Yanks in Blighty - August 31, 2003.

Our long dry summer heralded an unusual event --- a real heat wave. For a week or longer thermometers climbed to the mid-nineties and weather (that can opener of conversation) became a topic in its own right. London and parts south sweltered, but it was nothing compared to the plight of France as some 15,000 people succumbed in the prolonged heat.

What we lacked in air conditioning was mollified by a steady breeze blowing from the green nearby. The days were bright and dry. At dusk we pulled out the tent and spent the night under a canopy of stars and watched Mars' growing luminance.

There was little time for astronomy with Aunt Patti on a month-long loan from America. A few days after her arrival, she and Judy were off to explore the Gower Peninsula in Wales while yours truly stayed home. Their exploits are present here, thanks to Judy's and Patti's selfless contribution to Yanks.

After a few days and several hundred miles we rendezvoused in Windsor. Auntie P. took Chris and Elena to LegoLand (again) while Judy zoomed west on the M4 (again) with me for two nights of freedom in historic Bath. It seemed we'd spared no expense for a baby-sitter and time alone. >

The problem with writing about famous places is so many others have done it and used up all the meaty phrases. Of all the cities we've visited none seemed more congruous than Bath. The reason lies in the city's startling rise to popularity with vacationing Georgian aristocracy and the readily available stone used by Georgian architects to build their client's houses.

All that beige colored stone made the swelter feel closer, so we wandered through churches and exhibits for refuge. Bath Abbey was unusually bright with filigreed column capitals the shape and color of seashells. The old Roman bath and temple was a required visit, but even in the cool we felt a gentle medicinal warmth rising from the springs.

We were hoping to take a dip ourselves, thanks to a modern spa that was scheduled to open this summer. Unfortunately delays kept the project from completion. Considering the state of my middle aged body, it was a masked blessing.

Much as we wanted to stay and remain childless, we knew a more eventful journey lay ahead. We drove back east for Windsor, picked up Auntie and the Monsters, then steered a course south and west straight into the heart of Thomas Hardy country. >

My mother suggested a stop in Salisbury to see the cathedral. It's one of the few times I heeded her advice. Begun in 1220, Salisbury remains one of Europe's finest gothic buildings. This mammoth of stone left me slack-jawed. Inside, laid in state on beds of cool marble, were medieval nobles whose quest for perpetuity beneath the massive vault made all life seem fleeting.

Affixed to a wall by the adjacent garden I found this plain wooden cross. It once marked the grave of Capt. Francis Dodgson, one of the hundreds of thousands of British doughboys who died in 1916 at the Battle of the Somme. The Great War lies across English history like the shadow of a Crossroads Tree, marking the decimation of a generation and the beginning of the end of empire.

Stonehenge happened to be along our route if we hurried. We arrived just as the sun was going down. The stones stood like immense curators guiding little clothed figures around the monument. A German couple paced by deep in conversation. All I could do was wonder. For what purpose would anyone have bothered to break the expanse with a circle of massive stones? In a pensive mood, we continued on to Shaftsbury where we spent the night. >

The next morning brought us to the Elizabethan manor house of Monacute, built by Sir Edward Phelips at the end of the 1500's. The house remained with the Phelips family until 1911. By 1931 the house - valued at a paltry £5882 - was bought and given over to the National Trust, an English preservation society. The honey colored stone used came from Ham Hill, a natural rise just to the west. It was there we turned to after lunch.

Stoke-sub-Hamdon was the peaceful little village tucked beneath Ham Hill. Its name can be rendered as 'the town of Stoke below Ham Hill'. It was a typical English village with a High Street for shopping and pubs, a local Primary school, a stone church, and a historic relic or two. I half-expected to see a horse-drawn hay wagon plodding up the road leading into town, or a group of girls with braided hair and pinafores.

The stone used to build the town also came from Ham Hill. Most of that construction took place in the early 1890's, a particularly difficult time for the rural economies of Wiltshire, Dorset, and Somerset. Many families and even entire villages left England in the hope of jobs and a better life abroad. These three counties form the West Country made famous by novelist Thomas Hardy, and the reason for my visit might have fit well into one of his stories. That little town is where my family come from. >

I felt a little embarrassed dragging the children here after all my hype; it was just another sleepy little town like so many others. It was probably smaller and sleepier when my ancestors left it over a century ago. People from more splendid places like Naples or Prague have claim to a grander legacy. Mine was a little town in Somerset, barely astir on a hot August afternoon. Yet it felt cozy and quaintly familiar.

My father and I once talked about bravery, and how ordinary people prove their courage. For some it meant to stand firm, plant their garden, and protect it from the tempest. For others it meant to cast away all and set an uncertain course into that storm. For three generations, in America, my family planted its garden. I thought that was all we Hoopers did. These past eighteen months and my visit to that sleepy little town have proved otherwise. Beneath our coziness lie adventurers ready and able to answer the call of Fate.

I do not know how long our adventure here will last. More and more, it seems to resemble that Grander Scheme. We go where we are asked, we each do our part, and we wonder how much time we'll have. We do not know the answer, and that is God's answer to us. While it is our time we must live bravely and with purpose. God will guide us. Love will sustain us. Courage will see us to our journey's end.