I’ve got this three week trip across our fabulous country dancing around in my head.  There is so much, it’s difficult to know where to begin.  Never having been further west than Wisconsin, there was a great deal I hadn’t seen or experienced.  Huge mountains and desolate prairie.  Winding rivers such a deep shade of blue that it steals one’s breath.  Mount Rushmore and the in-progress gigantic Crazy Horse Monument.  Yellowstone, and watching hundreds of bison cross the road in no hurry, and with great nonchalance.  The museum of the Massacre at Wounded Knee.  Big sky and cowboy boots on fence posts around homes and ranches.  Towns with populations of 28, while one with 1500 citizens is a “city”.  Mount St. Helen’s and the stripped trees still floating in Spirit Lake 30 years later.  Landscape that can go from flat, brown and sagebrush covered to green and mountainous in the blink of an eye.

I feel quite humbled, and grateful to have been able to experience it all.  Mother nature always puts one in one’s place, doesn’t she?  Speaking with the “locals” is always one of the pleasures of travel.  I’ve been called “ma’am” by a cowboy (a brief instant of wishing I was 20 years younger and single) and purchased a handmade beaded necklace from an elderly Indian of immense dignity at the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. Felt collective guilt while driving through miles of Reservation land, and seeing the plight of Native Americans.  Watched children play amidst a garden of flowers that had to be seen to be believed.  Saw the awe in the faces of my country men and women as they gloried in the same sights that were overwhelming me.  I also ate way too much and have expended my calorie allowance through Thanksgiving.  There’s always a down side, isn’t there?

Although it was close once or twice, I didn’t melt.  I learned you can spend three weeks traveling in an antique bus with friends and still be friends upon homecoming.  Realized that clothing disappears from suitcases much as it does from the dryer at home, and that I have a “Jersey” accent.  The only hamburgers you can get out west are tortured into seared and weathered hockey pucks.  No such thing as medium, let alone rare.  Having met our daughter for the last 6 days of the trip, I was reminded that she and her father are funny together, and a pleasure to watch.  Although I could have done without that one lady’s room moment with Kate.  The one where we entered a two stall bathroom with one stall occupied.  She heads for the empty perch and pounds on the other door on the way past.  Leaving me to explain to the woman that it wasn’t ME, but my daughter being amusing.  Good grief.

A wonderful time awaits me in September as well.  I get a few days down south, visiting our son, daughter-in-law, daughter  AND our wonderful Arielle, who is growing in leaps and bounds. I cannot wait to wrap my arms around her, and catch up with her life.  Pure heaven!  So good night and the best to all….