Author: yvettefrancino

This is not a typical Microadventure, but more of an ongoing major adventure. I just finished Week 1 of an 8-week stay with Matt & Stella, my son and daughter-in-law.

I get what you’re probably thinking: “8 weeks? That’s probably 7 weeks too long for a Mom to be living with her son and his wife!”

Yeah, that may be true for most people, but I have some pretty incredible kids.

Stella has insisted that they are very flexible and that I’m welcome for as long as I want to stay. And though it has only been 1 week and they may very well get tired of my extended visit, I can say with certainty that I’m loving every minute.

Halloween

I arrived on the night of October 29th, and the first thing we did was go to the Halloween Party of my friend, Ranya, who also lives in Chapel Hill. I’d met Ranya in January, 2020, in Costa Rica while I was in the Conversa Spanish Immersion class.

It was so thoughtful of Ranya to invite us all to her very cool Halloween Party. There were so many creative costumes and decorations. We very unexpectedly won a bottle of wine for “best creative group costume!” (This has been a season for me winning stuff with very little effort on my part.)

The Halloween fun continued on the 31rst at Matt and Stella’s house where they’d set up a projector to create special effects out their front window for the trick-or-treaters. They had a cool backdrop that made their house look like a haunted house from the front door and Matt and Stella were both dressed as unicorns.

Stella loaned me a dragon costume so I could join in the fun.

There were a few sets of trick-or-treaters, but unfortunately it was a rainy night. I was disappointed that more of the neighbors didn’t get to see how creative and cool their house was, but at least I was there to experience it!

Fall Colors and the Magical Neighborhood

Matt and Stella live in a forested area that is filled with magnificent tall trees, full of colorful Fall beauty.

Every day I’ve been snapping so many pictures, in total awe of the gorgeous scenery. It’s as though we’re walking through a Thomas Kincaid art gallery.

The neighborhood is full of incredible, well-kept houses, decorated for Halloween. Matt and Stella have raved about how friendly everyone is, complete with support, community, and frequent block parties.

Their neighbohood backs right up to the Carolina North Forest where I found a Nature Observation Trail on my first morning of exploration.

Round-trip from Matt and Stella’s front door through the Nature Observation Trail turned out to be almost exactly 10,000 steps! What an excellent way to get in my morning exercise!

When I’m not out walking or exploring, my favorite place to be hanging out in Matt and Stella’s house is their spacious sun room. This is where I’m sitting now, as I write this post. It’s interesting to see for myself how much nature and beautiful surroundings impacts my mood and happiness!

The Meals

Stella is an excellent cook and every evening she’s made us delicious, healthy, colorful meals.

Matt, too, often helps with the meal prep and has made crepes and pumpkin-spiced coffee for breakfast. Tonight was catfish with broccoli and cauliflower with a glass of Vinoh Verde wine. I feel like I’m staying at a 5-star resort!

Daily Life with Matt and Stella

Though they don’t plan to have children, Matt and Stella are the loving “parents” to two adorable little dogs, Choco and Mochi.

The two little dogs are super-cute and cuddly. Matt and Stella take them on frequent walks and when I’m around, I love joining, too. It’s not unusual to spot deer in the neighborhood, but even if we don’t, the little dogs keep us entertained by playing with the acorns or jumping through the leaves.

We also are a family of gamers, so one night they introduced me to the game Wingspan. We also play Heardle every morning (a musical spin-off of Wordle) and the other night, Matt patiently helped step me through a Magic, the Gathering tutorial.

Whether it’s going to the grocery store or a coffee shop, I always enjoy the spirited conversation with these two. They’re both PhDs and brilliant critical thinkers, always learning and ready to debate and discuss everything and anything!

How fun that my 100th Microadventure of the year is not an ordinary microadventure, but the opportunity to spend this 2-month chapter of my life with Matt and Stella in their’s.

Jack (who I affectionately call, “Jackster”) and I have been friends since both living in H Building of the Tercero Dorms at UC Davis!

For the past few years, whenever I visit Mom in Sacramento, I try to combine it with a quick trip down to the Bay Area to visit Jackster.

Jackster picked me up from the Emeryville Amtrak station and we drove down the coast to beautiful Sausalito!

We walked the iconic streets and stopped to eat at the Barrel House Tavern on the waterfront. This is undoubtedly has made it to the #1 Spot of “Best Restaurant in Sausalito” travel articles.

We ordered up some fancy appetizers and had an outdoor table so we could enjoy the view and catch up in style.

We headed from there to downtown San Francisco where there was a double-70th-birthday party in the works for Jack’s cousin and her husband! This party was like a wedding! The birthday couple owned an Indian restaurant and there was an abundance of yummy dishes, desserts, and drinks!

But best of all, there were lots of happy people! Jackster introduced me to his sister, “Pammy” (I resisted calling her “Pamster,” follow the tradition that Jackster and I have established of adding “ster” to names.).

Jack has often spoken of Pam over the years, so I was happy to finally get to meet her in person. She (along with the rest of his family) were so friendly and welcoming. I felt so lucky and honored to have had that opportunity to be part of such a celebration!

The next morning, “Cafe Jackster” served a delicious breakfast, complete with grits! There was even fruit and yogurt on the side. This meal brought me even more joy than those fancy appetizers we’d had at the Barrel House Tavern!

Jackster was just full of surprises, with the next one being the car that we would be taking for our excursions: A restored 1957 Volkswagen Beetle!

I have to admit, it was crazy to be driving in a car with absolutely no modern-day gadgets! Cars without a line of software? How do they operate? It almost looked like a toy car!

Luckily, Jack is a talented driver and knows how to operate old cars!

We stopped at a place along the Pacific Coast (Maybe JV Fitzgerald Marine Reserve?) and spotted a sea lion on the rocks!

But the highlight of the day was our excursion to Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park!

The trees and scenery here were incredible.

Such a fun weekend and it was so thoughtful of Jack to plan so many unexpected surprises! I have a lot to be grateful for.. especially for my wonderful friend, Jackster.

David is one of those rare people who started as a virtual friend and became a friend in real life! We “met” first on a site called “gather.com” before Facebook or Instagram were popular. Gather.com was a site for people who liked to write or post pictures.

I wrote this about David in a blog post back in 2010:

I got to know my friend, David, because he sent in a donation when I was fundraising for Leukemia. I only knew him as a “virtual” friend from a social networking site, but he has been one of the most generous and supportive friends I’ve ever had. It’s those kind of people who I admire beyond words.

I discovered that David lived in Sacramento so we’d met up in person on one of my family visits. In the past few years, I’d noticed that David had been posting incredible pictures of animals at the Sacramento Zoo. One of his many talents is that he’s an amazing photographer!

On my recent visit to Sacramento, I asked David if I could visit him at the zoo. In typical “David style” he took the day off of work and gave me a detailed very informative tour! I thought he’d be volunteering and I’d just be able to see him in passing, but instead, I got what amounted to a VIP pass with the best guide ever!

David knows how gaga I am about flamingos. Even though the flamingos were in quarantine because of an avian flu epidemic, David was tell me a bunch of fun facts about flamingos in this little video:

David is just a wealth of knowledge about all the animals! Never have I had such an informative and fun tour! What a treat! It’s clear that David has such a passion and love of the animals and the Sacramento Zoo. His energy was contagious.

I took a lot of pictures and was impressed with all the anecdotes and fun tidbits of information about the different animal species. When we were looking at the giraffes, David pointed out a pregnant giraffe and pointed out the difference between the coats in the male and female giraffes.

My favorite giraffe, however, is in this picture he posted for Halloween on Facebook!

I’m way behind on blogging about my Microadventures, but this is an important one! I typically take a trip to Sacramento to visit my Mom at least once a year. She and her parter, Philip, are in their late 80’s and live in the house that I grew up in (starting in 1972 when I was in 6th grade.)

Even though Mom would prefer to stay home than go out on some kind of excursion, I consider myself very lucky to be able to spend time with her in our home that holds so many memories.

Mom and Philip both recently gave up driving and I’m so proud of them for doing that. They both resisted initially and I know that it’s very difficult to be dependent on others. One of the purposes of my visit this time was to try and help make sure they were getting all the help they needed. Philip also had a fall and broke one of his vertebrae so he was getting some physical therapy and was having some mobility challenges.

I’m happy to note that even when I was out there, he was tootling around with his walker. He’s continued to improve and he and Mom are walking regularly in the neighborhood now.

Luckily, my brother, Neal, lives relatively close by and regularly helps Mom and Philip with the house and rides. He also was able to find a wonderful woman who comes regularly and gives Mom and Philip rides to the store and doctor’s appointments.

While I was out visiting, I even went out swing dancing with Neal! This is something I’ve done enough times with Neal that I’m getting to know his swing dance friends, which is very fun.

I also visited our long-time family friend, Dee, who is almost 90! I blogged about her being in hospice over a year ago. The woman is invincible!

I have my fears about aging and the grief I’ll feel when I lose people I love. However, I’ve learned that it’s more important than ever to savor the time I do have with the people I love. Seeing how Mom and Dee handle aging with such grace inspires me. I’m so glad to have these role models to remind me of the beauty of living life fully at every age.

My friend, Jill, has a beautiful second home which she refers to as her “cabin.” I put the word “cabin” in quotes because cabins are usually small and her house is more like a luxury vacation home!

Jill generously invited our whole GGG (Girls Gathering Greatly) group to enjoy a weekend retreat at her place! Those of us who could make it were in for a treat!

I’d been particularly stressed over some family illnesses and drama. I was worried that I’d be distracted and bad company, but getting away with trusted girlfriends was exactly what I needed! I’m so grateful to have such supportive friends!

We had some beautiful hikes, delicious food, and deep conversations. Last year, Cathy and I also enjoyed a getaway weekend at Jill’s.

Getting off the grid with girlfriends is such a joy and a boost to my mental health. I’m so grateful to Jill for sharing this priceless sanctuary and to all my friends for their support and friendship.

Weddings are my favorite type of celebration! Even better, when the bride is one of my best friends.

I met Rebecca at least 20 years ago at Toastmasters when we were both married. We went through our divorces at about the same time and were newly single women, navigating our way through the dating world in our 40’s.

Rebecca met Mitchell in about 2007 – 15 years ago! Mitchell was in his 50’s and had never been married! (This is often a “red flag” in the world of dating.) In fact, Rebecca had often told me that they’d “never get married.”

However, over the years, they were progressively more of a serious couple – living together for the last several years. But still, it was a surprise to me when Rebecca told me earlier this year that they’d decided to get married after all!

At the reception, her daughters remembered the night they were told about the engagement. When they asked Mitchell “Why now?” he replied, “After 15 years, it’s about time!”

The ceremony was gorgeous in their backyard on a beautiful day. Rebecca was escorted by her daughters, all three of them looking stunning in their flowered gowns. Mitchell was escorted by his two sisters and also looked happy. At age 70, his first marriage!

Though I’m very happily single, I couldn’t help but feel a bit inspired at the thought of marriage at this stage of life. We are wiser and have retirement days to look forward to. Both Rebecca and Mitchell are very healthy and active and now have the security of knowing they will be with each other always.

I know I’ve often heard the argument (and even thought it myself) that marriage is “just a piece of paper.” It doesn’t change how you feel about one another.

But I talked to Rebecca recently and she said she feels different since the wedding. Marriage does make a difference. The life-long commitment, the sacred vows we take in front of friends and family, that pledge of love — it makes a difference!

Maybe it’s time to get back on match.com! Or not. As I discovered at my 50th birthday party, no need to get married to celebrate love!