Day One! Or is it Day Two? What Day Is It Anyway?

We arrived in Boston, and ran into Melissa and Andrew from Icelandair in the elevator! They were on their way to meet us and we had gotten off on the wrong floor! They are the ones who gave us our plane tickets to Iceland. I have been emailing so much with Andrew that I felt like I was meeting my long lost brother.

The day we arrived (which was today, even though we left yesterday), we hit the ground, napped for a couple hours, had brunch with a new friend (to be revealed later!), had another hour so to relax, and then we met up with Auður of I Heart Reykjavik for a walking tour. It was Auður who spread the news here of Pippa´s fundraiser. What she doesn't know is that I have been reading her blog for months and months and was really eager to meet her. She brought her whole family, which was so nice. We had an abbreviated tour since Pippa was fading fast, but I would highly, highly recommend Auður's tours. She knows her history and she will show you the things the locals know. Her tours are not touristy, if you know what I mean.

Look very, very closely at this rock mural, with the gorgeous moss. This is one of my favorite spots today.

The view of Harpa concert hall. It is beautiful on an overcast day and gorgeous lit up at night.

This is the Kvosin Hotel where we are staying for the next few days. The manager, Snorri, met us at our car in the dark hours of the morning to make sure we could get right into our rooms. This hotel is so nice and comfortable. It's very much like home, or at least how I would like my home to look. I would call it rustic-modern, but there is nothing rustic about the duvets. There are like big, billowy clouds! I love a good duvet!

Tonight we ate dinner at Nora Magasin, which I had read about before coming here. It is literally 5 minutes — if not less — from the Kvosin. It was dark and cozy, and the food was delicious. To start, we had dried fish with soy butter (No kidding. It was delicious.) and bread with red pesto and smoked salmon. The smoked salmon is not what you would ordinarily think. It was more like a really delicious spread. The menfolk all had a seafood stew that had a hint of curry, while Pippa and I shared a spinach and truffle risotto. It was so, so good, but even better is that it came in a shockingly hot bowl and mixed at the table. I loved their presentation too: wooden slabs as trays with little mismatched bowls and jars as serving pieces.

We rushed the barely 5 minute walk back to make it maybe 4 minutes. We were awaiting our rental car delivery from the wonderful Johnny at Go Car Rental for tomorrow's adventure!

Bless bless for now.

Begin the Begin

Here we are. I've written a very, very short version of life up until now in the right sidebar. More can be explained in the articles posted below. So why the video above? Well, we need to begin this story at the beginning, so begin the begin. If you know Pippa's mom, me, Megan, you know that I am an R.E.M. fan from way, way back. (And a former Athenian, at which time I was acquainted with Michael Stipe, but that was a million years ago.) Michael called "Begin the Begin" "a song of personal, political activism." And that relates to me because Pippa is the fire of my personal activism. I can't fight all the fights in the world that I want to. I am just one person. But I can fight the fights that relate to Pippa because those battles — and the betterment of her situation and how the world relates to her – are easy. I fight for her from a place of love. Sometimes the things that come out of my mouth (or keyboard) don't sound like they come from love (some of you know of my rants about handicap parking violators)! If my fights for Pippa result in her life being easier and the lives of other people being easier, then every rant is worth it.

So the fundraiser started by my girl Tamara was rolling along, and Then. It. Exploded. The darling Auður of I Heart Reykjavík spread the word around Iceland, unbeknownst to any of us. On the morning of Friday, September 26, I was awoken by my phone's Facebook Messenger dinging its head off. Tam — who had not slept yet from the previous night — was begging me to wake up because Pippa's story had been written about online. In Icelandic.

Then that afternoon Pippa's "Boys," as she calls them, Sigur Rós, had made an extremely generous donation.

Then there was another article on Saturday.

And second one on Saturday. 

And then Sunday.

And it all was wrapped up and tied with a bow by me — me?! — having an interview with the Reykjavík Grapevine.

It is now Monday, November 17. On Friday we are flying to Iceland. Pippa talks about nothing else all day at school, so I am told. We are still stunned by the kindness and generosity that we have been blessed with.


[I do apologize if some of those article links don't work. They were from DV.is who might not keep their articles online.]