My vacation

I love the word vacation. It invokes thoughts of sleeping late, seeing goofy things, bad restaurants, and motels. And lots of driving. If I never see the inside of my car again...

However, we did go on vacation. We drove from California to Oklahoma. It was a long drive. And by long drive I mean, have you ever been through New Mexico? It goes on forever. It is around 390 miles across. I can't remember exactly, and my atlas is in the car. You do get to see such sights as Tecumcari, Santa Rosa, and Albuquerque. I know there are towns west of Albuquerque, but I can't remember what they are. I will say that Flagstaff is probably the most beautiful town I've ever seen. With all those wonderful pines trees around, it's not what you expect when you think of Arizona. I know Music Man wants me to say that his hometown was the most beautiful, and while it was pretty, Flagstaff was just magical to me. Could be because for some reason I didn't remember it was at something like 7700 ft.

In any event, I do want to share one story to give some background information and then a conversation that occurred in the car on the way to Oklahoma. We were still in California and it set the tone for the trip. My grandmother took my mom and uncles on trips to see historical markers all over the state of California when they were kids. She took my sister and I on trips to see many of the same historical markers. On these trips we would invariably pass Joshua trees. And invariably Grandma would say something like, "Look kids, a Joshua tree, it's a cousin of the lily." Now my grandma has a wonderful sense of humor and we have teased her about that for years. In fact, when Grandma, Miss Goofy and I took a trip down the mountain to the nearest big city, Miss Goofy pointed out Joshua trees every 5 or 10 minutes and said, "look a Joshua tree, it's a cousin of the lily" and Grandma would giggle. So, we're out in the middle of nowhere California, and I was feeling goofy and excited about the trip. So, I said while pointing out the window, "look a Joshua tree, it's a cousin of the lily." We all giggled. A moment later, Music Man points out the window and says "Look a call box," Miss Goofy doesn't miss a beat she pipes up with "It's a cousin of the phone." We howled. Grandma will love that story.

We did have a purpose in going to Oklahoma. Music Man's father passed away in November of 2005. I embarrassed to say that before now we either had the money to go back and bury his cremains or we had the time to go back. It took until now for us to have both the time and the money. We did however finally have both time and money for the trip. We buried him at the foot of Music Man's mother's grave. Music Man placed his father in the hole and he was even allowed to bury him himself. It was very healing for Music Man. He felt much more at peace after it was over.

I got to meet some of Music Man's cousins and we got to spend a lot of time with his uncle and aunt. I felt so welcomed and loved right from the start. What a wonderful family. I am so blessed to be a part of them.

There was one day on the trip where the weather was hot and humid. It was uncomfortable, made only worse by the fact that my hay fever went crazy. I hadn't had an attack like that since I was a kid and lived in the San Gabriel Valley. Come to think of it I hadn't felt heat and humidity like that since then either. I didn't mind the hot and humid, but I really didn't like the hay fever. In fact the hot and humid was kind of nice. Reminded me of my childhood and those were happy memories.

Well, that's about all I have to say for now. I'll post more about our trip as I think of it and I'll try to figure out how to post some pictures.