St Patrick

 By odd coincidence many of our English-speaking contacts in Lausanne were Irish, inviting us to their folk jams, reminding me of Tacoma's Slainte band and this gig;

Michael home just 2 months with his Chinese "squeeky" shoes, dancing a jig.  Slainte was an early mp3 sensation and Kent (left) a penny whistle/accordian playing colleague at Puget Sound.

Ray (right) gathered musicians for monthly gigs in Vevey, informing us

that the Irish had a tortured history not unlike that of native Americans, adding Catholicism to the mix.

That St Patrick - not originally Irish - should become a national figure seems about right as our own boys adopted from China donned bright green and joined in the festivities at church,

  where we sang St Patrick's Breastplate.

I depart from tradition and offer John Rutter's arrangement of God Be in My Head by Henry Walford Davies (O Little Town of Bethlehem fame), another Tacoma memory as Carolyn fondly remembers singing in the choir.

God Be in My Head 
And in my understanding
God be in mine eyes
And in my looking
God be in my mouth
And in my speaking
God be in my heart
And in my thinking
God be at mine end
And at my departing