My first journey abroad since 2012 has been a very productive experience in helping to elicit memories of travel and adventure.  However, technological complications will prevent me from posting again until I return to the US at the end of the month.  Happy summer!

When our train first entered Germany from Holland, I immediately felt a strange connection to the landscape, although I'm sure my mind just conjured those feelings because I was aware that some of my ancestors on my mother's mother's side (Tupper from Jackson from Lehman) emigrated from northwest Germany in the mid-nineteenth century.

My Grandma Barbara died 11 years ago on this day.  I'm not aware of the exact year, but she was also married on this day.  I suppose that's why the crescent moon has made an appearance for the first time in ages.  I think she's smiling because she can see my fun-loving nephew Jacob, who is 8 months old.  If she could see the 8 month old separated from its parents in a detention center at the US border, I imagine the crescent would flip to an arch shape.

When we went to her funeral years ago, there was a board with photos of my grandmother, including an obituary from one of her students who had taken her history course, "Problems With Consumer Democracy."  At the end of the piece, she said the best way we could remember her was to go out into the world and work to solve the problems of injustice that brought so much pain to her heart.  You wouldn't know it from all the photos of her smiling and laughing, though.

History zigs and zags.  Keep spreading time, money and positive energy.  If you can't find the latter, I'm sending some your way.

One might ask how I could even imagine being positive at a time like this.  Honestly, I don't feel very positive, even though I'm on vacation and I've loved visiting Brussels and Amsterdam, seeing where the Beatles got their start in Hamburg, and visiting my sister, brother-in-law and nephew here in Berlin.  The last time I was here, I was glowing from my around the world journey's climax in Egypt, yet I was trying to square those feelings of jubilation with the emotions I felt at the start of the adventure when I saw children on the brink of starvation.  I suppose what I'm getting at is that regardless of what we feel responsible for based on where we pay our taxes, the world has always been an awful place for children and adults alike... and yet I'm still honored to be here, and thankful the universe allows me to do so.

On top of that, it's hard to feel sad when my nephew Jackie is so cute.  I'm so happy that even though he was separated from his biological parents, he has wonderful parents who have adopted him as their own and will love him his entire life.  The situation at the U.S. border is disheartening, but what warms my heart is that so many people I know are speaking out and angry, and a few are doing whatever they can to help.

Now that the light has been shined on the suffering of children at America's doorstep, I hope people keep pressing and continue working to make this world a place Grandma Barbara would be proud of by helping those out of sight who could really use some white knights.  Thank you.

It's 12:17 in Germany, but it's 6:17 on 6/17 in the US

I love Jackie, even though he is enthralled by pulling my beard with both hands for several minutes at a time

Very thankful for new Dutch friends

I am very honored to live life

Original Amsterdam certainly gives New Amsterdam a run for its money, yet I am definitely remembering the virtually ubiquitous usefulness of the English language, especially when traveling.  Also, the joy of entering a comfortable hotel room after a long trek with a very large bag

Exploring

Going places

Enjoying the viewpoint I am provided gracefully

Woke up, ran to the subway (not necessarily late, but I like to get my blood flowing to wake up some more), got to the turnstile, and decided it would be a good day because this elderly woman ahead of me was wearing this blue hooded sweatshirt with a rainbow peace sign on the back.

When I came home, the trains were all delayed.  I waited 10 minutes for the 1 train, and it was so packed I waited for the next one a couple minutes later, which turned out to be train 1434.  We went slowly, and then it announced it was skipping five stations to 137th.  But for some reason, it stopped at 103rd with the doors closed, I assume just to mess with people.  I resumed my book, Globalization and Its Discontents Revisited: Anti-Globalization in the Era of ***** by Joseph Stiglitz, and the next sentence read "requires patience."

When we finally got to my station, I waited for the masses of riders exiting and walking up the stairs.  That's when I noticed the same elderly woman walking with a cane, wearing a blue sweatshirt with the rainbow peace symbol.

I am currently at one of my best friend's (Brad) younger sister's (April) wedding in Saratoga Springs, the Cambridge trio of Brad, Dan and Ben is reunited, and I love life.  Also, they sat me at a table with older hippie women and a ponytailed dude with tales of canoeing on Lake George and reenacting Last of the Mohicans