Alas, Its Over

I am so sorry

to say that

tomorrow will be my last day on this road trip. My uncle John, who was married to my favorite aunt, Millie, and the father of my cousin Amy, died suddenly last night of a heart attack. He was one of the nicest people I have ever known and I am so sorry that he is gone. I need to go home and be with my aunt and cousin.

I am driving to Chicago with Guy tomorrow morning and I am flying back to Philly from there. Because we don't think its a good idea for Guy to drive the rest of the way home alone with the two dogs, Salvi is flying to Chicago and going the rest of the way with him. Guy will exchange the wife, for the daughter and Sal will get to have a mini road trip with her dad.

Today was another really nice day. Lots and lots of corn, for as far as the eye can see, its nothing but corn. It actually looks really pretty as it sways in the breeze and its kind of cool to imagine that this is where all of that popcorn that I love to eat at the movies, comes from. I wonder if people from Iowa eat corn or they are so sick of looking at it, planting it and then harvesting it, that they eat broccoli instead.

As we were leaving Sioux City, Guy asked me to look up his old college room mate online. Guy had nicknamed him "Nebraska" (duh!) when they were in school and since we were planning on driving right through Omaha, he thought that he'd look him up. They hadn't seen or spoken to each other in over 30 years, and the last Guy knew, Bill (his actual name) was a physician practicing in Omaha and he thought it would be fun to see him again. Now, this is something that I would never do, look someone up who I hadn't seen in all of that time, but that's why I love him, because he does things so differently than I do sometimes ( and also the reason that I hate him sometimes), but, I have to admit, once again, that he was totally right. He called Bill's office and although he was not in, Bill's office was kind enough to relay the message to him that a "Guy Muzio" had called and Bill called him back immediately , and they had a fun reunion for about half an hour. It was fun for Guy and I think, for "Nebraska" as well. They promised to keep in touch and I think they will. That's a picture of them of the two of them up there.

We drove through a town called "Brooklyn" which I thought was kind of funny, especially since we were listening to a book called "Brooklyn" as we drove by. We also saw a sign for the exit to see the "birth place of John Wayne" and the real "bridges of Madison County". Who knew all of these wonderful things were in Iowa? And here I'm thinking its only about corn!

After driving 85 miles an hour for 6 days, Guy finally got stopped by the highway patrol, in this case, the Iowa highway patrol. Like everyone else in the middle of the country, they were so nice (I have to admit, this whole "nice" thing is kind of getting on my nerves) and after Guy explained that we were driving across the country on our way to NYC, the officer didn't even give him a ticket, only a warning. I wanted to take a picture of him for the blog, but Guy didn't think that was a good idea.

We eventually got to Davenport, Iowa, where we are staying tonight and thankfully, once again, the hotel is just fine. We thought that since Davenport is on the Mississippi River,( the very same river that Tom and Huck sailed down), we would go to one of the casino riverboats that they have here, for a last night drink. We went to the one that was recommended by the front desk and it was kind of awful. (the lesson there is that you don't ever ask someone who works at the front desk of a Best Western for dining or entertainment choices) We ended up at the bar of the hotel drinking scotch (me) and martinis (Guy) and eating potato chips (kitchen was closed). It was kind of pathetic and funny at the same time.

This drive across the country has been so much fun; more fun than I thought it would be in fact. Although it would have been a lot more comfortable if all of those Best Westerns and Comfort Inns and whatever the hell else they're called, could have been Four Seasons; but then I wouldn't have had the golden opportunity of walking into someone else's room with my two dogs and then being able to tell you all about it. (OMG, what if they had been naked, or God forbid, having sex?)

I was talking to a friend of mine today and he asked me if we were having fun and I said that yes, we were having a lot of fun. He laughed and said, of course you are and its because you love each other, you could never do a trip like that unless you loved each other. He is right, of course and I already knew that, but after almost 28 years, its kind of nice to know that we can be together in a small car with 2 dogs for 7 days and be sad because its over.