Happy Birthday Erin!

It is hard to believe that Erin is 26 years old! It seems like yesterday that she was just a baby - then toddling - and now ...

Happy Birthday ErinEliz!

The First Saturday in December

The first Saturday in December the battlefield at Antietam comes alive with luninaries – one for each casualty of the bloodiest one day of the Civil War. Last year, unknowingly, I happened upon this wonderful celebration of these lives. I went for a hike and found a national treasure.

Erin Eliz having an Antietam Adventure


Last Saturday, my daughter Erin and I, together with my friend Toby, went for a hike in Antietam. Like last year’s hike, this was a Sierra Club sponsored event. The hike started at 11:45 am and we strategically parked our cars near where the drive through the luminaries would begin 6 hours later. It was a cold day and we layered and bundled in an effort to keep warm as we walked. The hike followed the same path as last year and wandered through the farms and fields, Dunker Church and the bloody cornfield and after seven miles we were back to our cars. At this point, the hike continued south to the Burnside Bridge – only we discovered that Erin had worked a nice blister on her foot and opted to sit out the last 4 miles in our warm car.

When we returned to the car we discovered a flyer from the Antietam Café – you know those windshield flyers – I usually throw them away without a second thought. This one however said that they would deliver hot chocolate and sandwiches to our car – can you imagine? So we ordered pulled pork sandwiches and hot chocolate – all to be delivered to the eighth car in a five mile long line of cars! It was wonderful – it felt decadent – and we were warm and happy. About this time we discovered a woman in the car behind us that had also opted out of the last four miles of the hike – she was sitting in the car without the benefit of a running engine and heat – so we invited her into our backseat where it was warm – and ordered more food from the Antietam Café!


About 6:00pm the parade of cars began to enter the Antietam Battlefield – the battlefield we had hiked during the day while volunteers placed paper bags with sand and candles in neat and space rows. It was much different after dark as we slowly passed rows and rows – hundreds and hundreds – of candles. One candle for each casualty – one for each of the 23,000 killed, missing or injured in that one day battle in September 1862.