Happy New Year!
As we begin 2014, we resolve to become better organized in all
aspects of our lives!
Sound
familiar? We say that just about every
year! But this time, we really mean it! For the first
time in 38 Christmases together, we passed on sending cards in favor of New
Year’s greetings.
We could blame it on the UK Faculty Senate, which made
the academic calendar as late as it’s ever been; or Franklin D. Roosevelt, who
decreed that Thanksgiving would be on November’s last Thursday, not the fourth
one; but the real culprits are a couple who just can’t get as much done when they’re 59 as they did when they were 49. But we
hope you and yours enjoyed the holidays and are looking forward to 2014.
We told you a
year ago that we had picked a contractor for a major renovation: master bath,
closet and dressing room, and after several delays, it is done, but we’re still
getting the house back in order after moving stuff around for the construction,
so please call ahead if you plan to drop by soon. We’d love to see you; just need to move some
boxes out of your path.
Our big trip of
the year was to Tybee Island, Ga., in August, with Al’s brother David and his
extended family. We had a big house near the beach and enjoyed trips into
nearby Savannah, one of our favorite places. And Henry, our West Highland White
Terrier, even got to go. Later in the month we went with David and his wife,
Jennifer, to the Kentucky-Western Kentucky football game in
Nashville. Our alma mater won!
We’ve been going to Tennessee more
often, now that Al and members of his extended family own half of The
Gatlinburg Inn, the oldest hotel in the town next to the Great Smoky Mountains
National Park. The 69-room hotel is a quiet spot in the middle of town, right
next to the chairlift. The entertainer at the grand re-opening May 31 was Bobby
Osborne, who with his brother Sonny did the first recording of “Rocky Top,” the
most famous song written at the Inn by Boudleaux and Felice Bryant. The Inn
will host the Smoky Mountain Songwriters Festival in 2014.
We were glad to welcome Al’s cousin Allen Barker and his wife Anita to Frankfort for the NAIA Division I women’s national basketball championship, in which their daughter Melanie’s team from Lee University in Cleveland, Tenn., was runner-up. Go, Flames!
We were glad to welcome Al’s cousin Allen Barker and his wife Anita to Frankfort for the NAIA Division I women’s national basketball championship, in which their daughter Melanie’s team from Lee University in Cleveland, Tenn., was runner-up. Go, Flames!
We
went to Anaheim for the Society of Professional Journalists convention, where
Patti accepted the national award for outstanding member of a small chapter, and
to St. Louis for the SPJ regional conference. Al also went on business to Phoenix,
Washington, D.C., Charleston, W.Va., and Chapel Hill, N.C., and gave a speech
at the library in his hometown, Albany. And if you go through there, stop at
Albany Full Service, now owned by Al’s niece Lora Brewington and her husband
Matt!
Our extended families continue to
grow. Al’s other niece, Terran Cross Helm, and her husband Derrick had their
second child a few days before Christmas, and Patti’s cousins are multiplying
like mad; she now has 10 first cousins once removed, up from five at this time
last year.
Patti remains on the Frankfort-Franklin
County Joint Planning Commission and its Architectural Review Board. She
remains a very active volunteer and board member for the county fair, Habitat
for Humanity, Capital City Woman’s Club, and SPJ’s Bluegrass Chapter.
Al continues to teach a class or two
each semester and publish The Rural Blog, Kentucky Health News and the Midway
Messenger, a student-fed news site for the town between Frankfort and Lexington.
His health work won him an award from the Kentucky Psychological Association, and
the Midway project, now starting its seventh year, was recognized by Columbia
Journalism Review. In addition to his work as an extension professor and director
of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, he writes a
fortnightly political column for The Courier-Journal, in which he will track
the nation’s top U.S. Senate race and the 2015 race for governor.
We’ll probably be as busy as ever in
2014, but never too busy for our friends and family. Call, write or come by! Again,
tardily, Happy New Year!
We’re both on Facebook, and Al is on
Twitter @ruralj
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