July 11, 2014: North to Peoria

Finally by long stretch at home alone is over. I packed up the car this morning and went into the office fully prepared to not have to return to the house before heading north. Work was fine, nothing special today. I was able to wrap up well and was able to leave on the early side. I was pretty excited because I haven’t seen the family all week and am excited to not have to work this weekend. The reunion should be fun.

I made amazing time leaving Norwalk down on the Connecticut coast. There was a little traffic on the north bound trek up to Danbury but once I got on Interstate 84 I was moving quickly and getting on to the Taconic Parkway north up through the Taconic Mountains allowed me to really make amazing time.

I have started reading “The Darkest Summer” which talks about the summer of 1950, the Marines and the Korean War. It is a part of American history that I really know nothing about, despite having grown up watching M*A*S*H all through my childhood. So the book is incredibly interesting as I learn about that portion of history and a war that I know so little about.

I made great time over the entire trip. I was doing so well getting to Frankfort that when I made a stop to grab a bathroom break and a sandwich en route I called Dominica to tell her to start packing because we had time for me to get there, get everyone loaded up, get on the road and go on to dad’s house rather than spending the night in Frankfort and going on to dad’s in the morning which would be a huge hastle because I have to work tomorrow and don’t want to spend the morning racing to get there before it is time to work.

It was just after nine when I got to Dominica’s parents’ house. Four hours flat from Norwalk to Frankfort in the slow, little Spark! That’s a record.

We packed up in a few minutes, transferred everything from the Spark to the Acadia and got right on the road west. The trip was uneventful and we made good time getting out to dad’s house. It was around midnight when we arrived there.

We stayed up for probably an hour. The girls are, of course, all excited to be at grandpa’s house. Liesl remembers it well and knows what toys and there and what she wants to play with right away. Luciana has a hard time remembering the house. So we were off to bed around one in the morning. Dominica and I got the television room and Liesl and Luciana slept in the guest bedroom.

For a nightlight the girls used my mom’s fiber optic swirling light lamp. Liesl thought that it was “so cool” to use it both because it is a neat light and because it belonged to her grandmother.

Tomorrow is my class reunion. Twenty years. Pretty hard to believe.