Vacation Day 1

No wonder everyone likes vacation.



A frenetic pace yes, but at the division of work versus fun. The video here is my brother’s band – that’s Mike Soffa on the pedal steel. Country music. County fair type atmosphere. Crowd of 400. The show put on by Andy’s Automatics was great. The crowd was dancing and hopping!

An uneventful flight left me in Milwaukee. Through the tangle of traffic at Summerfest up to the burger shack in Lake Park. The allure of summer is best trumpeted where the hand of winter holds steady. Never have a seen a more appealing beach than Bradford beach. A long stretch of sand punctuated by volleyball nets. The rolling waves of an inland sea on a gentle day. Stark blue sky.

Past the park one stares at the mansions, rarely overdone, on the bluff over the lake. The appeal is tremendous. The turn inland reminds you that only a select few live on the lake in such style. Squat apartment blocks, zero setbacks, a dearth of tree cover leaving only sunbaked cement and car parks. Then a few more blocks and the empty storefronts, detritus from our economic overreach.

Perhaps my surprise that everyone is not like me, has similar tastes, similar income, and similar desires should diminish with experience. Suffice to say that walking through Sawdust Days, in Oshkosh, I was surprised. Or, that by leaving for 30 years, the greater distance of the class divide is starkly evident.

Just as an aside – could it be that when people complain about boredom they are commenting on the pace of stimulation in their lives? So traveling and meeting 25 people you know by name but see once or twice a year, plus an entirely new visual field – would seem to be a surefire boredom reliever.