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     Apparently this trip was scheduled to last exactly eight weeks. Why else would Matty drive twelve  hours (the first hour and a half in snow) in order to get home eight weeks to the day after we left? Not much new in the 'hood. The nearest homeless camp moved a couple of hundred yards up the road. The buildings under construction are four stories taller. And that's about it. The concierge could not come up with a single nugget of interest that we missed.
    We're no worse for wear after eight weeks on the road.  Emma Peel performed flawlessly. Matty stayed healthy the entire trip and, except for some minor tummy trouble in Virginia, so did I.
    We saw many interesting sites and some not so interesting ones. But, as I have written previously, it was the people who gave us shelter and the people we broke bread with who made the trip. Even the households with the overly friendly big dogs were fantastic. To all of them (you) we say thanks.
    The trip began with a total eclipse of the sun, the sun being entirely blocked from view. It ended with the sun rising bringing a new day. Sounds like a metaphor for what's been happening in our lives recently, but analyzing metaphors is above my pay grade.
    When Steinbeck got behind the wheel of Rocinante he wanted to discover the character of America. By his own admission he did not succeed and ended his book on a fairly negative note choosing to describe a group of  protesting racists. If we had sought out strangers to hang with perhaps we might have a negative view of what's going on as well, but we stayed with friends. What we found were a lot of people who agree in general that the world is going to hell in a handbasket. We also found a lot of people living harried and somewhat stressful lives. But I don't believe we met up with anyone who would change their life in any fundamental way. We also met a lot of great kids. I spoke recently with a fourth grade teacher who loves this generation of grade schoolers. When asked why,  he said, "They're better than us."
     A couple of stats: we slept in four provinces and sixteen states and passed through ten more states. We stayed with twelve sets of hosts. All were awesome, but Dorothy had it right- there's no place like home.


Ciao, Precious

Comments

  1. One of Us Is Not LIke the OtherOctober 17, 2017 at 5:43 PM

    Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.
    And return thence to home.
    -- All's Well That Ends Well

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ken GadbowOctober 24, 2017 at 9:44 PM

    Welcome home!

    ReplyDelete

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