Donna and I took an elevator with former Secretary of State Senator John Kerry

I greeted former Senator John Kerry in the elevator saying it was nice to see him again and that we had met twice- we hadn't, I had mistaken him for Thomas O'Neill III, whom we met when Donna's father and my father were still alive. I told Donna he was the senator and mentioned he went to Yale, to which he said "I did", but I kept thinking of the former Lieutenant Govenor for some reason. Senator Kerry said he knew I was talking about whom he knows as "Tommy". He gave me a salute of a raised arm to say nice to meet you. Donna's father was a high school principal and worked with Hubert Humphrey.

Donna's favorite downtown Boston orange juice and the adjacent former offices of Houghton Mifflin Company

A visit from Dr. Scott Sunquist, usually I greet Dr. Elaine Phillips between services

Dr. Sunquist smiled enthusiaticly when I showed him my copy of his student writing in the student magazine "Debarim" published by Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary, of which he is now President. I asked him if there was always a methodology to Apologetics, to which he seemed to nod in the affirmative. His paper was on Arnobius of Sicca, who wrote "Against the Nations"., the methodology of Apologetics, and apparently the Astarte-Venus cult.

point of view shots of Donna's desk at Church Library

The library, built in 1809, is beautiful.

These two botttom photographs in particular were taken from behnd Donna's desk from where she checks in books with a scanner and removes the checkout cards. I discussed theology with a new minister today explaining to him that he was the eighth minster I have had a rapport with and that my questions are more precise after a decade. There have been ten or eleven I have known since attending. Scott Lord

With Donna on my Sixty Second Birthday, Downtown Boston

Donna and I walked down Tremont Street, Boston, passed the church where she is a librarian, it bells ringing, and went to lunch at one of our usual places for my Sixty Second brithday.(She bought me a pocket hair comb for a dollar and said it was for my birthday, I took her to lunch this time, ps. I had a Western Omlette.) scott lord

During Commercials, hint Reti Opening,

fair use photo of game against Bot Scott Lord

During Commericals hint Reti Opening, Potato variation

fair use photo of game against Bot

Scott Lord

Happy Thirteenth Anniversary, Donna

Tommorow is our thirteenth Anniversary. I took Donna to lunch on Temple Street again to a restararaunt we go to once a month and decided to take a short cut across Boston Common and down Beacon Hill. Once a month I also aske her if she would like to visit the Old State House. Today, she passed the entrace to Massachusetts State House and asked if we could go inside. We've been to the Boston Antheneum, and there were marble statues inside the State House as well. She particularly like a statue of a nurse treating a wounded soldier (I have had a coronary bypass several years ago) and my favorite was of John Adams. Happy Anniversay Donna and Thank You for a wondeful date this afternoon.

mother's day, I brought Donna tulips during the church service

I wanted to photograph the tulips I brought Donna during church- I had to run an errand and we are here during three church services- from outside looking into the church,but as you can tell, the reflection precludes it. The otherside of the building looks on to the adjacent churchyard with tulips on the graves of Ben Franklin's parents where I "reflect" every week (diligently) for those who have passed.

Sunday at the Church Library

Donna is shelving books.

For anyone interested in Ben Franklin, his parents are buried at the church. The graveyard was here before the church structure, which was a granary that held gunpowder during the revolution. The expression "fire and brimstone" came from our church, it being where the colonists stored gunpowder during the AMerican Revolution.

Donna’s Birthday, Dinner near the Bunker Hill Monument, Charlestown Massachusetts

We were looking for a restaurant and the cab dispatch told us there was in fact one closer to our apartment than the one that had recently closed. For her birthday, she had a computer class, in which she was given a new computer, she lost twenty pounds and we celebrated by going to dinner when, after dinner, I looked up and noticed we were right near the Bunker Hill Monument, our having come from a different direction. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DONNA and I look forward to our thirteenth anniversary this summer.

Living on the thirteenth floor, I can see the monument, the entire monument, clearly from our living room, The Boston skyline has almost changed dramaticlly while we've been together. Evacuation Day in New York City is on November 25, 1783, and also marks the British departure. (Donna's father went to NYU) Happy St. Patrick's Day. ps. I ordered fish chowder for myself but she was hungary and couldn't wait for dinner, so I gave her mine untill my seafood came later, which was half the fun of an enjoyable evening- I was glad she liked dinner after our skipping lunch during a busy weekend.

Donna in library Valentine's Day

Donna is at her library desk as the church organ plays upstairs- this is a poster of the church from 1971

From a poster made during 1971, this may in fact be The Old North Church, the tallest building in America before 1809 when the Park Street Church was built, it then becoming the tallest. I belive both have clocks. I asked a member from M.I.T and he thought it was Park Street Church and it afforded me the chance to tell him that the Internet Archive hists all Dewey Decinal categories of out of print books by using keyword search, not just "Christianity", but also "Thermodynamics". She refers to it as her "antique desk". These are my photos from this morning when Donna was behind her desk.

photos: Scott Lord, I apologize for the lack of a telephoto lens.

Postscript: Embrace: Dr. Martin Luther and Coretta Scott King Statue added to Boston Freedom Trail

I usually don't update this blog and usually do update my other blog on film, but this morning the guide that welcomes people to either the Freedom Trail or to the Park Street Church began a conversation about our lack of books on William Lloyd Garrison. There was one that we had. The photo above is our library card catalog that has internet- as an assistant church librarian I could pull up the sermons that William Lloyd Garrison delivered in this room twenty years after the church was erected (in the same way that if you were at Harvard College you would have poems that Oliver Wendall Holmes had delivered there.) Our welcomer referred to the stautue from the previous entry, and you can notice that there was not yet any snow, as "The Image" and judging from her age I really think she meant "the blessed image of the late Dr. and Mrs King". She couldn't just say statue even though there is a statue of J.F.K (the blessed, but more than that the still legally elected) at the Boston State House, but that is something polite, and nice. There was a class today- Tammy (Harvard Divinity) gave me permission to "jump in" in the middle of it or be added to it next week. It is titled Lenten Discipleship Initiative. -----:-----::-----:::-----::-----:

Below is my original blog entry on "The Image" and I myself quake in many ways:

Although the Boston Freedom Trail is meant to be a tour of the Revolutionary War and the grave of Crispus Attucks, a stevadore killed in the Boston Massacre, is directly outside the Church window where I am right now, the new statue of Martin Luther King holding his wife, Coretta Scott King has been unveiled on Boston Common. Another piece of history, ourchurch ran a film on this week marking the one hundreath year of radio broadcasting of the church service, there having been a shop that sold radios across the street on Tremont Street. The service is in progreess upstairs and on WEZE while I am in my wife's library. Donna, please accept these photos as symbolic of our spending our Sundays together.

photos: Scott Lord

photo: Scott Lord Postscript:The Girl on the Flying Trapeze I spend every Sunday on the Freedom Trail, which our church is on, and I listen to the ministers conduct tours in case I'm needed when in the library or if I think I should point out the Granary Burial Ground. This morning we had a new addition, a sculpture where the usually have a Christmas Star. The other Christmas lights are still in Boston Common. As it is Freedom Trail art, I thought I would add it here, but it takes a couple of photos to conquer the height distance and perspective. It is an installation- a sculture of a girl on a swing put into an envirornment where art meets reality.

Girl on a Swing photos: Scott Lord