A Day in the Life of Chaos

Very young Patrick There is a land far to the north that in many ways seems disconnected from reality.  When you live there it is like living on an island and news from the outside comes in snip-its that leave you at times questioning your involvement with the rest of the world.  It is a magical place and I when I first came to know it,  the largest city was still developing.  Many roads were unpaved.  Television was primitive.  There were only three networks and shows would come up on tapes from Seattle with a two week delay.  Try to avoid a Monday Night Football score for two weeks!  The town was so news starved there were actually two news papers.  How many cities these days can boast that? The people that lived there were as disconnected as the place.  They seemed to all be running from something and everyone had a different and unique reason for their flight.  Somehow in the self imposed exile there was company among strangers.  Everyone seemed to revel in being different, be

Every year about this time when you are an adult you find yourself reflecting on the past.  Christmas is like a bookmark in our lives and while one might blend into the next there are often moments or traditions that hold a specific significance.  Sometimes, they are remarkable for their simplicity. When I was a young man my parents took me to Europe.   It was my second time across the Atlantic.  When I was younger we spent a summer driving around to genealogical sites and visiting the English Country Side.  It was a magical introduction yet  this trip however was different.  This time it would be a trip that would span London to Vienna and Rome.  In three short weeks I would visit or cross five countries and enter the greatest capitals created in the history of the world.  It was also Christmas time and with a plane fare too low to resist, we boarded a nearly empty DC10 and left the eternal darkness of Alaska for Europe.  I was fortunate, as an only child my parents could make the