Magical Milestones

We met at a U.S. Forest Service fire prevention training session on the campus of Central Washington University in Ellensburg during the summer solstice in 1978. Three months later, we were living together at Lake Wenatchee. On November 25, we married at the Little Chapel in the Woods in Leavenworth during Thanksgiving Week.

Ten years later, with his older sisters anxiously awaiting, our son arrived by home birth during Thanksgiving dinner. Now 40 years hence, we celebrated our anniversary with a trip to Italy and welcomed our first grandchild. As Henry David Thoreau noted: “I am grateful for what I am and have. My thanksgiving is perpetual.”

Jazz Master

Living at Lake Wenatchee in the late 70s, I first saw Pat Metheny at The Moore Theatre a couple blocks away from the Pike Place Market in downtown Seattle. I immediately became a true believer in his eclectic style of jazz guitar. This year, Metheny was recognized as an NEA Jazz Master by the National Endowment for the Arts.

A 20-time Grammy winner, Metheny and a talented group of musicians played a collection of his earlier works at The Shedd Institute in downtown Eugene last week. “I love playing Eugene,” he noted in a rare moment of conversation between songs. “You keep asking me back, even after 40 years.”

In addition to his long and distringuished career as a performer, Metheny has also taught music at the University of Miami and the Berklee College of Music in Boston. Playing for nearly three hours at The Shedd, Metheny covered a wide ranging opus from his catalog, which harkened memories from days of yore.