Derek Sandstrom

The Difference Between the Sexes

We were at a family campfire last night, and Sheri’s cousin, Kristin, demonstrated a critical difference between men and women. She brought Sheri something and said, “Sheri, smell this.” It was an herbal tea, I believe. Cinnamon Apple Harvest. Okay, I made that up. And I thought, here’s another difference between the sexes. When a woman brings another woman something to smell, it’s probably going to be a pleasant experience. But when a guy approaches you and says, “Dude, smell this!” you might want to run the other way! And no sooner had we finished laughing about this, than Sheri’s dad came back from fishing. The boys asked him how many and what kinds, and he said, ”One bass. Wanna smell?” and offered his hands to my boys to smell. You see? Men and women are different, and here’s just another proof.

The Art of the Lake Bath

The Art of the Lake Bath.

For those of you who may be thinking, “Wow, camping for a month…These Sandstroms must be pretty rugged,” I submit the following. Our camper has the following.
• Heat
• Running water
• A water heater
• A microwave
• Cook stove with oven (mostly we keep things in the oven)
• A bathroom with a toilet that flushes and a shower.

Rugged? Maybe not.

But there is one roughing it thing we sometimes do because it’s cool. Lake baths. We take our soap, shampoo, and towels out and bathe in the lake. It’s a unique experience, performed while wearing a bathing suit. Sheri’s grandmother had a way of describing the proper technique. She said,”First you wash down as far as possible, then you wash up as far as possible, and then you wash possible.” Enough said. Maybe too much!

Home on Wheels

What could be more boring than to read about the weather on someone’s vacation? But I have to comment. We finally got a break from the damp and chilly weather, with one day of hot and humid. Today it started out that way, but we had some spectacular thunderstorms. I was sitting on the camper floor (okay, I was hiding under the table) and the whole thing vibrated with each of the 7324 claps of thunder that went by. It was amazing! And then, it abruptly ended and the sun came out. Now the kids are fishing. One minute the world seems to be ending, the next, we’re fishing!

Here is a shot of our home on wheels and a pretty sunset over the lake.

Rhyming with Sheri

So, 7/7/07 passed without much fanfare at Crotch. Of course, we don’t have access to news, so I hope I haven’t said anything incredibly insensitive. We went into a town called Perth, which is about 45 minutes from the lake, for church. There’s a small church there, which is sort of like our church away from church. As I thought might happen, they asked if I would play for the service in two weeks. So I will.

Here at the lake it was forecast to be sunny and high of 92 today, and feeling hotter. They were close…..It’s rainy and low 60s. (!)

Sheri’s dad, Ed, bought a pontoon boat and brought it up here. Yesterday we rode around on the lake, which was my first trip out on the water since we got here. It was gray, but still beautiful.

Remind me not to write songs with Sheri. I had a song started on the computer and I invited her to fill in the next line. It’s one of those serious, introspective songs, with each line being a question about some major heart issue. We were trying to rhyme the word “day,” I think. Her line was “how many eggs can one chicken lay?”

If I can’t come up with anything better, I may have to use it!

More Fun from Crotch Lake

So we made it to Canada, ready for more fun at a Lake called Crotch. So we arrived, and it was cold and gray. Today we woke up to another cold, gray day. Fun. And then it started raining. Rain on vacation is never fun. Rain on vacation camping…well, that’s REALLY not fun! For those who don’t camp – and maybe this is why – rain on a camping trip is miserable. Being in the camper doesn’t allow much time before cabin fever sets in. Going out is cold and wet, so you come back inside, dragging wet, sandy mud with you as you come. So now your camper is covered with dirt for you to look at while you sit with cabin fever.

But my boys are not dissuaded. They caught a frog today and are launching a pontoon boat with their granddad and playing with grandma in their camper. They say it takes a village to raise a child, and fortunately we brought one. In our camper we have Morgan, Carter, Sheri, and me. Next door, we have Sheri’s brother, Curtis, and his wife, Kim. Across the campground we have Sheri’s parents. So Sheri and I are actually catching a moment of quiet as the boys are out in the “village.”

One bright spot, literally and figuratively, to our trip so far (aside from all the vomit, of course) was a little fireworks moment we had last evening. I bought some fireworks at a convenience store. They worked, and we managed to keep all of our digits and other limbs intact. Morgan said, more than once, “those fireworks were cool!” If he said it more than once, he must have meant it. I think they were cool, too.

Back-to-back gigs!

“So, you’re going to do two full concerts, back to back?” Sheri asked.

“Uh…..yeah,” I nervously replied. It seemed like such a good idea when I booked it! Suddenly I wasn’t so sure! 

Well, both the concerts went fine, and as it turns out I’m glad I booked them both. But Sheri’s right, it was a little ambitious. I should learn to run these things by her once in a while! The voice held out but the fingers got a little dizzy! Glad there wasn’t a third one after the second!

We’re in Jeffersonville, NY as I write this. Sheri and I sometimes say that if you’ve never heard of a place, I’ve probably played there! Or I’m booked there. I had never heard of Jeffersonville, NY, but I’ve been here since Friday evening. I assure you, it exists. And it’s a VERY nice place, to boot! Small town, USA at its finest. People are friendly, ice cream stand gives WAY too much ice cream per order, and someone booked Derek Sandstrom to come play at the First Presbyterian Church.

That someone is Rev. Lee Andrews, who lives next to the church with her husband, Dave. Both were extremely friendly and helpful to us. Great folks from South Dakota. Dave makes no bones about missing SD and that he would return there in the blink of an eye! Lee says that everything is much more exaggerated and severe when it comes to the weather in SD. Rain and snow don’t fall, they fly past your window at 40 miles per hour. But they are following God’s leading, which has them in Jeffersonville, NY. I have to respect that. 

This morning I played at this church, and at the Reformed Church in Youngsville, NY, which is the sister church to this one. Rev. Lee is the pastor at both. She says that pastoring two churches of different denominations is no problem since the two are virtually the same anyway. One thing I’ve discovered by playing at a lot of different churches is that, while denominations can have radically different creeds, and that those are important, we still have more in common than we have in dispute. Don’t get me wrong. I know each church has separated from the others for a reason, and I believe in my church’s mission 100%. But I have learned by experience that God is alive and well at churches with a variety of labels on the doors, and that’s good to know.

I forgot to mention that Jeffersonville is one of the few places I’ve been to lately that does not have cell phone service. It also has a creek that runs through town that tends to flood. Dave said that they’ve been here three years and have had three floods that filled up their basement. Wow! That doesn’t sound like much fun to me. Dave agrees.

The people at the churches were very kind and appreciative. It’s always nice to play for an appreciative crowd. Duh! And this one was. 

Before we made it here, we left Etters on Friday morning. It was classic Sandstrom. We had the kids in the truck, ready to pull out at about 10:45. Then we went back inside to make sure the cats were both out. Then we stopped at Rite Aid to pick up something. Then we stopped for gas at BP. Then we hit some traffic around Harrisburg, and then it was 11:30. Harrisburg is usually 10 minutes north of us. We joked, “is it time to stop for lunch?” But as we considered the options and the decided lack of options on the road, we decided to actually stop in Harrisburg for lunch. We said, “we CANNOT tell anyone we stopped in Harrisburg for lunch!” And here I am announcing it to the world. But it was too funny not to share. So we finished up at Panera Bread, got back into the truck and got on the highway about 12:30. Leave Etters at 11:00, get past Harrisburg by 12:30. Pathetic! But once we hit nap time it was smoooooooth sailing! All part of the plan…

More of our adventures coming up as we head north to a Lake called Crotch! Check back often.

Travel Bug

What a difference a day makes! Just yesterday Morgan was feeling full of vim and vigor as he rode this homemade scooter at Rev. Lee and Dave’s house…

…and today he was sick as a dog. He threw up at least six times, and the first one wound up costing us an outfit, a carseat, and 30 minutes of time on the side of the road cleaning up. Thank God for Walmart, as non-PC as it may be to say so, where we found a new carseat. He was miserable. We all felt so bad for him. So we decide to stay in the USA for another couple days, We’re at a campground near Watertown, NY. We figure that if Carter catches this, with his MCAD we want to be ready for a nice, American hospital stay where we sort of know what to expect and where insurance may cover us. So Canada will have to wait for a couple more days. For now we pray that Morgan will feel better and that Carter will not come down with this.

For all situations that happen against our wishes, we are challenged to ask, “what spiritual lesson is God trying to teach us through this tangible event?” We’re still looking for the lesson here, but I am certain that there is one. God is too kind to let us go through a day like this without a lesson to bring away!

More from the road to come…

Greetings from Beautiful Crotch Lake

We’re training our kids to be rock stars. Not on purpose. We just get into this incredibly late schedule when we’re on vacation like this. As I write at 10:00 am, Carter is still asleep. That could be because we didn’t get the kids to bed until 11:00 last night! Clearly not a normal kids’ schedule! This happens all the time. Every day we say, “we should try to get these kids to bed at a decent hour,” and then every night comes, and it’s more fun to sit by the fire and talk with all the relatives. The people who go out fishing in the evening don’t usually even get back until 9:30. I know, I know. Put your kids to bed early, and then go back out to visit. It’s too late now. Carter’s a rock star. Morgan is usually up at 9:00 or so. Maybe he’s a soundman. I could use a soundman in the family!

After two full weeks of rainy weather and temps in the low 60s, summer has come to Crotch Lake. Warm, sunny, and 80 degrees. That’s Fahrenheit, of course. Up here it’s in metric. But 24 doesn’t help me much, as I was raised on Fahrenheit. The weatherman reports, “sunny with highs around 26,” and I’m thinking, “uh…is that warm?” Driving is the same way. You cross the border and you can drive 100! Yee haw! Until you realize that it’s 100 kilometers per hour. That’s about 60 mph. Not so exciting after all!

So what do I do up here to keep working? It’s hard to put life on hold for a whole month, of course. Well, one thing is that I’m working on music to get ready for the next CD. It is tentatively entitled How Do I Explain? We’ll have to see if that sticks. The other thing is that I’m working on the finishing touches of Susquehannock High School’s marching band show. Some of you know that I have been involved with marching bands during my life, and while I don’t have the time to direct one or even serve on staff, I do enjoy arranging the music for them to play. Susquehannock is marching a Japanese-themed show this year, which includes Impressions Of Japan, a concert band piece by James Barnes, and also some things that I have composed to fit the mood and the theme. I’m excited to see how it all shapes up and comes to life on the football field.