The last day was a really nice day.
That morning I woke up fairly early and got my junk together, for the last time. I packed everything and took a photo of my pretty, pretty room. Then I lugged all my junk downstairs, where Charlotte and Charlie were having coffee.
We chatted for a while and then headed out to breakfast, a place called “Yetters.” For some reason, eggs, toast, coffee and home fries sounded good to me, and the waitress was nice enough to ask me if I wouldn’t rather have a half-portion of the potatoes.
Boy am I glad I did that. I only got about one-third of the way through the half-portion before I called it quits. It was really good, though.
After that we took a drive around Belleville, an Amish/Mennonite community. I snapped a couple of photos but I felt tremendously guilty. I suppose I remember Harrison Ford in “Witness,” when all of the tourists were snapping cameras in his face and commenting on his dress, etc., when he finally got really angry and said something about wrapping one of the more agressive lady’s brassiere around her neck. To be fair, I was in the car and we were moving, but I still felt bad. I bet you all didn’t know that my childhood dream (aside from being a firefighter, a cellist, and a horse) was to be Amish. I really felt a pain in my heart, driving through there, knowing that no matter how many things changed in my life, I would NEVER know what it’s like to be Amish. The farms were so lovely, with plain dresses hanging on lines along with black pants, children playing barefoot on the porch, and all the quiet beauty of what (I imagine) it means to be Amish.
Anyway.
The next stop was Thousand Steps. Joe would have loved this, Charlie said, and we hiked to the beginning of the steps, which was quite an endeavor, I am mortified to say. I think I pulled a muscle. Thousand Steps is actually 1,033 stone steps that workers at Ledge Quarry used to walk up in order to spend their long and difficult workday quarrying ganister, a Tuscarora sandstone. The stone was carried out of the quarry by “dinkey railroad,” a small train that ran between the quarry and the refractory.
Upon returning home we chatted a bit, then headed to a neighboring town to pick up Charlie’s daughter and headed to the airport. Charlie, brought up in the area, new every back road and tore through them in a manner that was, I must say, quite exciting. There was one dippy stretch of road that I actually whooped as my stomach dropped through my feet. Oh, how your reservations fall away when you’re with people who feel like family.
Not a backroad, but a highway in Maryland with wildflowers down the center.
And that, my friends, was one of my great regrets of this last day. Charlie and Charlotte declined my assurance that I would be fine if they just “dumped me off at the airport curb,” and in fact, seemed a little insulted that I would suggest such a thing. Instead, they would check in with me and we would grab a bite to eat before I left.
O, patriot act*! How cruel and uncaring your policies do seem! When I checked in, the Continental guy said, “It’s peak travel time so your mission now is to get through security.” I asked him if non-ticketed passengers could go through with me. Hah, seasoned airport travelers, I hear your chortling from here. So it was with a heavy heart and a mild feeling of panic that I had to say goodbye to them. I had thought that I was going to have another hour or so with them and all of a sudden it was time for goodbye and, quite frankly, I was unprepared for how sad I would be. Unsurprisingly to many who know me, I bubbled over with tears and hugged everyone, even Charlie’s daughter who I had only met an hour or so before (but she was ultra-cool). I’m sure I said a bunch of dumb things and then it was over; I was on my way home.
*or whatever policy has beefed up airport security to its current extremist state. I’m not all that up on this stuff. And before you holler at me I’m not saying it’s bad, I’m just saying that, like everything, it has its downside, and this was it.
Well, I was on my way to the most boring a torturous 10 hours since I gave birth to Ruby. Security was fairly easy, although I had to take out the laptop and take off my shoes and I wasn’t sure about my camera and my bag got swabbed for explosive residue. They guy was really friendly about it, he kind of reminded me of Willow Ufgood except more average-sized. Then I sat on my butt for 2 hours, steadfastly refusing to pay $4 for 10 minutes of airport wireless and wondering why they would put so many non-functioning electrical outlets in one place. Was it some sort of experiment?
The flights were boring. I saw two movies, one called “The Last Holiday” with Queen Latifah and the other one was about Texas Western University and how they stopped sucking when they hired a new coach and recruited African American students. It was hot and cramped. And utterly bo-ring.
Finally I grabbed my bags and launched myself out of the airport, and who should be coming around the corner just then but my beautiful family in our gorgeous family car. I tossed my bag in the back, gave my stirring Ruby a huge kiss, and jumped into the car, enveloping my husband in a sideways bear-hug. Porter didn’t wake until the morning, when I was treated to an exclamation of, “Mommy!” and an extra-long cuddle.
Today we went to lunch and Ruby packed up her three most favored treasures: the rocks I brought her from Yosemite, the Amish doll Charlotte gave her, and the Amish doll Charlotte gave Porter which Ruby then stole from him.
Now it’s over. Thanks for riding with us.