Boothbay Harbor the Heart and Soul of the Maine Coast

This is one of our favorite locations to visit while on vacation in Maine. This show was put together a few years ago but not much has changed.

Our new grand daughter, Paige Ondine Gosselin

Our new grand-daughter Paige Ondine Gosselin! Born at 11:21pm 3/15/2010 7lbs 7.4 oz. I got to hold her Friday afternoon March 19th. She is the cutest little girl with her full head of nice dark hair.

In memory of my step-brother Patrick Powers

I was eleven years old and I remember it like it was yesterday. Bill Powers was having dinner at our house in Watertown, Mass. when he received a phone call that his house was on fire.  We learned that his son Paul who was 4 years old had taken a lit candle into a closet and burned the house down.

The following year Bill’s ex-wife had taken ill and was now unable to take care of their three boys, Peter, Paul and Patrick. Peter moved in with my cousins and lived with them. Paul went to Canada and lived with his mother’s relatives and Patrick moved in with us. Two years later my mother and Bill married and now Patrick was part of our family.

Patrick had the most gorgeous curly hair as a kid and was your typical three year old. But, one thing he had that most kids didn’t have was Hemophilia. Every time Patrick fell down he would bruise very easily and have continuous internal bleeding until we could inject him with a blood factor that would stop the bleeding. As a little kid this was quite often and very painful for my mother who took care of Patrick.

Patrick would never be able to play the sports that we could all play as kids and take for granted. He couldn’t play football, baseball, basketball, hockey or even dodge ball because any physical contact would mean internal bleeding and a black and blue body.

Patrick led more of a normal life than most would think, but as he got older all the bruising and falling down had taken a toll on his knees and he had a hard time walking. His leg was extremely hard to bend and he always walked with a limp.

One thing Patrick had to have a lot of was blood clotting factor concentrates that helped stopped the internal bleeding. These were little bottles that we got from the hospital and Patrick would get injected with this blood clotting factor to help stop the bleeding and save his life.

The early eighties brought us the scare of HIV/Aids and due to Patrick’s Hemophilia he would be very accessible to contracting the HIV virus from blood transfusions. Sure enough our fears came true around 1985. Patrick needed a blood transfusion and contracted the HIV virus from tainted blood. I never found out for a few years as the family kept it hush hush.

As the years rolled on Patrick led as normal a life as he could and became quite ill in 1999.  One of his goals was to live to see the ball drop in 2000, the new millennium. As the Christmas season neared in 1999 Patrick became extremely ill and fell into a coma. The doctors told us to gather the family as Patrick was slowly slipping away and may never regain consciousness again.

We were able to contact his brother Paul, who was living in Seattle at the time and had not seen Patrick for many many years and I had never met Paul as well. Paul was able to fly in right away.

We all were in Patrick’s  hospital room when Paul and his wife walked in and Paul walked up to Patrick’s bed to say his goodbye’s when all of a sudden Patrick woke up and sat right up to say hello to Paul.  This was a miracle and shocked us all as well as the doctors. I know it is hard to believe but if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes I probably wouldn’t have believed it as well, but I did.

Patrick stayed awake and celebrated Christmas with us and in the next few days he started to slip away again and on January 1st, 2000 at 4:00 pm Patrick passed away.

Patrick was able to see the new millennium as he so wished.

May you rest in peace Patrick we all miss you.

Happy New Year 2010 so long 2009

Hampstead NH Christmas Parade 2009

My wife Monika attended the Hampstead, NH Christmas Parade for 2009 it was an overcast day with temperatures falling during the day along with a little bit of snow. Here is the video she shot of the parade.

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