Kentucky, Part 1

This weekend we put 1087 miles on my car. Around 4:45pm on Friday afternoon we left Greensboro with a car full of snacks and DVDs and too many clothes and drove north through Virginia and West Virginia, where we turned left and headed into Kentucky, past Moorehead, where apparently Cavin and Sunshine were soon to rest their weary heads, then onto Lexington. The Google directions I had printed out suggested a different exit from the one I am used to taking into the city, but since it was nearing midnight and I couldn’t remember the exact number of the exit, we followed the directions at hand and pulled up to my sisters house at 11:58pm.

The kids were put straight to bed, along with Dan, while MaryAlice and I got down to work, drinking a bottle of wine and trying on all of her new clothes and shoes. She has some awesome clothes.

We stayed up until 3am, so it was pretty painful when the kids woke us up at 6:45am that morning. We showered and dressed and walked down Limestone to our favorite coffee shop Third Street Stuff and Coffee. The girls ate chocolate croissants and bagels and we had coffee and Bronwen practiced her walking in the parking lot.

After that fun, we headed back to MaryAlice’s house and Bronwen and Dan took a nap. Piper and my sister hung out and I lied down on the couch.

Eventually, we got everything together, loaded up the car, circled the block and drove to my mom’s house where Jason and Dan were required to hang a massive mirror for my mother.

Then we all got into our respective cars, gassed up and drove two more hours west to my brother’s house. He was, after all, the entire reason why we had driven out to Kentucky in the first place. We got to his house around 2pm, central time, and Josh and Bronwen met each other for the first time.

It was wonderful to see my brother. After a year in the desert of working out and no drinking, he is very cut. He looks amazing. Unfortunately, Heidi (his wife) had pneumonia, so she stayed in bed most of the time.

Piper, Aiden (my nephew) and Bronwen played all day. We swung on the swings and fed the horses (one of the horses bit Dan), and we rode the four-wheeler all over. The kids collected dried corn out of the corn field; we got to be country mice for the day, and it was really relaxing.

Josh told me about Iraq. He only fired his weapon once the whole year, it was warning shot. I saw pictures. They were exactly what my imagination had devised; dusty, hot, and beige. He told me about the time when he was working on the computer and a mortar was dropped in front of the office and blew out all of the windows. He smiled when he said that he kept a piece of shrapnel as a souvenir. Overall, he looked great and seemed really well adjusted. I cried when we left them to head east, back to Lexington.