Quick! -- Before the world ends

In two and a half hours, it will be December here. For how long have we been warned that according to some interpretations of the Mayan calendar the world will end -- or at least come to some major reconfiguration -- in December 2012?  Should it come to that, the above picture shows my preferred way to depart -- aboard a narrow boat on a peaceful canal. Won't you join me?

Me, in Grade 4 of West Barnstable
ElementarySchool on Cape Cod.

My brother, Ralph Mitchell, also taken during those
Cape Cod years. He was always making something.

My aunt Helen Cahoon has gone beyond the reach of the Mayan calendar believers. The baby is my Leah at two months. We were visiting Cape Cod after giving Leah's Dad a send off from Quanset Point, Rhode Island. He was a photographer on the U.S.S. Intrepid, heading out to sea to spend his reservist's active duty scooting up and down the coast of Europe, taking official tourist pictures -- and making official photographic records of any planes that missed the deck.

Here is baby Leah tracking her Daddy's
Navy tour, from our perch in Parsonsfield, Maine.

Here is my Dad, Sandy Mitchell, also long since
gone beyond the reach of any end of this world.
It was a VERY snowy winter in Maine,
the year Leah was born.

This little lamb was born the same day as Leah.
My Dad never wanted him to reach the
end of his world, the way the other lambs
eventually found themselves in the stew pot.

Leah with her Dad, Tom Gallant. He, too has
gone into some new dimension. 

Leah and me in Parsonsfield. Can't take any credit
for the hue of the photos.

And here we are at Leah's 3rd birthday, at the
GAR Home in Bangor, ME, which Tom and I
"caretook" while finishing undergrad work
at Universtiy of Maine - Orono. 

Backing up a step or two, here are Tom and me with my bridesmaid (sister Beth), my parents (Eleanor and Alexander Mitchell) on the right and Tom's parents (Clifford and Barbara Gallant) on the left. Both sets of parents are gone, now. What were we all looking at, with such a mix of expressions? Only my Mom is in the moment -- and enjoying more than the bite of wedding cake.

Eventually another little girl joined
our family and we moved to Boston.
Here is Rachel visiting the office
where I worked at the Christian
Science Publishing Society.

Was life really this romantic? Yes, it often was. 

And Niagara is a good place to end this blog. My point tonight is that if the world should indeed end next month (now one hour and 45 minutes away), I have tremendous riches to take with me. And the riches have only been multiplying since -- check them out on my other posts and other blog.