This newsletter is way overdue. We (including Pauline) left for Virginia to visit with Will, Darice and the kids last Wednesday. We had a really good time together. Here are the highlights of the trip...
ARE WE THERE YET? If we heard that once, I’ll bet we heard it every 15 minutes. Well, it seemed like it anyway. Ben, for comic effect, began asking this question before we got out of Pauline’s driveway. (Darice gave us an aloe vera plant when we came home. I told Ben if he asked that question he’d have to hold the plant in his lap. That threat did the trick.)
We hadn’t seen them since October so it was interesting to see how much the kids have changed. Emily has changed the most. She is talking a lot and can express herself well which makes her all the more adorable. Cameron and Zachary have grown a lot too. Cameron is as tall as me and Vicki. It is one thing to hear about how much the kids have grown, but quite another to have your almost 12 year old nephew look you in the eye. His voice is starting to get deeper as well.
SWIMMING. Thursday was a very leisurely day. We let the kids play around the house that morning and then went swimming at the pool in Waynesboro for a couple of hours that afternoon. On leaving the pool I took the kids back to the house while all the women ran errands (Will was at work). That evening we grilled out and the kids enjoyed playing in the yard. The huge sandpit was especially fun.
A WILDERNESS ADVENTURE. Will took off work Friday. Will and Darice purchased some property a couple of years ago and plan to start a new house on it soon (they have been talking about it so long Darice and the boys call it the “imaginary house”). Will, Vicki and I went out to the lot and marked off where the imaginary house is to be built. It is fairly secluded so we had a great time with a briar blade, lively lad and pruners. Like the previous evening, the kids enjoyed playing out in the yard.
AN URBAN ADVENTURE. Saturday morning we headed to Washington, DC. We parked in Vienna, Virginia, and took the Metro in from there, which was the first memorable subway experience for our kids. Their eyes got big as we picked up speed. We saw all the major points of interest along the Mall from the outside: the Capitol, the White House, the Washington Monument, the WWII Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, the Vietnam Wall. The kids did really well for such a hike.
We rented a wheelchair for Pauline and Will assumed the pushing duties. He sped along and at times was a full block ahead. I think that ride was the most memorable part of Pauline’s DC trip. We watched as she bounced across the grass by the Reflecting Pool, hopped a curb when there was no ramp (traffic was coming), and be rushed out and back in the subway car at a quick stop so she could sit with the rest of us. We were laughing pretty hard as we recalled her ride the next day.
We also went to the Natural History Museum. Pauline wanted to see the Hope Diamond. The last time I was in a crowd that tight was at a UT ball game. I have never seen the Smithsonian that crowded (and I had a wonderful opportunity to live in the DC area in the summer of 1989).
A MEDICAL ADVENTURE. We were getting ready for church Sunday when we noticed Zachary’s foot was red and swollen. In all the roughhousing he had cut the side of his foot on Nate’s toenail Thursday and it had gotten infected. Darice took Zachary to the doctor and the rest of us stayed home. We were looking forward to seeing Zachary receive a Cub Scout award for religious study. He was upset that this didn’t work out while we were there to see it, as we were. We spent the rest of the day enjoying each other’s company. The last we heard his foot is improving.
A HAPPY REUNION. Our trip home Monday was uneventful like the trip up there. It was still light when we got here. We dropped Pauline off at her house and the kids ran across the yard to see Sallie Mae. (Thank you Kenny for feeding her while we were gone.) That was a reunion I wish I had on film.
A SAD TRAGEDY. This evening we were all outside working in the garden. Sallie Mae was right in the middle of things. I’d had to lead her to the side of the garden and make her sit because Ben was using the hoe and I wanted to protect her from his backswing. We were so busy that we did not notice her leave when one of the neighbor’s dogs came up. She followed the other dog to the highway where she was hit by a car. She did not suffer, but she leaves a sad family behind.
Joe
