Wrathful Grapes

The comedy we can chalk up to experience. Our friend the comedian didn't make it because of the snow. 

Can you believe it? We arrive in New Mexico and it snows. Last night we ordered pizza and the drive was perilous. Freezing slush caused cars to slide into 180's and the pizza place understood why we were 40 minutes late picking up our order. "Drive safe!" The girl at the window admonished. I decided to close my eyes and pray hard the whole way home (since a third set of eyes doesn't do any good anyway) and I prayed for her since it was still snowing and it would be worse when her shift was over. 

We watched "the Grapes of Wrath" with our pizza and Angry Orchard hard cider (another first for me - I'd never had a beer before). We agreed as we ejected the VHS tape an hour and a half in that the movie was incredibly well-acted and -flmed, and that we had seen enough. I read the Wikipedia summary of the ending and confirmed out decision. 

The depression-era movie about a large, dirt-poor family searching in vain for work was heavy on my soul. We watched Frozen in order to lighten the load. 

Anyhow, we listened to recordings of the guy we came for on the way home. 

There were four acts tonight and we stuck through them in spite of the cringes and awkwardness of new performers. The crowd was kind and it really was a good time. 

Arriving in Albuquerque, Heather and I hung out in a Barnes and Noble to shelter from the gray cold outside. She told me that the state was more enchanting and colorful to her the last time she had come. I haven't been before, so the landscape is thrilling. 

The mountains are pointy and jagged like the kind I used to draw as generic mountains when I was a child. I might not yet have seen snow-covered mountains making those nature drawings but something in me believed they were out there when mom told me to draw them and so I drew them. 

Heather loves the state nonetheless. She will live there someday, she says. She turned to me and asked, "What state will you live in?"

"All of them."

I learned a little about Cirque de Soleil from the guy we're visiting here. He has a huge book all about it. I can see Cirque's makeup and art and travel being part of my future. 

I'm sitting in the back seat of our Dodge Journey because Heather and Matt are navigating. It makes me feel like a kid again when mom and dad would sit in the front!  

We visited the "Old City" of Albuquerque and a lot of places were closed because of the snow. Sugar skulls abounded at the tourist shops which speaks to happy memories of mine from my face-painting days at Dutch Wonderland. 

I found a ring that made me think of the "frozen fractals" Elsa sings about in the movie we watched last night but how nice that I told the lady I felt I could spend my money more wisely! I had room to buy the better ring tonight!

In the old city was an old church. The walls are five feet thick. Most importantly, on the walls were numbered paintings depicting the narrative of Jesus' crucifixion. Could these be the stations of the cross I had been wondering about earlier? I think so. 

New Mexico was a good state today. 

 

Simply Southwest

So, I'm in New Mexico right now. But pretend I'm in Texas still, because I still have to tell you all about it, and this is a blast from the future. 

I just have to tell you about my very exciting experience shopping for jewelry today. 

The farther west I travel, the more hell-bent I become on buying beautiful and unique jewelry as means of "souvenir."  And today, rifling through shop after shop in Albuquerque and Santa Fe, I searched anxiously for the perfect piece. 

I found it in:

Simply Southwest Trading Post

78 E San Fransisco St.

Santa Fe, NM 87501

Traipsing through the cold streets as darkness fell, something drew me inside. Maybe it was the name of the store or the window display. In any case, I met a lady who showed me to the rings that came from the time when the store used to accept pawned jewelry. 

I was immediately captivated. These pieces had stories, and appealed to my "goodwill"/"thrift store" shopping sensibilities. 

Make no mistake, however - there were no thrift store prices here. 

I had my eye on three pieces. And of course, the one vying for first place was way outside of my price range. 

This is when the store manager comes over, listens to my plight, and whips out his calculator. He takes almost half off of the original price. 

And this is the part I'm proud of: I bargain him down fifteen dollars further with my iron gaze (I'm sure those of you who are familiar with me know exactly what I'm talking about or are laughing right now). 

And he shakes hands with me and both of my accompanying friends. 

The least I can do is give the store a big blog mention. 

I haven't taken the price tag off the ring so I can remember exactly how blessed I am by this event. 

I should put my blogging device down, I suppose, because I'm trying to experience New Mexican night life at a comedy club. My friend knows the comedian and I feel so grown up being 21 and allowed into a bar! It's good to be enchanted by the little things, right?

Blue Bell

The second day in Oklahoma I got baptized which you already know about.

We went to Chipotle afterward. It was my first time there and I definitely didn't know what to get because I didn't want anything there. So I got lettuce with roastred vegetables and cheese. I could've at least gotten meat.  *facepalm*

I hear great things about this chain and was surprised and nonplussed by what I found inside. The cafeteria setup reminds me of a place back home called Taco Maya which is at least 100% better. Maybe because it's not a chain and because I'm more familiar with it. Anyway, Leslie, if you're reading this, this is for you: GO TACO MAYA!

During our dinner, I learned that Phillip (one of our friends) works for Blue Bell ice cream. I was reminded of this because Heather and I are driving out of Texas right now and we just passed by some trucks with the Blue Bell logo on them. I smiled.

When I heard this, I smiled politely and nodded, thinking of Bkure Bunny ice cream which my friends tell me doesn't actually ever melt but just kind of congeals and turns into a spongy flavorless mass. They only purchase the big tubs for kids' parties. But Phillip quickly assures us that Blue Bell is at least 100 times better than the bunny stuff. Apparently his company receives letters of adoration and videos of grandkids eating a gallon of their recently deceased grandmother's favorite flavor. Therefore, I was impressed.

It was a good night. Phil and Sarah are great people.

But the night wasn't over. Nick, our uncle-ish cousin, has connections and got us a ride on a police helicopter. I was more nervous about the controls and communication inside the helicopter than actually flying in it, but everything turned out fine. Cousin Vinny, Heather and I squished in and it was a good time.

We flew over a giant cemetery.
A pilot: "No heat signatures there." Heh heh.

The next day we took a tour of the police station. It was something else. Then we drove around Tulsa in the dark and took pictures of everything we didn't get to!

The last thing we did on the way out of OK was make a pilgrimage in the falling snow with Peaches and all to a special gas station/gift shop/restaurant/soda bottle heaven called Pop's. It has a giant pop bottle out front and its glass walls are lined floor to ceiling with over 600 flavors of bottled soda. I got prickly pear pop. Heather and I bid our goodbyes to the Hondroses and moved on.

Well, I guess that wasn't the last thing to report - carrying on courageously (behind low drivers) through the slush and the filling snow, we made our way to Oklahoma city. And what do you know, the memorial museum there was closed early for bad weather.  Lots of the recommendations in the tour guides can be skipped if they're closed (like the Devil's Rope museum somewhere in Texas - totally devoted to barbed wire), but the bombing memorial isn't one of them. We stayed the night and vowed an early start the next morning.

Hotels were especially full. Nobody wanted to drive in the snow. This brought out a bit of Massachusetts pride in my sister as she expertly navigated the slippery mess on the roads. "It's not so bad," she said, "these people have no idea what they're doing." I was very proud of her.

The museum was on point. The curators used technology to make an impact rather than simply to impress, and everything was tastefully done.  For example, the exhibits barely mentioned the person at fault until about halfway through the walkthrough plan of the museum. That way, the memorial was sure to be about Oklahomans and the american spirit rather than a monument of anger against a single man.

I feel like if I was doing a paper on the event, going to the museum instead of to the library would be a good idea. The memorial left no stone unturned.

Basketball

In Oklahoma our family has been incredibly welcoming.

When I say "Oklahoma," I always want to sing it like they do in the musical: "OOOOOOO....klaHO-ma!" Not that I've ever seen it before or anything.

We stayed in Tulsa with a geriatric dog named Peaches. I think Peaches and I became friends. Peaches' brother Buck died a few years ago and the way you hear the owners talk about him and see the way they treat Peaches is really wonderful. I love it when people have deep love for animals.

The first thing we did upon arrival at the Hondros' house (besides flopping on the couch) was go to their son's basketball game. The last time I had watched a basketball game was in middle school when Heather was a cheerleader. I was bored out of my mind.

It's been several years since I was in sixth grade, and I couldn't believe how exciting this game was. It ALMOST made sense. The suspense, the emotion, the excitement, the disappointment - and the HAIRCUTS. Each of the players must have gone out and gotten a fresh one before the game because I was fascinated by the cleanly executed coifs. It was a hairdresser's dream.

Another amazing thing:  before the game, there was a senior player-honoring ceremony. Seniors walked onto the court with their parents to recordings of their voices introducing themselves telling about themselves and their future plans. One of the guys shocked me by saying his "pre-game superstition" is praying and one of his future plans is to go to Bible school and study missions. I totally wanted to give him my number.

But that's not all. A girl walked on and I don't remember what else she said but at the end she quoted a Bible verse and said straight out "I give all the glory to god and aim to serve Him in everything I do."

That's my GIRL!

I've never seen anything like that happen at MY school. I don't even know if I'd have the courage to do that. I was so happy in that moment.

I was told later that everyone knew there were two new faces in the stands that night. And when we went to Applebee's the Hondroses had never gotten better service, they joked. That made me feel special.

I also feel super-cool and mature going to a high school game since I'm not in high school anymore. I can observe high school social dynamics and antics from a removed standpoint and find a sort of enjoyment from the fact that I'm not stuck in that hell anymore. But I didn't see anyone not enjoying themselves either - which was enjoyable too.

And I almost forgot - there was an INCREDIBLE dance team at half time (and they sure knew how to tease their hair, man). They did an Alice in Wonderland-inspired dance with talent that I wouldn't expect to come consistently from such a large group of high schoolers.

What a full night. I also got coffee at Starbucks instead of a frappuccino. So many discoveries!

So it should be no surprise that the next day I slept IN.  And the next, for that matter.

Baptism

There was a commercial the other day where I turned around just in time to see a man rescuing a goldfish (fishbowl and all) from a burning building.

I had never thought of that before. Have you? Cats and dogs, yes, but fish?

Well, fish are people, too.

I also just saw a poster with the words, "men are only temporary. Cats are eternal."

Yes.

Speaking of water and eternity, I got baptized yesterday. I can't help but think about the Crystal Castle's song "baptism" which I love. But that song is about bitterness and hopelessness, which is not how my baptism was.

As you know, I'm on a road trip. I'm currently in the state of Oklahoma, and Heather and I were visiting her good friends by going to their church for a Saturday night service. It was great. I was skeptical at first about the genuinity of the worship and the biblicality of the teaching, but it all came together, for SURE. And, go figure, this church has the resources to have an ever-ready baptismal pool thing in a room adjacent to the sanctuary. After each service, if someone "gets saved," they can get baptized immediately. The church is called Church on the Move, but when I messed up and called it "Church on the Go," maybe I wasn't so wrong.

A cool thing about this church is that at the end of each service, EVERYBODY stands and says a salvation prayer together. There's no altar call or awkward hand-raising and every believer gets the opportunity, not to say it again in case it didn't work last time (that's not how it works) but to tell God again how much they love Him and want to love Him more.

And it gives those who weren't  believers the chance to say the prayer with the rest of the church and maybe to mean it for the first time.

I love it.

And then there's no awkward waiting time like I had where I felt like I had to wait until it was JUST the right time to get baptized. The church is bringing it back to the days when preachers would come to towns and the people would experience revival and run to the river to be baptized (that's how it is in the movies anyway). And even to when people listened to John and did the same thing!

You don't have to wait. Get baptized spiritually and physically!

Anyway. I hadn't gotten this feeling in a while, but I got it when everybody stood up to go home or get drinks from the church café. That sinking, tight stomach feeling that I can kind of ignore until I get out into the parking lot and it might go away but it pretty much means God is convicting me to do something right away and I'll feel better if I do it.

So, I ask Heather and her friend (who works for her church) "can you guys baptize me?"

So we do it. Finally.

I was really concerned that everyone would think I wasn't truly serious about having Jesus as my savior. I wanted them to know I had been a Christian for a while and I was "one of them."  I know I looked so nervous and shifty to them.

The first lady I talked to asked me, "do you accept Jesus Christ as your lord and savior?" (Or something like that) and I answered yes and then tried to spit out the rest of my testimony. She stopped me and said, "it doesn't matter, so long as Jesus is in your heart."

Well, okay.

The next ladies I talked to I told them I was from PA and this was my first and only time at their church and then kind of tried to dig myself out of the implication that I was a thrill-seeker getting baptized so I could come home and have a really cool story to tell. I dropped some words like "Kenya" and "obedience" and "conviction."

But that might be part of why I did it to be honest.

I also did it so I didn't have to make a big deal about it with all of my Christian friends (this includes my parents).  At home, I'd have to tell everybody and they'd all make a big deal (and probably cry and pray over me and come to the ceremony and cry more).  I'd have to take lots of classes to make sure i knew exactly what I was doing. Get it?

When I got baptized, nobody cried, nobody gave me wise words or said, "you've been washed in the Blood, sister." I did it for God and it wasn't about anyone else.

And honestly, I don't feel overcome with anything. I can just check it off as a big thing God says to do so when he comes back, I won't have to snap my fingers and go, oh shoot, I never got around to that.

There's a woman who came into the bathroom when I was changing and she told me she had gotten baptized (and implied that she got saved at the same day) three years ago. It changed her life, she said, and it will change my life, too. She told me to remember that when I fail (which I will), everything has been left behind in that water.  It's still taken away and paid for by God. That was beautiful.

I didn't care that she thought I had just come to Jesus. Each of us comes to Jesus each day anyway and Jesus sometimes rewards, celebrates, and honors the new workers in his vineyard more than the old ones. There's no shame in being new.

I See People

I am currently experiencing the length of a cargo train. If a train is going to carry cargo, I guess it had better carry a lot of it. Probably a good five minutes past a road of it. Okay, it's done.

Today we visited a national park dedicated to george Washington Carver. He had a disturbingly high-pitched voice, but otherwise, the path his life took and the path he took his life was enthralling. (We watched a film.) He helped farmers plant their way out of poverty, man! And he made paintings! He earned respect from white people even during a time when segregation made no leeway for him.

Heather and I had good burgers today, with everything on them that a burger could want and nothing that a burger wouldn't want.

We are on our way to Tulsa to see family and have stopped at a couple of old gas stations. We drove through the corner of Kansas, which we could count as an accomplishment.

I would like to note that, especially in Missouri, consistently and almost equidistant from ome another would be flocks of small birds that would lift off from the road just as they were about to be run over. Not so much in Oklahoma where we are now or in Indiana where we were before, or back home where the main ani!Al's of the road are squirrels.

We have passed by a few interesting billboards:
"Does your logo look like poop?...."
"Quick and easy divorce!"
"We see people."

And some license plates:
S8N H8N
AS U WSH
YES LOVE (that was actually at home before are left)
DOG LB

I think I'm officially caught up on here!
Check back for more, eventually!

Precious Moments

The first stop after the wagon wheel hotel was "the world's biggest rocking chair." It has a sign not to climb it. I wonder why it was built, and if it rocks. It towers above the gift shop and indoor archery range next door. Built of cedar and filled with candles, it is a good-smelling shop indeed. We leave in search of another cavern.

This time our tour guide was a geologist but she didn't skimp on the fun history. This cave was a speakeasy at one point, for example. And the first people to explore it were twelve women. Women.

The best part was that we didn't have to walk. It was like a hayride. We sat and drank coffee from the gift shop and took pictures and asked questions without shifting our weight and getting bored of standing up. This is the lazy Danielle shining through. The edge of the trailer gave me a place to stabilize my camera since I had it on "no flash" which makes the shutter speed really long which makes the pictures really blurry. I felt like I was a sniper, holding my breath and squeezing the trigger between heartbeats.

Heather and I met this great girl our age in the restroom and talked about hair extensions, life, and travel. She was so friendly and if she's reading this, I just want to give her a shout out for !asking my day!

Then we rushed to a national park before its closing time to get more stamps for heather's national parks book! This park was a civil war battleground where a lot of guerrilla-style warfare went on. There I met a woman and we connected over her hair. I learned how to achieve the blonde she has, too, because her hairdresser let her in on the ins and outs of the whole process. She is also a historic costume designer! How cool is that?

There, I also got a high-five from a ranger for having pink hair. That made me feel good.

We found a warmer hotel. It is called the "precious moments some chain or other hotel" and has precious moments sculptures and stuffed animals in the gift shop and precious moments artwork all over the walls.

How precious.

Gateway to the West

So anyway. Getting to saint Louis was easy; getting a cheap room in the city was not (go figure). I was tired and ready to spend anything, or even go for a hostel with very eerie reviews, but heather and I used an app called "hotel tonight" and found something surprising. Our room wads spacious and even had couches! We ate easy mac with my business cards folded up as makeshift spoons at the coffee table just like we eat dinner at home (minus the cards).

We asked the man at the front desk where we could get milk for the cereal we brought in and he activated a card for us: "room 817 - and feel free to leave some of your pop tarts." Room 817 was for premium guests it had a fridge with milk and a rack of granola bars, etc. We left a couple of our pop tarts in exchange for the milk. I felt very surreptitious.

We walked to the arch the next day. St Louis seemed windier than the windy city, and very quiet. We asked about this and apparently it's normal. Due to its unusual shape, there are very star-trek ish "trolleys" to the top instead of "regular" elevators. And the sound of shifting cables plus the sight of dimly-lit spiral staircases, riveted sheets of metal, and ladders was what I like to call "something else."

Upon arriving at the top, the windows were just like they look like from the bottom, little horizontal rectangles with a big view. While trying to get a meaningful photograph out of one of them, I hear a beckoning to come over and get a picture taken with my sister. And then, the unthinkable. The man asks, "Would you like a picture with your camera?" I pause visibly. There was that one cute kid in Kenya, but normally I don't care for people to use my camera.

One of the ladies with him read my mind. "He's a photographer," she said. I smiled at myself as I handed my baby over and got the first picture of myself (plus my sister) on my memory card for this trip. It was quite a nice photo.

The four people were so pleasant and encouraging about our journey. I hope to see them again someday!

There was also a very cool law enforcement ranger who referred to the first half of our drive through Missouri as "deliverance" country (and then had to explain the movie to us). If the first part was, then I'm pretty sure all of it was, actually. But the people were nice. Two people so far have pulled over and asked if we were okay (which of course we weren't). One man even got out of his car.

The ranger told me that once the museum underneath the arch is finished, it won't be about westward expansion anymore, it'll be about Missouri. And the arch is supposed to be the gateway to the west. Sometimes governmental people have to make decisions and the ones they make don't always make sense.

Also, rangers have to pay for their own oparking (including when there are big games and events in the city and the price goes wayyy up). Ridiculous.

Fellow ranger "deliverance country"

Coming in from our long walk through the blustering walk to the arch (our only stop was a brief stop in the entrance of an old church recommended by a tour book. It was in the entrance while people were exiting with ash on their foreheads that we realized Mardi gras, was, on fact yesterday and today was ash Wednesday. We made a graceful exit and left the full church with beautiful singing behind.), the security guard notifies me, "you've got a little...run...there." - referring to the mascara running down my face.

This is no ordinary mascara. This is IT mascara, innovative technologies mascara, the first to make me feel comfortable without fake eyelashes since I first started wearing those eyelash-destroyers.

I also I have an IT suitcase. Coincidence? I think NOT. Not significant, though.

...And these are no ordinary mascara runs. They are scars from doing battle with the eleven degree wind chill outside. They will be documented forever in the souvenir photo heather and I are bringing home with us.

We get get "concretes" (blizzards) from a stand where you I have to order outside. Ridiculous, right?  The man there tells us about people who pass through driving the route in brand new cars given to them by radio stations for some reason. Guess we missed that boat.

But we didn't miss the boat to the meramec caverns tour. Heather wanted to see it and she wished so hard that even though we arrived significantly past closing time, a very charismatic and knowledgeable man led us on a tour that lasted an hour and 20 minutes. I mean, that's what he said it would be. I wouldn't be surprised if it was two hours. I learned about dolmite, limestone, manganese, iron, expand more. Even a different kind of formation that takes place in stagnant water which was unfamiliar to me.

This man's life story came out slowly. He was an artist and continued from there doing a range of things until a misunderstanding sent him back to Missouri. It was hard for me to understand, but tjhe thought came to mind that everybody's life story makes sense to them.

There was a motel along the way with some history, next to a barbecue place with some authenticity to it. We stayed there. It was a creepy night. I put my coat and the laundry bag up against the cracks in the door to insulate. The front desk lady left right after we checked in and the only other guests left just as we were settling in. It's called in the wagon wheel motel. It has a nice sign and a nice gift shop.

My sister made a recording of my snoring on her phone and played it for me upon my waking. She says it's constant. Her life must be very unpleasant when I am asleep.

Let's Not and Say We Did

Have I mentioned that, among all of the unrelated and ridiculous jewelry you can buy in Chicago gift shops, I did not see any jewelry boasting a shiny replica of the Chicago bean. Of course, one never finds what one hopes to find. Perhaps the bean is copyrighted, as any other work of art would be.

You can get bean jewelry online but the beans are shaped like vegetable beans.

In Lincoln, Illinois, there is a building with a telephone booth on the roof. In the tour book there was a picture of a different picture right next to that paragraph so I was led to believe the booth was inside the dome of the courthouse. The nice man who showed us the beautiful domed ceiling of the courthouse pointed us across the street to the city hall, a brick building...with a white, glass-walled telephone booth right on the roof. (It would've been cooler if it was blue since I'm a Doctor Who fan.)

We walked inside knowing they were planning on taking it down soon for "safety" reasons but asked to go up anyway. The person up front was a woman so we couldn't flirt at all to make our way up the stairs. She said no. (So I guess it's for the best it wasn't blue!)

Somewhere along the road after that we were passing through yet another lonely agro-industrial town-village and nearly drove by this gloriously kitschy route 66 junk storefront. There was a big sign, a few old cars out front, lots of lawn ornaments, a Betty Boop poster next to one of Marilyn Monroe, lots and lots of old gas station signs, a couple of old pumps, and a sign that said, "open all the time, except when closed."

We took lots of pictures, then moved on.

We most recently saw a giant sculpture of a green and yellow frog up the hill from us on our side of the road. Before that, there was a pink elephant wearing hipster glasses. I write these down because these things are smack on the side of the road with no place to stop and get out to take pictures. It's also cold and we also don't have all the time in the world.

When we got to Springfield Illinois, our magnificent tour guide Jennie took us around the house former President Lincoln owned with his wife and I believe four children (one died very young). I was very impressed by how much of the interior was original.

Maybe it's just because I'm older now, but the tours I've been on are incredibly more I interesting than I have expected.

There's a place called Carlinville (which I imagine is a bit like Levittown) where there is a large remnant of houses installed right out of the Sears catalog.  People could pick a house, order it, and have it built by sears, and here in Carlinville was a whole neighborhood if we were willing to drive 24 extra miles.

Nope.

We'll look up pictures later.

Right before Saint Louis there is supposed to be a super-long walking bridge called Chain of Rocks bridge. And I couldn't help but sing "chain chain chaaain....chain of rooocks"

This bridge is difficult to find in the dark with contradicting signs and directions. We found a bridge but it didn't look like the one in the picture and so I will refer to grandpa's legendary joke statement (because I'm pretty sure he never actually did this) "let's not and say we did." Therefore: we saw Chain of Rocks bridge and moved on to Saint Louis.

Hot Sauce

Today Heather and I set out for Springfield after a healthy, hearty hostel breakfast.

It quickly became apparent to us that there would be little staring out of windows today. We brought books along to read to each other across the country, but if the complicated directions in our route 66 guidebook continue, the trip will proceed like this: Heather drives, I read the directions, and when the directions stop making sense we pull over and Heather makes it work again.

We were introduced to the feeling of being half in the middle of nowhere but half somewhere. The snow spread flat and largely uninterrupted except for roads and industrial shindigs and power plants.

Signs would pop up: "Town Name : Population 500" or even 2500 for one town. One town described itself as a small town with a big heart, which was very sweet.

We stopped for some legendary hot dogs which were pretty much hot dogs, and photo ops along the way "Look over THERE! Pull over!"

As the light faded our quest for Springfield became more frantic. Would our exhausted minds make it? No, let's just get to Lincoln and stay the night.

No doubt due to the season and a God that loves us, sister and I found a hotel room. I feel like a queen in my queen bed.

Also, there is a man named Billy Bob who lives in Chicago and is looking for work and makes YouTube videos and wants to make a Wizard of Oz remake based on the healthcare system and wants to be a motivational speaker. His favorite restaurant gives him hot sauce whenever he walks in, and he told us where a better sign was for The Beginning of route 66. I wish him the best.

The Road

Trucks are a big part of the road system anywhere one goes. In Kenya they're called "lorries." We passed by one that I imagined looked about the shape of the kind of truck that hauls pigs off to the slaughter - except this one was covered in black tarp - a small nod to humanity perhaps, on such a cold day. Not that such a thin covering would keep the poor pigs from dying of cold before they got to the slaughterhouse. 

But that was all in my imagination. Perhaps I should do more research. 

There's an Elizabeth Arden perfume, I believe, called "red door." There was a spoof on it in the form of an SNL "ad" where a man narrates "she's funny, but not in a ha-ha sort of way. (Awkward pause.) More in a scary sort of way." The visual is a well-dressed and polished woman at a society party making faces at a man and then changing them after hiding her face behind a napkin. A deep advertorial voice comes on and names the perfume as the image of the bottle appears: "Red Flag." 

Another SNL clip worth reporting: a hick voice narrating the beginning of a movie: "papa always believed laughter was the best medicine. I guess that's why eleven of us died of tuberculosis when we were youngins."

There's a reason I was glued to the TV instead of the pizza. 

Have you experienced a suddenly warmed heart when someone driving your way on a dark, dark road has turned of his brights for you? It makes you feel seen, considered. Loved. 

Have you also experienced the miracle of four-way flashers? It is so accurate and understandable. "Avoid me."  "I'm lost." "I'm not from around here." "Just drive around." "Don't expect me to do anything right."

A miracle. 

It is also a miracle that we are doing this in the OFF season so that the pressure comes only from our own confusion, not from other frazzled drivers, too. 

There's a lady I met at a gas station as I was buying yet another red bull in exchange for the use of her bathroom. We exchanged our hair's life stories. I never once told her about my cosmetology background, but was able to understand her as she told me about getting the type of perm she didn't ask for and the type of haircut her hairstylist wanted and she didn't. I congratulated her on cutting her mermaid hair to a more reasonable length (after having thought about it for two years) and we parted amiably. I really hope that as a cosmetologist I will be able to maintain the identities of my clients that they have through their hair. I love out-of-salon experiences like this to show me how to listen. 

Now that I have left the Chicago hostel, I can officially say that the girls with whom I shared the room totally friendly, totally respectful. I think sometimes it is easier for people to get along the less we are familiar with one another. We respect each other's strangerness. 

In Chicago were a few beautiful sculptures. My dilemma: if they already are works of art, why photograph them in an effort to make my own piece of art?

I tried to express this to my sister whose indifference showed me that my idea was kind of an excuse not to try. The next morning we revisited the sculptures and I found the most amazing compositions in some of them. At the end of my trip, I'll give you the link to see the best photos from my trip. 

I have so much more to share: lincoln's house, the St. Louis arch and the amazing people I met there, the wagon wheel motel - the nice man at the hotel before that who let us get milk for our cereal out of the vip lounge (!) - but there's more driving to do. Probably in Tulsa Oklahoma where we stop to see family I'll catch up. 

I also want to share about running mascara and my sister's seventh circle of hell (aka my constant snoring). More later. 

Gift

Heather and I spent Valentine's day with our family near Detroit.

Mommy and Daddy gave us chocolate in envelopes to open on that day. My bar had a colorful Mona Lisa on it. My parents know me.

And do you want to know something dreadful? One of our cousins is sick! But this cousin was such a good sport, and so was everyone else about our stay. Heather and I kind of didn't want to leave.

The drive from PA was rough. We stopped as little as possible, didn't lollygag, didn't run into traffic. We lapped each rest area building to keep our sanity. But it kind of barely worked. If aunt, uncle and cousins weren't there to greet us we might have been very forlorn that night.

My cousins are adventuresome, achieving, atypical, amusing, and attractive (good for "a" words, right?) and each time I see them they're so different from the last time yet very much exactly themselves.

I visited the MAC makeup counter at the mall with the gang and the manager and I had a nice conversation. I kind of want to move to Detroit now and work there.

But I also want to live in Chicago and go to the art school there. This is why: Heather and I walked by the Art Institute and, among the omnipresent "falling ice" signs on the sidewalks, a student had posted: "falling ice/falling dice/falling mice/falling rice/in any case, take care and use caution." And I laughed and said, "There must be an art school nearby." And I looked up, and there was the sign.

I'll probably want to live in all of the places I stay.

Gift or curse?

Certainly not a curse.

Lemon Water

Today H. and I are driving to Chicago! And

Okay well now it's night time and we've gotten there.

I had to stop writing because I'm the backseat driver everyone wants too have: I say encouraging things, give my advice when requested, don't freak out when we have to drive into the little triangle at the fork on the road and discuss which fork tine to take, agree that all maps and road signs are stupid, and I don't ask "are we there yet?" And I don't beg to drive if h. doesn't think conditions are favorable, and I put the four-ways on when necessary, and also act as an extra pair of eyes for switching lanes (which brings us full-circle to me putting down the tablet).

I wasn't required to sign the rental car agreement, but I can be a grown-up by having a good attitude and helping the better driver. Yes, Heather is the better driver.  The two of us have come to the conclusion that my art art is not precise and neither are my thoughts, and so it should not be a surprise that neither is my driving style. I feel totally safe with myself in a car. Apparently sister is working on it. Seeing things from her eyes, I give her much credit.

We counted the lanes on the way into Chicago: five, then six. And of course I had been of the opinion that we should be on the absolute left because a mile ago the exit 51 sign had been on the left. Exit 51 is on the right. Sister did an excellent job of changing lanes. I had a face-to-face (through windows) encounter with a nice woman who waved us on, and also experienced the phenomenon of people honking in a sea full of cars. Which is pointless since one think could be for any of eight cars around the sound. And it puts everyone who hears it on edge. But extra beeping is part of the glory of a city - signifying its pace and attitude and separating it from other places.

We went up to the top of what used to be the Sears tower this evening. It is now the Willis tower. The tower was originally built because Sears was booming and had four office locations in Chicago. In order to fit it all under one roof, they calculated the floor space that they would need to combine all four offices and came up with the tower we have today.

It's sad how Sears was so bright and beautiful back in the day and now it's hiding in the back corner of the my nearby mall, with a half-full parking lot on the good days.

Once I saw a Sears sign with the "S" out. I took a picture.

From the top of the tower, though, was the night view. (No wait. It was 14 degrees. Small blessings.) At first I thought all of the straight, bright yellow lines were the cars down below.

Nope, Heather said, those are street lights. Brighter than headlights, and a different color. The headlights were a mess of wiggly, blurry little white fireflies moving along the big roafds and the cloverleaves.

If I were to draw a conclusion from that it would be that, from above, even cars are ephemeral.

I mostly just thought about the owl city song "fireflies."

We went to a restaurant to eat Chicago's (so I've heard) famous deep-dish pizza. It took 45 minutes to bake. There were televisions around the perimeter of the restaurant and when the pizza came (really just a solid hunk of baked cheese - worth it only to say I've eaten it) it didn't draw our tired eyes away from SNL (on a Sunday night?) Heather commented, "It's as if we'd never seen TV before." And it was true. We were one of THOSE people whose "together time" is sitting together, apart. But we're together a lot.

Oh, and she bought me a drink. And I liked it. Two milestones.

The best things at the restaurant were the two black toilets in the ladies room. No, I take that back. Our waitress got us water before she asked us if we wanted anything to drink to save herself the sorrow of "I'll just have water, thanks" that she would otherwise have to hear thirty times a day.

We saw the Chicago Bean and a fountain with no water, and a frozen Lake Michigan. And are staying at a hostel with nice people. And we have a blue car.

I'm getting a lot of compliments on my hair. I feel like it opens doors in people's hearts, if I may go so far as to say that. For example, black women notice and then they know I appreciate their hair and the work that went into it. The only shutting doors might be the little old ladies I make eye contact with. I smile at them and they quickly look away.

Oh yes, I saw you!  (But I smiled politely at you, bet you didn't see that coming!)

Our last stop in Michigan was a "Pure Michigan" stop. It was a very...independent gas station with all of your grocery needs inside, and a soda fountain. And wine, and a cafeteria (closed). I prayed the toilet would remain attached to the ground as I balanced upon it and snickered at the machine that was vending "assorted" "adult" merchandise instead of the usual things you would find in a ladies' room.

My dilemma: if I am filling my water bottle at the soda fountain at a place like this or any place, and while intentionally pulling the water lever, I unintentionally push the lemonade lever too, do I pay for the lemon water or let it go?

This was a very large moral problem for me but it felt like picking at scabs to go and explain and pay.

I'm getting the feeling there are bigger moral fish to fry.

Break a Mirror

We're off!  I just put on my makeup in the car and there are still about 113 miles left to drive before our triptych from AAA gives us another direction.

My sister and I avoided leaving yesterday because of forecasts of snow and other bad conditions along our route. If we had left, though, we wouldn't have gotten laundry and extra shopping done.

Not to mention we went hither and yon to get together and send my application to take my state board cosmetology test. We went to Walgreen's to get a 2"x2" passport photo, PNC to get a money order since the testing facility doesn't take checks, and the post office since I'm not psychic and don't know how much postage a packet of application materials costs.

Such were my dealings with the state.

I will not be studying on my trip. Come on. Would I actually choose my textbook over staring out the window?

My sister just pointed out that this is Friday the 13th. We have no choice but to keep living. It is bright and sunny, and the police are out, and I refuse to knock on wood because I trust God to take care of us, and all of the other drivers on the roads today too. I may even break a mirror for good measure.

The Alabaster Jar

Until the last month or so, I was feeling very noncommittal toward this trip. I didn't know if finances or timing would line up. But once they did, I went nuts deciding to "take ownership" of the trip.

My research and decision-making got to the point where mom had to remind me that it's my sister's trip and I'm the guest she invitied. After that things got back into balance.

One of the things I'm most excited about is drawing on the backs of all of my old vistaprint business cards. They have this annoying complicated URL that people can use to get to my photobucket to view my artwork, which was good enough for a while. But I actually needed a new card a while ago once I started doing hair (one that says I do hair). And it's about time I have a legit website that people might see and actually consider visiting!

So - what to do with the remaining 200 crap cards I have? Do mini sketches on the backs of them instead of keeping a sketchbook, duh!

I'm so smart.

Packing will be interesting. Dad and I were just talking about cleaning out his bookshelf and how he knew he'd want at least one of the books he was getting rid of. And he did. So, when packing minimally so we have to mail back as little as possible, what will I wish I had brought about an hour out on the road? And how late is too late to turn back to get it?

Another thought I had is that the trip I made to Africa over a year ago was nearly a waste of time because I had a bad attitude the whole time and if I have a good attitude during this trip I can make up for that horrible month. If I spend it right, I can build stronger relationships with God, my sister, and even my country.

I have a question-is driving all over the country for no particular reason except just to see it actually a waste of time and money - and should I feel any kind of way about that?

I did kind of like how when someone scolded a lady for pouring expensive perfume on Jesus' feet because the perfume could've been sold and the money given to the poor, Jesus scolded that person and said, "you will always have the poor, but you will not always have me." What looks like waste to some isn't always.

And if so, does turning it into a little personal mission trip make it worthwhile?

Telling people about Jesus on the way sounds scary but I might try it if it feels like God wants me to.  But I might stick more to the being a living testament kind of ministry where my actions toward others will bless them. In my other blog I end up writing often about my driving experiences. I hope I can find a way not to curse other people through my driving. 

My sister wants to read "the grapes of wrath" on the road. I just got it in the mail. It's a long book and I can't wait to read it even if it's horrible.

You know how I go through phases? My false eyelashes, for example. Now it' s pink hair. For the trip I hope to put micro braids in my hair with pink kenakelon. That way it will look the same every day and stay pink better than my actual hair.  We'll see how long the pink phase lasts.

I obviously have expectations for this trip. But what if no book reading occurs and my sister and I fight all the time? Or what if the weather is different from the average of the last ten years according to Wikipedia? What if I'm not as flexible as I think I am? I pray the negative things become laughable. 

Fun fact - did you know that for every hour a gallon of milk is left at room temperature outside the fridge, it loses a day of goodness?  That makes me think twice about leaving it out until I'm done with my cereal.