Aberdeen, MS

Last night and today it has been raining and we have been napping and reading. I just finished The Secret Life of Bees (a wonderful novel by Kidd about a teen age girl growing up motherless in the South and becoming acquainted with the divine feminine, the tradition of the black Madonna, mother Mary) and started reading Barbara Kingsolver's Prodigal Summer. Linda and I recommend both to you.

While we are resting on the boat in the Aberdeen, MS marina we have had the opportunity to enjoy getting acquainted with the people of Aberdeen, the warmest most hospitable people you could imagine. Last night four of the Pounders family- Charles and Jean Pounders and Roy and Ginny Pounders- joined us on board Sandpiper at the marina for drinks and snacks. We had wonderful conversations about their young adult lives during the days when relationships between blacks and whites were beginning to change. Then we went into town to watch election returns but like all Americans went to bed unclear about the results.

Tonight we will attend the Harvest Family Dinner at First Presbyterian Church in Aberdeen and on Thursday Linda will join the Red Hat Society meeting and Thursday night we will go to Tupelo to have dinner with Dr. Mike Currie and his family (Loy's MRI radiologist) who sailed with his wife and five children on a 60' sailboat from Florida to Portugal, Spain and Turkey and back. They invited us to come and discuss sailing, their trip and ours. You don't find warmer hospitality than this. I understand why several people we have met say they came to Aberdeen on a boat and fell in love with this part of Mississippi that has better weather than Florida and beautiful rolling hills and woods and they decided to move here.