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| The next day, Saturday, Eric, Mark (his brother), Ruth (his wife) and Jack (their son, did you follow the sliding prononuns) went site seeing at the various monuments on the U.S. National Mall, but I stayed home. My throat had been feeling a little off during my extended travels and I was feeling decidedly poorly with an apparent cold. I stayed home that day and tried to get well (and so no pictures from me for that day). On Sunday, we drove to SUUSI (Southeastern Unitarian Universalists Summer Institute) at Radford University in Virginia. We had gone there last year and I took lots of pictures of the basic environment, which was pretty much the same (so no new pictures of the same things). Registration (shown above) is an exciting and hectic time. You get your final registration for the activities for the week to come, get your room key and linens, and then have your picture taken for the annual 'year book' as shown above. They also had an ingathering, which was a tremendous double circle facing each other as shown above, here and below. The outer circle moves clockwise while the inner moves counter clockwise so that you get to greet everyone (and there are about 1,000 people attending SUUSI each year) with a point where the inner and outer circles loop back so that you change inner / outer circles at that point and really get to greet everyone. It is so cool. I made a short video too. |
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| Above is a picture of the loop back point where people swapped inner / outer circle. After everyone had had a chance to greet everyone, the circles broke down and many ran to the center (where there had been drummers and had a tremendous hug (shown above with a video, too). SUUSI clearly explains that they are an intentional community and I was impressed by it. It is a great bunch of people trying to improve themselves and develop an environment of respect, acceptance, compassion, and love. It really is a remarkable experience that can't be described adequately. Monday through Friday there was a Men's Support group toward the end of the afternoon which was four or five guys talking about their issues and in a supportive environment. Zem and Eric (shown here in the Dalton Dining Hall) are two of the foundations of the group. |
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| I arrived at SUUSI with a dreadful cold and spent eseentially all of Monday and Tuesday in my room trying to get better (I did go to the Tuesday afternoon men's group). By Wednesday morning I decided that the strategy of trying to get better didn't make much sense as I might miss all of SUUSI before I was better. So, I went on the scheduled canoe trip leaving at 6:30AM (yikes, not so early for me usually, but it sure felt early when I was sick). We drove out to our drop off point in a SUUSI van (shown above with the group) and met the commercial van which delivered our canoes. I had done this trip last year and had been partnered with Ronnie, shown here. We had a good time visiting and agreed to be partners again. They passed out life vest and we carried the canoes to the public boat ramp (below). |
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| We canoed down stream to our pickup point and then canoed around that area. It was really beautiful as you can see here with the mist (a problem going downstream as we approached rapids, but not really serious for the route we took). I also got a short video of our leader canoeing ahead of us. There is another short video of a water bird (perhaps an egret) flying over the water. It was really a wonderful trip and I had a great time visiting with Ronnie. In the afternoon I went to an polyhedron origami seminar and then the men's group. After dinner I was off to bed early to rest. |
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This page was last updated on July 29, 2009.
