HOME SWEET HOME / BACK TO REALITY

March 2, 2009
Sunny and 20 F


FIRST:
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Saturday, February 28, 2009

Packing the car got very interesting. It’s a gypsy’s life for us! We started driving home at 8:36 a.m. As one can imagine, Tim’s favorite area to drive is the I-95 corridor past Washington, DC. He has admitted it is a shorter route, but reluctantly. Fortunately the weather was clear-in the 40s. We stopped about 1:00 p.m. in Hagerstown, Maryland for lunch at Cracker Barrel. The fire in the hearth was crackling and warm. Back at the car I put my leather coat on, but I was still wearing sandals, now with socks.

Breezewood, Pennsylvania was not as busy usual when we fueled the car. Then, we headed onto the infamous Pennsylvania Turnpike. This is my favorite route in good weather—I know it is faster. While driving along we listened to and finished Greg Iles’ The Footprint of God, a CD/story about artificial intelligence and a computer that had a human brain. We started seeing random patches of snow, but the weather was still clear. By 5 p.m we were approaching Erie. To our amazement, there still was no snow on the ground!

Welcome Home! Our home looked the same. I was very happy that I had taken the time to tidy up before we left. We decided to run to the grocery store (no Jack Nicklaus here) for milk and bread and Tim’s brother’s for our mail. I elected to sort the mail, open bills, and check my credit card statements to get that least favorite task over with and start unpacking. Heaps of clothes, souvenirs, and all the other well-traveled items began to pile up on the floor. I even started washing! We called our sons to let them know we were home—happily they would be able to see us on Sunday.

Sunday, March 1, 2009
Cloudy and 22 F

On Sunday we were very excited to see our family. Son R came in from Jamestown, NY, with dear C and Granddaughter B2. Son B, dear D, and Granddaughter B1 live a few blocks away. It was so great to see them all. It seemed that our dear granddaughters had grown so much in 7 weeks and they were glad to see us, too!!! After distributing bags and bags of beach towels, jewelry, t-shirts, toys that change colors in the sun, beach balls, island spices, etc., we watched a video of the award ceremony in which B1 received her second award for a photo she took (she is 7 yrs. old). We had dinner at O’Charley’s and truly enjoyed the gift of family. Son R did fix my “D.” The S, the X, and now the D key on my laptop keep coming off and R is the only one who can fix them!

Monday, March 02, 2009
Today—Back to Reality
Everyone knows the feeling of returning home and returning to “normal.” We are fortunate to be retired, but I still have some things to do with local schools, as well as organizations that I do volunteer work with (U.S. Brig Niagara, Books for Kids, Newspaper in Education). Tim is already having breakfast tomorrow with his retired buddies.

About the blog…I am going to do one more “Cruise Triathlon” blog to compare the cruises. I know I promised this earlier, but fun times kept getting in the way!?!! Imagine that! I have really enjoyed this chance to stay in touch with family and friends. I have even found more dear friends were reading it than I thought. I would recommend this type of communication for those who may be on an extended travel plan and it really was not difficult. I had hoped to post more photos and still plan to do so.

The trip was truly a dream and we were so fortunate along the way: new friends, the weather, found suitcase, found wallet, Jack Nicklaus, new adventures. Tim is a very good and patient travel husband, too!

3,947 miles later, three Caribbean cruises, a timeshare resort, in-laws, cousins, and historic Williamsburg—we would do it all again!!