Musings in Milwaukee

Sometimes my posts turn into a hodge-podge of random thoughts, and the writer in my goes crazy trying to make a coherent entry out of them. This post is one of those - all just random musings following my cousin's wedding in Milwaukee on Saturday.

Dave and I missed the actual ceremony. I always have conflicting thoughts on the ceremony: if you go to it, the day can become really long, but yet attending it helps you feel connected with the whole process.

The reception was downtown at the Pfister hotel, a lovely place with a nice sense of history. (I'll have to take some of my writing friends there sometime - especially up to the Blu lounge on the 23rd floor. It has nice views of Lake Michigan, comfy atmosphere and wine flight samplers on the menu. Perhaps our next girls retreat?)

The reception was a great opportunity to reconnect with my cousins. It seems like every time we meet, we say how we should get together more often. We exchange emails and vow to look each other up when we're in town. It often seems that these things are mostly made up of good intentions, but I'll give it a good-faith try.

During the reception, I also had a nice conversation with another cousin's mother-in-law. She's an Episcopal priest who had very encouraging things to say to me about persevering in writing. It turns out that her own mother is romance writer Violet Hamilton, who is retired after publishing 27 books. (I had to Google Violet Hamilton, of course, and I was disappointed to find no satisfying online biographies of her career.)

We couldn't stay nearly as long at the reception as I would have liked. We had almost a two-hour drive back home and dogs waiting for us with legs crossed. Although, on our way out the door for our drive back to Chicago, Dave and I couldn't help but pop back up to the Blu lounge for one quick glance of the city at night. Our timing was perfect, as we had a great view of the fireworks display for German Fest.

Note: Photo credits go to my sister, as I never seem to take photos when she's around.