Hello Family and Friends…

Well we made it. Whew!!! It was a LONG drive. We did stop for some fun things along the way.

We left Logan at about midnight after packing and repacking the truck to fit as much as possible (my brother in law is awesome at packing, thank you Glen once again for helping us). We were so exhausted that we could only make it to Heber City.

The next day we made it to Roosevelt to visit with my family. The girls had a great time camping with them while we packed. Of course this was a bitter sweet time, glad to be with my family but cried for good 1/2 hour when we left, heck I am crying right now just thinking about it… it is hard to think about the fact that I am on the other side of the country from them. Thank heavens for modern technology!!!

Sunday we made it to Denver pretty late and slept in so we only had a short time for the kids to play in the pool. It was a beautiful hotel that Jason got a screaming deal on through priceline, I wish we could have stayed there longer to enjoy it. The kids loved the elevators, which were made of glass walls so you could see the gorgeous indoor gardens as you went up.

Monday brought us to Topeka Kansas, near the Kansas/Missouri border. The next day we explored western Missouri and visited Independence Missouri and Liberty Jail. It was a wonderful opportunity for us. Jason and I have always wanted to visit some of the church historic sites. Liberty Jail was such a formative period for the Prophet and the Church in general. Despite the cold and damp conditions in the squalid little stone jail, Joseph received some of the most beautiful, and relevant, revelations. As B.H. Roberts wrote, Liberty Jail turned out to be more a temple than a prison.

Tuesday we made it to St. Louis and learned a lesson that you should never reserve a hotel downtown in a big city when you are driving an enormous truck… a little tricky for parking! We had a lot of fun in St. Louis. Went to the arch, Becca and Katie were scared to go up but they did it. Xander loved seeing all the “little trucks” and cars and busses and pools and trains. We could even see our van with the canoe on top! He thought that was pretty exciting. They also had a really neat museum dedicated to western expansion. It was incredible. It went through all the changes over time in the west, as St. Louis is considered the “Gateway to the West.” We could have spent a whole day there. As we were leaving we decided to take a ride on… I don’t know what you would call it… a bicycle built for… all of us! It was fun, they rent by the hour but I think we only made it for 20 min. before we were drenched in sticky sweat from the humidity and our happy peddaling! Not to mention we ran out of riverwalk and didn’t want to head up the hill.

Before heading out of town we stopped in to Chuck E. Cheese’s to celebrate Susie’s birthday. We have never been to one before so it was fun. Susie was a little embarrassed (too grown up for this kid stuff) when Chuck came and gave her a big birthday hug. Great picture though!

We left late in the day and so arrived late to Nashville Tennesse. I have already lost track of days…

Our next stop was Ashville North Carolina…Yeah we made it to NC!!! Our day near Ashville we spent time in a place called the Emerald Village gem mine. We had a great time, once we finally made it there. Another lesson… on the map it looked just off our route an hour or so, well again with an enormous truck on those cute narrow winding forest lined roads took us more like 4 hours! It was a beautiful drive along the Blue Ridge Parkway, though.

The emerald mines were awesome. They had sluice boxes set up right outside the mouth of the cave and you could buy buckets of rocks to sort and sift through to find the precious stones among the granite chunks. We found several large pieces of garnet and amethyst as well as good size pieces of emerald, topaz, citrone, and other semi-precious stones. They can cut the good stones into faceted gems and finished stones for jewelry. It was really fun. It is definitely on our list to come back and do again.

Since we spent so much time roaming the hills of NC and several hours at the mine we decided not to make the drive into Havelock that night. We stayed in a little place called Hickory. We swam at the outdoor pool until past 10 pm then got a 5.00 pizza for the kids and I had my first “southern” meal of EVERYTHING deep fried. There was shrimp, flounder, and deviled crab. It was really good. Well ok I didn’t care for the stuffed crab too much.

Saturday brought us to our destination and new home in Havelock NC. We were so glad to be greeted by Jason’s parents. It was just as I had imagined and hoped for. Jason found us a beautiful home in a great family friendly neighborhood. The master bedroom, bathroom and walk-in closet are as big as the entire apartment the kids and I were living in. The kids are loving having more space and it is like Christmas when we unpack boxes and they discover toys and things that they haven’t seen in 6 months!

Love,

Jamie and the Family

We are also really enjoying our backyard. It isn’t nearly as big as the one we have been used to but it is so fun. It is rather wild and overgrown, very natural looking with a lot of wildlife. We have watched several kinds of birds eat from the feeders throughout the yard, squirrels that are not afraid of Roxy at all, lizards, toads, what else… oh we love the fireflies or lightening bugs at night. They are so neat. The first night home the kids were out catching them.

We have learned another lesson about using bug spray, you need it a lot more out here! The kids legs are just covered in bites from just one or two times of not using it when we first got here. Couple of other things that are different, the humidity of course. The first two days we were here were bad, so sticky. Then there was almost a full week of really nice cool weather, even turned off the AC and just opened the windows, it was wonderful. Then the stickiness has set in again. Today it rained really hard. I have never seen rain like this except for that summer I worked in Wyoming (remember that scary storm Laura?). Katie was really scared, she kept asking if it was a hurricane and telling me she felt like it was going to flood. She finally cried out “I don’t want to live here!” poor kid, but it is over now and the sun is trying to come back out.

That is another thing I have noticed the sky hasn’t been bright blue, it will have parts of it having some blue show through but it just seems like the sky’s are kinda overcast or something. The grass is different too. It is a different texture, not soft like we are used to and the ground feels spongy as you walk on it. I love all the neat flowers and trees, some really cool exhotic looking plants. My table has had fresh flowers on it since we arrived. I love it. Also thanks to Jason’s mom I have tomatoes and cucumbers growing happily and a gorgeous plant called a mandevilla with huge hot pink blooms.

We have actually had a great experience with the church, in fact I just laughed the first Sunday. We were 2 minutes late, and here at this strictly military town the saying is “if you’re not 15 min early you’re late!!! Well anyway we sat down on the back row and a lady turned around and whispered “Well sister Swan, we’ve ahll waited so long to fahnally meet you, we’re so glad y’all ‘re here…(pause with a twinkle in her eye)…now ahl we have to do is wait for the Savior!!!” We just busted up laughing, as reverently as possible of course!

Jason finally received a calling, he has been asking for one for 5 months now. I teased him that they needed to wait until I got here to see if he really did have a wife and children back in Utah!!! He will be an assistant in the High Priests’ group and will also teach the temple preparation class.

My mom gave me, I think it was 3 months, to receive a calling in a presidency. Well mom try 8 days… good grief they must be desperate here… I know Kristen, Jessica and Summer are going to get a good laugh out of this one. I am just wishing I could have had more time watching and learning from Kristin, I am going to need a lot of help in this calling as primary president. Yeah, the Bishop just laughed as Jason and I both scraped our jaws off his desk!

What else, Oh yeah we loved the beach. We have gone several times now. The first area was at Atlantic Beach. The beach was beautiful, white sand. The girls declared the water “warmer than the swimming pool at the hotel.” Susie and Becca took right to it and were riding the waves in no time. Katie and Xander were a little more reserved, and did go out with Daddy, but stayed near the shore otherwise. They had fun searching for shells and feeding the birds with G’ma Sam. Well Xander was actually trying to protect his chips from the birds. He would say “go away bird, my chip!”

The second area we went to had a really short shoreline but was suppose to be good for snorkeling. Again Susie and Becca figured out snorkeling with no problem but Katie got frustrated and gave up and played in the sand with Xander. There were lots and lots of boats coming into the harbor there. It was nice.

Anyway, I am sure it took you awhile to get through this, thanks for being patent with me, my next one won’t be so big I promise!!!

All of our love to all of you, we miss y’all sumthin’ terrible. (Just practicing my suthern)

Love,

Jamie and Family

Dear Friends,

We be headed west, the end of our second day. We are parked in a little
RV park that somehow got three stars in our RV directory. We couldn’t
see the sign, missed the turn and got stuck in a turn around that we
couldn’t turn around in. I don’t know how Dave got us out. The Four
Seasons RV Resort has 45 trailers in varying stages of literal decay
and half a dozen pull through sites which were thankfully available. Of
the four washers and six dryers, three washers work and two dryers
work. I finally got so irritated I stomped over to the managers trailer
and demanded my money back, in quarters!

But at $22.00 a night, it’s probably better than last night, where we
paid $38.00 to be parked in a cow pasture at the end of the Lake Myers
RV Resort. That Park has over 350 trailers parked in a maze of trees
and dirt and shrubs and plastic flowers. The directory said “some
seasonal sites.” It was all we could find and we were tired. We don’t
always know how long we can drive until about 2 PM; depends of how many
big cities we had to go through, road construction, concrete highway,
etc.

Anyway, we are west of Knoxville, Tennessee, and hope to get past
Little Rock tomorrow. This is Saturday night; we are due in northern
New Mexico on Wednesday.

We had a great visit with the kids. They arrived from their cross
country trek a few days after we did, one moving truck, one van with
canoe on top, and four kids. The house Jason rented is really nice, in
a beautiful neighborhood, 2-story with a wonderful fenced backyard and
deck, full of shade plants and bird feeders. Roxy, the Springer Spaniel
(and my special friend) romps around the backyard with full time
squirrel-bird duty. The two indoor cats are content to sit in the
windows and chatter at the lizards in the laurel bushes.

The kids will start school in July. It’s year-round here, with three or
four 3-wk vacations. Susie just turned 11 and will be in 6th grade,
Becca will be 9 at the end of this month, a 4th grader and 6-year-old
Katie is busting to hit first grade.

Xander is 2-1/2, a darling blonde boy with great communication skills.
He asks for what he wants, says please and “tank you G’amma.” Every
time he said that I was poised and ready to get him whatever else he
wanted! Who says they can’t be spoiled and cute!?!

Jason has been promoted to project leader at his computer company whose
name I can’t remember. He has a corner office now; (okay, corner
cubicle) no window, but if he leans right he can see the front door. If
it was open he could see out. Jamie is so relieved to have the family
together and be rid of the responsibility of their Logan business she
is almost serene. We are just in awe of her because the place is a zoo,
four kids getting into boxes, trying to cook for her in-laws, etc. That
alone would have tipped me over, having my in-laws around while I tried
to move in. But she just moves through it all with a smile, already
hauling kids to church play-dates, re-potty training Xander, looking
for Jason’s lost wallet and emptying a box along the way.

These kids are a lot of work; no type A personalities here – they’re
into everything, sports, computers, lots of reading, painting, beading,
snacks, some lapidary lessons they picked up on their trip and of
course just playing with a truck load of stuff. Jason and Jamie let the
little battles go and maintain general control of the campaign. The
kids are out-going, secure and curious, not to mention bright and
beautiful. They know good manners and they use them as soon as they get
out of the house. We’re really proud of them.

We went to the ocean, can you believe, the ATLANTIC ocean, and swam and
picnicked on the beach. The eastern ocean is just like the pictures,
pretty boardwalk and balmy temperatures. Susie and Becca were in the
water in one mad dash (be still, my heart!); Jason took Xander and
Katie out. It was great. Twenty-five minutes from the house in Havelock
to Atlantic Beach City. Really great. It would be so perfect to meet
Kevin and Shelly and Morgan here, maybe at Myrtle Beach.

We went through the Great Smokey Mts today, passed all the cars going
to Ruth Graham’s funeral near Black Mountain, North Carolina. Diesel
is $2.77/gallon. We’re on US Hwy. 40, hating all the concrete highway
and wondering why they are still making it. We’re glad to know we will
be back; some of the things we would like to see but had to pass up:

– World’s largest display of pork products
– Tobacco Trail
– World’s largest cigar store
– Dale Earnhart Jr. Motor Sports
– Big Men’s Store: Size 8X shirts, size 72 pants
– Pigeon Forge

The weather has been pretty steamy. We have stayed in the south a month
longer than before; we won’t do that again, probably. Jason’s house is
extremely comfortable, but our stainless steel coach really gets
cooking. You have to put the chocolate in the fridge. We are using our
A/C more than we ever have.

Love to all,

We be good, just about full of sights. We didn’t do them all, but we
did a lot.

The farm we stayed on is just off Sudley Road, a few miles away from
the Manassas Battlefield sites. Bull Run is marked like any other
little creek. Seeing the open fields of Manassas, visualizing the
battle, left us depressed. This was the first battle, where people
brought their lunch, to watch … what were they thinking? Didn’t they
know the guns were loaded? The style of battle is such evidence of the
power of a paradigm: Stand up and walk toward a guy who is walking
toward you and fire. It had to be so terrifying. I’m relieved to find
that these battle areas are still grassy expanses – no housing
developments on them.

There is a lot of open country in this area of Virginia. Mostly fenced
very prettily, we see some cows, some horses, but mile after mile of
rolling green hills with copses of broadleaf trees marking creeks and
roads.

We did Washington by tour-mobile. It was $35 each for two full days,
unlimited on and offs. Over 200,000 motorcycles came again this year to
honor the war dead of America on Memorial Day. We visited the Vietnam
Memorial a day later and were touched by the tributes they left. We
would have loved to be in the city with the Rolling Thunder riders, but
it is hard enough to manage the traffic and find parking on an average
Tuesday, let alone a holiday.

So we’ve seen the Mall, the war memorials, Mount Vernon, Arlington
Cemetery, the Smithsonian Air and Space Center, the White House and a
lot of downtown Washington. Since 9/11 the city has erected barricades
everywhere. The White House is ringed with fence behind the fence; lots
of barricades are disguised as concrete flower planters. The tour bus
guides all claimed Washington was second only to Los Angeles for
traffic problems; we found that traffic moved along fairly well, but
the city is poorly signed.

Everything here is red brick. Lots of two and three story homes, tall
skinny windows, often quite plain looking, but generally huge. Lots of
townhouses in the city; big plantation homes on acreage in the country.
Even the strip malls are brick.

Washington itself is very park-like, relatively clean, LOTS of
tourists. Every kid on the east coast is taking a field trip to
Washington DC this week. Contrary to many places we have visited,
almost everybody we asked could tell us how to get to where we wanted
to go. Taxi drivers have a license pate that says “Taxation without
representation.” Especially bad drivers appear to be given a license
plate that says â€Diplomat.”

There are a lot of churches here, but not as many, and not as loud as
we experienced in the south. One sign we liked: A church is a gift from
God; some assembly required.

We drove north to Antietem to tour the battlefield. The trip itself was
great, beautiful countryside and a couple of quaint little towns.
Boonesboro and Sharpsburg both retain the look of 18th Century Virginia
communities. The houses along Main Street are tall and narrow, sit very
close to each other and the street itself. Some front doors opened only
a few feet from the road. We found very little commercial development
in this area although there are many lovely homes all along the way. It
has obviously been discovered but not exploited yet. We followed the
Harper’s Ferry Road for nearly 30 miles and saw the old Chesapeake &
Ohio Canal; the tow path is heavily used by walkers and cyclists.

Antietem is a huge area, 12 square miles of grassy fields and groves of
trees, a few farms. For the first time, the horrors of war are captured
photographically and displayed in the museum. It is hard to imagine the
toll: Twenty three thousand dead, in a day. The 8-1/2 mile auto tour
marks all the movement of both the north and south troops; corn is
still being planted in the fields that were bloodied; split rail fences
mark the boundaries of the farms; statuary and plaques from many
outfits, mostly northern military units, memorialize the losses.

The memorials to war and the war dead have impressed me deeply and
quite unexpectedly. I have never been touched by war, never have known
anyone who saw battle. When we witnessed the changing of the guard at
the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington, we were in the midst of
two bus loads of WWII Vets from Oneida, NY. In their 80s now, these old
men stood at attention as best they could, solemn reminders of where we
were, in contrast to the kids milling around, families hushing babies
and heavy white ladies poaching in the heat. A fellow turned to me, his
eyes as clear and bright as an 8-year-old at Christmas: “My outfit is
going to present a wreath today,” he whispered proudly.

The juxtaposition of the young, smartly uniformed, heel-snapping Honor
Guard and the old soldiers from Oneida made my heart swell and my eyes
leak. It still does, just remembering it. In their summer chinos and
hush puppy shoes, suspenders over plaid shirts, four of Oneida’s finest
marched to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and handed their wreath to
the Major who put it on the easel in front of the Tomb. Salutes all
around. In witnessing this reunion of men and their memorial
presentation, I felt I was seeing the irrevocable bond of loyalty that
survives the pain and loss of war. I won’t soon forget it.

We had our friends, Dan and Carol Perry, out to Greenville Farm for
lunch the day before we left. It was great to spend the time with them.
Talking politics was fun because they’re so close to it. Bob Chandler
had a hand in the direction of Dan’s life and career much as he did
Dave’s, so we spent an hour fondly telling Chandler stories. We’re so
enthusiastic about Carol’s potential retirement we probably sounded
totally unconcerned about any possible needs Dan might have for a life
partner in that time span. It was a visit we have looked forward to for
a long time and it couldn’t have been better. We are reminded how good
it is to spend time with friends who share a history with us. We just
need to line up parks to work in areas where our friends live!

Our last sightseeing stop was Monticello. It might have been the best.
Another national treasure managed by Friends of the national treasure,
organized so we didn’t feel the crush of tourists these places always
deal with. Nor was there a one hour line to get into the mansion We got
our tickets online the night before ($15 each) and our tour started at
9:30, just as we requested. Knowledgeable guides take 20 people at a
time through the house then turn them loose to tour the grounds and
gardens. The grounds are beautifully planted and maintained, a
gardener’s delight!

We’re on the road, I-95 South, headed for Havelock, NC. We’re somewhere
in northern NC tonight, still getting torrents of rain from tropical
storm Barry, although the day has been warm and sunny. Jason and Jamie
and four kids are remarkably on schedule and hitting Kansas this
evening. We will get to their place tomorrow and have some dog hugs and
make a cat lap until they get home about Friday.

We have lots of pictures but this letter is long enough. Will send the
pix later this week.

Love to all,

May 20. 2007

We left the little campground in Rutherford County, NC, scene of our car crash (as well as our second failure to get a map done; 120 calls and 3 sales). We be anxious for new roads and a little time off.

Climbing into the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, our ears popped for the first time in six months. We climbed to 3,000 feet; prior to the climb it was so exciting to see something on the horizon above the tree line! From a distance the Blue Ridge Mountains look like the Marcola Hills out of Eugene, Oregon. We try not to be smug when it comes to mountains.

Spent the night in Haysville, just past Fancy Gap, in Virginia. The park is an old farm, big and grassy. No map here. Too bad; we would not be interested in even trying this one!

It is heartbreaking to see the dozens of textile mills, huge, long warehouses, all empty now. I had no idea the textile industry has disappeared from America. Just as it moved from the northeast and left thousands without jobs, now it has moved to South America and/or India or wherever, and forever changed countless communities in this southeastern part of the country. Everywhere we go we see evidence of the cheapening of America. We have sacrificed value for price. Pogo was right: We have met the enemy and it is us.

The area we just left has had five mills close; 2,000 jobs were lost in the last two years. This is a relatively small area and no doubt it will recover, just like the timber towns did when the mills closed. I find it much more disturbing, however, because the resource didn’t run out, the mills just chose to move their operations to an area of cheaper operation. How can there still be labor unions anymore? Don’t they understand the part they have played in this outsourcing? When a company has a bigger payroll for employees no longer working, something has to give. Unions have outlived their purpose.

We came out of Rutherford County on State Hwy 74, then went north on Hwy 77. Somewhere in there we had to do a stretch on US 40 and we were dismayed by the condition of such a major road. It’s concrete (bup-bup-bup) and broken concrete, at that.

May 21, 2007

Hwy 81 travels up the long western border of Virginia. It is a major north-south route and the truck traffic is horrendous. Beautiful, rolling green countryside. The trees here are mostly round, nothing spikey. All the way up this 4-lane highway, the grassy divider area has been sporadically planted with red poppies, yellow daylillies or blue bachelor buttons. A surprising burst of beauty that delights us.

Traveling up the Shenendoah Valley we agree that it is beautiful but looks very much like the Willamette Valley. Lots of farming, hay fields, purple and while phlox edging roadways and fields, oak groves and cedar windbreaks.

May 25, 2007

We are settled into the Greenville Farm Family Campground in Haymarket, VA, about 35 miles west of Washington. There are not a lot of RV parks in the Washington, DC area and most of them are campgrounds, rather than large RV parks. What that means is, the RV spaces are few, less than 30, while there may be 100 tent sites in a heavily wooded area. Greenville is typical, I think, a working farm of over 200 acres, with 43 acres (the back 40) set up for RVers and campers. There are only 20 spaces with full hookups (water, elec, sewer) and about 80 more rustic spaces with water and electric, and many tent sites with picnic tables in the woods. There is a pool here and a laundry and four ponds stocked for fishing. Yesterday they baled hay right in front of our rig! It’s working very well for us. When I first stepped out of the bus, the lady next door said, “The famous G Street Fabric store is right down the road in Centerville.” Well, it seemed like that’s how it happened; that’s mostly what I remember of the conversation. Made me feel like I was in the right place.

We hooked up with our old, good friends, Dan and Carol Perry as soon as we got here. They so graciously had us come in to the city for dinner and stay the night so we didn’t have to try and find our way home in the dark. The Perrys are old friends because they go back to the days when Dave worked at The Bulletin. In age, they are younger than we are, very active and up-beat and living the perfect urban life, which is six to eight minutes from work here, and a house in Round Pond, Maine to escape the summer heat. We have watched their kids grow up and have kids through Christmas letters and very occasional visits and this get together was much anticipated.

And it was better than we could have imagined. Drinks and stories on the deck of their unusual, multi-level home above the creek, one of the best meals we have ever had at a friendly Chinese place downtown, more catching up, and a good night’s sleep in a four-poster. Breakfast of bagels and fresh strawberries, we were all off our separate ways. We’re hoping to get together again before we head to Jason’s.

Carol is the 5th grade teacher we all wish our kids had. She teaches in Arlington and still loves her job, although she is beginning to feel a few pangs of excitement at the thought of retirement. Dan founded the Alliance for Aging Research some 20 years ago and as he says, “expects to keep peddling life everlasting until he drops in his traces like an old dray horse.” I guess if you are running your own company devoted to improving the quality of life after 80 you can do that! They live in McLean, VA, just literally minutes from downtown Washington. Daughter Colleen is nearby with hubby and two little boys; son Matthew is in San Francisco with wife and daughter, so the Perrys know our pain about having a kid on each coast.

Dan and Carol took us on a night-time tour of the monuments. We got out and walked around the Iwo Jima Memorial, which was so much bigger than we had imagined. It is beautiful at night, very moving. Around the base of the statue is a running list of all the military conflicts the USA has been involved in. The base is huge; the list has gone to the second line. There’s still a lot more room.

When we left the city, we took the Washington Parkway (a long strip of National Park) to the end, which is Mt. Vernon. We walked all around the grounds, marvelling at the fact that George Washington’s homestead is still owned by the Mt. Vernon Ladies’ Assn, the same group who raised money and saved the place in the mid 1800s. There seemed to be at least 10,000 school kids there, but they were well mannered (and they actually moved through very quickly, but plugged up the gift shop); the line to go through the mansion, however, was about an hour long, so we passed on it.

Traffic here is unreal. There are just simply more people and cars than there is road space.

We have good maps, and plan to see a couple of sections of the Smithsonian, plus take the motor tour – I forget what it’s called, but someone else drives. We’re only about 11 miles from the Manassas Battlegrounds and others are not far away. We’ve both done so much Civil War reading, we want to see the battlefields. Davey has gone by himself today to see an air museum at The Washington Dulles Airport down the road; it’s part of The Smithsonian. Because of that it has some of the more important planes in aviation, like the Enola Gay.

I’m starting to hook Katie’s rug and staying cool. The temperature is about 84 degrees and the humidity is up there with it. Not that we’re complaining! Ron Hoyt sent pictures of a bike group doing the annual McKenzie Pass spring ride in the snow . . . . . Brrrrrr!!

Love to you all. Thanks again for everyone’s words of support, post-crash. We’re both fine and the “new” car is running fine.

Ever Sam

We be considerably better than the last time we wrote. We (I should
probably say I) didn’t realize how banged up this old body was. It took
more than a week to get back on track. We are still driving with
conscious caution, and I am still occasionally setting off back spasms
by clenching at the intersections. Davey is being extremely patient
with my clenches and I’m trying to relax. wuh.

This little Foothills Family Campground is being so very kind to us,
letting us stay an extra long time. Our sales are slow and difficult,
this park has very little impact on the surrounding area, but we’re
still trying to get them a map. We’ve essentially cut prices so that we
won’t make much but will make it up next year. It’s hard to sell a map
when you are trying to get the first one together and don’t have
anything to show potential advertisers.

We love this area, tucked in under the eastern slope of the Smokies.
it’s so beautiful with rich pink-orange soil bright against green,
green grass and trees. Lots of leafy hardwoods, and climbing viney
kudzu. Both Carolinas have areas along their freeways sown with Shirley
Poppies, red, pink and orange. It’s just the happiest discovery to come
upon a huge stretch of this color; looks like an impressionist
painting! The area has a lot of little unincorporated communities, held
together by a church and the houses are spread out, mostly set back off
the road with a huge lawn in front. Oddly, people don’t landscape with
flowers, but with carefully trimmed shrubbery and always, the huge lawn
in front. No push mowers here! John Deere reigns!

The Magnolia trees are in bloom, along with roadside Amaryllis, lots of
bright yellow daylilies and azaleas. We drove closer to the mountains,
right under the Blue Ridge Parkway near Chimney Rock and found lots of
wild Rhodys. Lots of homes have hanging ferns on the porch. Our park
has a huge honeysuckle hedge that perfumes the night and I have a
couple of hanging baskets near the bird feeder. Our allergies are the
worst they have EVER been, for both of us, and I had to get some
treatment to get a sinus infection under control. Because there has
been so little rain, folks say the pollen count is off the chart.

I met a guy with 150 Studebakers. Be still my heart! When I was 17 I
dated a guy from Monroe, Oregon with a 1957 Studebaker Hawk. His name
was Keith Simons and I’ve been looking for him for 40 years, mainly
because I loved that car. Davey and I both like old cars and he
maintains that every old car is a Chevy to me, but he does admit that I
can spot a Studebaker a long ways away.

We’re eating fresh strawberries every day, picked down the road. Also
small cukes and squashes. The Carolina Cafe in Spindale features a
Livermush and egg sandwich for $1.99; we just couldn’t do it. We asked
the waitress what Livermush was, and she backed off a step and said
“Y’all aren’t from around here, are ya?” She was young and has probably
been eating Livermush all her life, and didn’t know what was in it.

We’re sending pictures of the car. We were just so bummed about losing
the little red car, and so dismayed by the entire car buying
experience. We met one salesman named Courteous Curtis Prufrock, who (I
swear to God) was a 350 pound black man wearing a gold suit, with an
orange tie and hankie and hat band to match. The suit coat hung below
his knees; the whole thing had a sweaty zoot suit effect! Curtis was
very courteous but couldn’t always tell us the model of cars, just the
color and price, and the price moved around a lot. I was horrified when
Dave actually asked him what he wore when he preached! Curtis took it
well and confided that he had an electric blue suit that he favored.

We were so relieved when we found Mark Parish, 100 miles away, but at a
VW dealership, and he actually had two GTIs. We ended up with a 2005,
not as fancy a model as what we had before, a Turbo rather than V6, but
it feels pretty much the same, nice and heavy. The other day we came
out of the grocery store and couldn’t find the car, then realized we
were both still looking for the little red car. How silly to get so
attached to a car.

We’ve taken up miniature golf. Thinking about getting our own clubs!

This area, this park, has been the most rewarding ever for my bird
watching. I’ve seen Carolina Chickadees, my favorite little Tufted
Titmouse, red Cardinals, eastern Bluebirds, American Goldfinches, real
Blue Jays, a Blue Grosbeak and the amazing little blue Indigo Bunting,
with his dowdy wife. Also we have Chipping Sparrows, a Northern
Mockingbird and I think it’s a Whip-poor-will we hear all night long.
The weather stays in the high 70s and the humidity is higher than we’re
used to, but nice.

Jason and Jamie have sold their business, the Swan girls are out of
school on June 2nd, and they will be moved into their North Carolina
home on June 8th. We plan to leave here in a week and find a park in
northern Virginia, as close as we can get to Washington, DC, so we can
take in the Capitol stuff and see friends. We’ll come back to the North
Carolina coast and park in Jason’s driveway and take care of Roxy, the
springer spaniel, while Jason flies to Utah and drives the U-haul back
to NC. After a good Grandkid fix we’ll head west to do our park at Ute
Lake, New Mexico, then north to Oregon and Washington.

Love to all,

Dear everyone,

We be a little shaken up right now, not our usual up and at ‘em selves.
Yesterday noon we were in an auto accident, the little red car is
totaled (with 2 payments left), Dave spent the night in the hospital
with a concussion, Jason flew from east North Carolina to help us and
had a very stressful time due to PGA tourney and NASCAR race in
Charlotte. I’m so sore every move is a groan, and the phone won’t quit
ringing with insurance agents. wuh. Other than that, we’re okay and so
incredibly lucky we are humbled.

We were driving down Hwy 11 between Chesnee and Gaffney, South
Carolina, saw a restaurant we wanted to stop at and slowed down, but
couldn’t pull in because there were cars coming out of the parking lot
on our right. So Dave hit his blinkers for a left turn, we both turned
around and looked behind us because we knew there was a line of cars
behind us, but there was no one coming in the passing lane, and the
oncoming lane was clear, so we turned left to go into a side street and
turn around and go back to the restaurant. A second later everything
exploded. It was just awful. According to a woman who was sitting in
the parking lot ready to leave, and the guy in the car behind us, a
fellow in a 1999 Chevy Suburban had passed five or six cars behind us
at a high rate of speed, and was going to pass us but saw us signal,
so he tried to pull in behind the car behind us and he couldn’t slow
down, was going to rear-end the guy behind us, so he elected to pull
back out into the oncoming lane of traffic and stepped on the gas,
trying to go around us before we completed our turn. He didn’t make it,
but hit us in the left front tire. One second more and he would have
hit the driver’s door and Davey.

It tied up traffic for half an hour and seemed like forever before the
state trooper and the ambulance arrived, but the lady in the parking
lot and the man behind us stayed and gave their statements. The trooper
told me the other guy was totally at fault and today he apparently
accepted full liability.

I didn’t realize there was anything wrong with Dave at first, although
I should have. It took us a long time to get out of the car, and he
wouldn’t talk to me. He was awake and moving okay but had a real flat
affect. The first person to reach us was Teresa, a skinny little black
woman who smoked a cigarello, wore ten or twelve rings and stuck her
hand through the window, flapping it and yelling, “CA’M DONE, JES CA’M
DONE, AH UST TA BE A PO-LEECEMENN’S WIFE, AH KIN HEP!! CA’M DONE!”
Funny the things you notice during a time of trauma. At various times
until the ambulance took us away, I could feel Teresa’s little wirey
arms around me, and hear her, “God done talk to you, girl, you jus’
lissen up, you hear?” Lord knows, I heard. When we left, Teresa hugged
me and said, “Lord, honey, I don’t even know who you are, but I love
you, and Jeesuss loves you! Now you go on and finish you journey!”

Waiting for the ambulance we were sitting on the side of the road and
Dave asked me, what happeded? We were in an accident, I said. Did we
hit somebody? Somebody hit us. Where did he hit us? In the left front
tire. … Sixty second pause and then it was What happed? Did we hit
somebody? Where…? He repeated this sequence of questions for nearly
three hours, just like he hadn’t ever asked them before. He still
doesn€™t have any memory between seeing the restaurant and “waking up”
in x-ray. They did a CT scan and he doesn’t have any swelling or
bleeding in his brain, his neck is okay, the head wound didn’t require
stitches. For a long time he also couldn’t remember what happened in
the previous half hour, but that’s better now. They admitted him and
did an EKG and did the blood enzyme tests to make sure he hadn’t had a
heart attack during or before the accident. I told them if they could
just do a prostate exam he wouldn’t have to have a physical this
summer.

Jason and Kevin were lifesavers. Jason helped us with a rental car and
driving me in the dark and getting our stuff out of the little red car.
Jason couldn’t have gotten here without Kevin helping get him car
reservations on line. Our friend Karen at Sunrise Travel in Eugene,
Oregon got him tickets without having to pay $500 to fly 350 miles.
Sunrise Travel – it works for us no matter where we are or where we’re
going.

So now we’re back in our little bus-house, watching a big storm that
has come in. Just rain and wind, no big bad things. It feels like a
little wrist-flick of life, parked on a hill in the midst of
communities named Suck Creek, Sandy Mush, Hicks Grove, Fingerville and
Apple Tuck. We made pizza and are watching an old Goldie Hawn-Mel
Gibson movie and listening to the thunder with the door open. This is
very beautiful country , three miles into North Carolina, north of
Spartenburg, S.C. In the shadow of the Smokies, they call this area a
thermal belt, the weather is so mild. This park is a very hard sell;
folks around here don’t know there is an RV park here and actually
aren’t sure what “a Ar-Vee is.” But after we take a couple of days off
to tend to our bruises we’ll get right back after it. I figure I have
to make 100 calls before I talk about giving up. The park owners feel
terrible about our accident and say we can stay as long as we want.

We’re counting our blessings, more than usual, and you’re all on the
list!

Love,

We’re off to North Carolina today. Not to see Jason yet; we are headed
up I-85 to western NC, to do a park that has never had a map. This park
has been calling Southeast Publications for some time, wanting to get a
map done. The fact that no one jumped on it indicates it’s probably not
a resort but we’ll give it our best shot. When the owners called in
they said the park had 70 sites; the RV directories say they have 38.
As long as they don’t have too many permanent “guests,” we can probably
do it. What makes the difference between just getting a map and selling
enough ads to do it in color and get a great map (and make some money)
is the impact the park has on the surrounding community.

We’re off our “route.” It’s new territory and it feels good. We had to
give up a couple of parks but not any real good ones. The test will
come when we’ve established ourselves with 20 money making parks and
get stuck having to go back to the same places every year. When we were
really new in this job we wondered how older reps had such high sales,
really good parks every month. Now we see it is a matter of “refining”
your list of park jobs. And being good at it, building trust and
getting better every year.

I’m pretty excited about heading into textile country. I just don’t
know how these Georgia-Alabama towns survive without fabric shops.
We’re going to Forest City, just 50 miles from Asheville, NC. Fabric
shops and NASCAR … yeee-haw!

We got to do a lot more stuff in the south this year. We spent a day at
Tuskegee Institute, now Tuskegee University, while we were in
Montgomery. We were extremely impressed with the beauty of the campus,
the historical integrity, and their museum, dedicated to George
Washington Carver. Carver found a lot of uses for peanuts but I was
happy to learn his real passion was the amaryllis. Tuskegee had a
resident photographer around the turn of the century and the
photographs are wonderful, very sharp, even the ones blown up many
times. The National Park Service maintains it.

We were disappointed in the memorial and museum dedicated to the
Tuskegee Airmen. But construction is underway for a new facility and
that’s encouraging.

Last week we took a day off and rode the short-line train south to
Plains, Georgia. We’ve always admired Jimmy Carter. I’ll never forget
the letter Dave wrote from Tokyo in 1975, saying he met a fellow in a
bar at the hotel, a peanut farmer from Georgia who said he was running
for president. Had I heard of Jimmy Carter? Jimmy who? (Remember what
his mother said when he told her he was running for president … she
said “president of what?”) We hung out at the train depot, Carter
campaign headquarters, where the signs are still up, and we had ice
cream in a converted bank on main street. The owner served us and said
that Miss Roslyn had been in the day before and she saw Mr. Jimmy come
through town on his bike last week. (He still teaches a sunday School
class).

We got a tour of the house the President was raised in, another
National Park Service stop down the road, and toured the telephone
museum in Lesley. Dave has been wanting to see this museum for a year;
I think he’s seen enough telephones now to last him a while.

These towns are very small; a high school serves the county. A high
school in this southwestern area of Georgia had its first integrated
prom last week. It was fairly big news here, although Georgia doesn’t
seem to make any apologies. The school is more than half black; it was
the kids’ decision to have one prom instead of the usual two. Only
about half the kids in the school went to the prom; some white kids
admitted to having their own private parties at the country club.

There are a lot of people in the south who want to protect their
interests from “the ravages of multiculturalism and phony diversity.”
Check out dixienet.com.

So we’re leaving middle Georgia, the Towaliga River (Towaliga is Creek
for pale scalp!), and the gnats, headed for the Smokies and a fringe of
Appalachia. Hopefully the pollen count is lower in the “mountains,”
although we are assured that if we eat local honey we can reduce our
allergies.

Hope you’re getting some spring!

Love,

The other day I actually introduced myself to a potential advertiser as Miss Sam. Figured it was time to get out of Alabama. As our good friend Jim Crowell observed, we’ve gone native, and “it’s not a pretty sight.” We drove back to Georgia to finish up Indian Springs State Park. Bad wreck on I-85 tied up traffic for about six miles. We weren’t too bothered, just ate our lunch in the front seats, but it was annoying, with rain coming.

We stopped early and stayed at Lake Pines Campground in Columbus, GA. This is a park we mapped last year where we spent time with Angelo and Theresa, who have since moved back to New Yawk and Connecticutt. We were greeted with hugs from the park owner and really enjoyed the visit. We gave this park to new reps who have a son in Columbus; it was a hard job for them, too, but they got it done.

Tornadoes in the area, a few hours of warnings and watches, but they missed us again.

We are in Georgia about a month later than we were last year and we are really getting a burst of the beautiful southern spring. All the dogwood and azaleas are blooming; no rhodys south of Atlanta, but still lots of color in the azaleas. This has been a cold spring for the south; frost has nipped at the budding pecan trees, threatening the crop for the second year in a row.

We are settled in Indian Springs State Park, probably the most beautiful state park we stay in, east or west. I’ll try to get pictures today. We are expecting a big storm so the pictures may have to wait. We worked this park while we were doing High Falls State Park, 20 miles away, last month, so we won’t be here long. We have one big advertiser who has built a ten store village since we were here last, and I met with her this morning, but probably can’t wrap up her ad for a month, so we will work hard in the nearby town of Jackson next week and move on down the road.

Our company just got a contract to do all the state parks in South Carolina and we expect to do one of them before we leave the east.

Jason is moving into a rental house on Monday, but there is still no word on the Logan business selling, so we don’t know when Jamie and the kids will move to join Jason. Most important, we don’t know when we will see them. They might as well wait now, until school is out, to move. We have to be back in New Mexico by the first of June, to do two parks. (We don’t have to, we could let someone else do them, but they are both parks we did very well with last year and we expect them to be better this year.)

While we were in Alabama we flew to Palm Springs for the company meeting. It was good to see our managers and other reps we have befriended, but kind of tiring. Flying isn’t fun anymore.

This weather is very interesting. When cold air from the north swirls down and meets warm air coming up from the gulf, it gets real exciting. It has been just beautiful, 80 degrees with a gentle breeze, sleep with a sheet and light blanket … you-know-who has been basking! But it can turn stormy very quickly, and there seems to be a lot of those cold-warm meetings this spring. The tornado activity that hit Texas last night is reportedly heading east. We don’t expect it to get to us, but we’ve spotted the cinder block bathhouse, just in case.

Love to all,

Life in the rural south is different than life in the city south.
Obviously, this is true anywhere, but we notice it more in the south
because so much of this way of life is different to us and it is
magnified in rural areas.

The race issue has been clarified here in Alabama, at least to my
satisfaction. People are generally rude when they don’t have any money,
and no job and you come around and look at them. Doesn’t seem to matter
what color they are, or for that matter, probably what color you/we
are. There are many more black people here in Montgomery than we
encountered in Georgia and any sense of prejudice seems to me to be a
socio-economic thing. Since more black people are poor than white, it
appears to be race, but I don’t think so. If I lived in the poverty we
see here, I’d be a little peevish, too. I find it very offensive to see
newspaper pictures of the Talbot ladies raising money to send to
Africa.

We spent some time at the Civil Rights Memorial between Selma and
Montgomery. They have a very powerful display of photographs and quotes
following an award-winning film of the march and events leading up to
it. It was extremely moving. I felt so awful and emotional I wanted to
hug the old black couple going through with us, and ask for
forgiveness. I’m sort of glad to be the age I am. Being a bleeding
heart liberal white woman doesn’t seem so insufferable when you’re old.
I hope.

Dave looked up a bike club in Montgomery and recognized the name of a
guy he rode with when he rode the length of the Mississippi. Nice guy
named Mike Monk. We had dinner with Mike and his wife Barbara and
enjoyed talking with them. Dave rode last Saturday with a really nice
bunch Mike hooked him up with.

One of the few things we miss as full time RVers is conversation with
people we share a history with. You probably don’t realize it, but
writing these “How we be” letters is very important to me in that it
allows me to share, to maintain the connection we have with our
friends. You all think you don’t write back often, but there are about
30 of you we send this letter to, and almost all of you send a note
every now and then. It’s more than enough to make us feel connected,
and for that we are very grateful.

Montgomery is “unseasonably hot.” It was 86 degrees again today; had to
turn on the A/C. They usually have afternoon rains here but are at only
50% of their usual wetness. All the spring flowers are out. The
Wisteria grows wild, climbing trees and looking like the tropical
Jacaranda trees. The rural area outside Montgomery is stunningly
beautiful, meadows full of Charlois beef, little houses tucked in the
trees, occasional mansions set on green hilltops. Lots of wildflowers
in the ditches.

We found another great eatery: Jeter’s Diner in Shorter, Alabama. I had
chicken wings, HUGE wings and the best chicken I’ve had in 40 years or
so. I know they deep fry them but even the grease was good! Actually,
it didn’t taste greasy, it tasted clean and fresh. (For all I know,
Mrs. Jeter killed them out back after we ordered ….) Dave ordered a
pork chop sandwich and we were astonished when it arrived. It was a
very large pork chop, bone and all, and two square slices of sandwich
bread. We scored a little ketchup and Davey cowboyed up, cut the bone
out and slapped it together. Said it was real good, too.

We were in line at a small post office recently, behind an old guy who
stepped up to the clerk and said, “Is Martha here?” “No,” the clerk
said, “She’s off today.” “Hmmm,” said the old guy, leaning over the
counter, “I was in here yesterday and Martha was off then, too.” The
clerk, startled, said “Martha was off yesterday?” “Yeah,” the old guy
confided, “Just a little bit.”

We just roared! The old guy gave us a little sideways grin, very low
key. It was so perfect, must have pleased him. Yeah, I know, I’ll send
it to Reader’s Digest.

Speaking of good laughs, I was talking to my 92-year-old mother the
other day. We were on the road and I was describing the flowers in
Alabama to her. All of a sudden traffic stalled and sirens screamed and
I mentioned the crime and violence in this State. My mother thought I
said “climbing violets” and that’s when it got funny ….

Hope it’s spring where you are.

Love,

Sam

Musings from Dave:

Greeting from the land of the Happy Dumpsters. Ours even has a saucy
tilt to his lid. And . . . . you don’t judge southern eateries by their
exteriors. Excellent seafood at the Oyster Bar.

D.