips to the beach, ate good food, drank good wine, and had a really fun time together. Tyler and I were sad to see them go, and it made us miss our friends back home a lot. But we look forward to more visitors again soon! 
On our other weekends in June and July, we made frequent trips to the beach to get some relief from the hot summer here. It really is hot. To our knowledge it’s been as hot as 43C (for you non-metric system people, that about 109F!), and people say it can get hotter. We’re thrilled that the beach is no more than 30 minutes away by car and we try to take advantage of it as much as possible! We also have AC at home now, so that helps. We also continued developing new friendships, especially the neighbors next door (the singing and non-singing ones) and our friends from the UK that we meet on Fridays for beers. It has been fun getting to know people better as time goes on.
Tyler also worked hard on the garden, which has produced many wonderful tomatoes and watermelons! We are still enjoying the tomatoes even now. We also got a few peppers and some basil. Other things did not fare as well (plants have to like heat to survive here, apparently), but we’ll do better next year. Sadly, we did lose one watermelon to theft. We suspect it was one of the guys from Telecom Italia who came to the house to figure out where to install a pole so that we can have phone and internet at home. To add insult to injury, we still don't have home phone and internet (and it may take weeks for us to get it) while some random Telecom employee likely enjoyed the biggest watermelon in our garden. Way to put salt in our wounds, Telecom! As if the agony of knowing we might not have fast internet in time for football season wasn't enough. Moving on...
Towards the end of July, I went to Nova Scotia for a weeklong conference in Halifax. It was great both for my work and because I got to catch up with a number of old friends from U of M. I gave a presentation at the conference about some work that I did for my PhD and had recently published. It was bittersweet for me because it was something I had worked on for a long time and I was finally putting it to rest, but it was also something I had worked on closely with my advisor, Jerry, who passed away this spring. Jerry’s wife and daughter came to the conference too (with their cousin and her daughter), and I got to spend a lot of time with them which I enjoyed. This was a conference that Jerry had almost always attended in years past and there were many people there who were sad to know he had passed away. We had a small gathering one night to remember him, and that was really nice.
After the conference, I tacked on another visit to Michigan (this one I had actually been planning for a while… the earlier one was just a bonus!). Rebecca, Will, and their kids were in Michigan at that time, so I got to spend a few days with them. I was really glad the timing worked out so that I could see them. I also spent a couple days in Ann Arbor to see some colleagues and friends. It made me nostalgic for our Ann Arbor days, and thankful for the great friends we have there. I was also able to be in Michigan for my mom’s birthday and got to spend a few fun days with her and my dad.
While I was gone, Tyler went up to northern Italy and went hiking in the Dolomites. He loved it. The mountains were beautiful and the weather was good (I’ll ask him to post some photos). He stayed in huts every night where you get a bed, a shower, and can have a good dinner. This means not having to carry a tent, sleeping bag, or stuff for cooking which makes the backpack a lot lighter! He liked it so much that he wanted to take me back there.
Fortunately, August is vacation time here in Italy (and in other parts of Europe). So after my return to Italy, I worked for a week and then we got to take some vacation together! We packed up the car and headed north. We got to see so many things on that trip that I’m going to write a separate blog post about it and will include some photos (when I can use faster internet to upload them all). This one is just a teaser :-) It is from our trip to Verona earlier this week.
In summary, we are having a great summer, and we hope you are too!
