That's our word for today: Resiliency.
When we picked Darcy up on her last day of school at Klamath River Early College of the Redwoods (KRECR), she came with bags of gifts from her class and after-school program, and a pea seedling in a plastic cup. The pea had five or six leaves at most and barely peeked over the top of the cup. We didn't have high hopes of keeping the pea alive as we drove straight from KRECR to Ashland, OR (Bed #2 for those keeping track), and beyond across this great nation.
The pea mostly lived in one of the back seat cup holders, where it got a little sun most days. On the first desert-y days, we watered frequently and took it into hotels at night to prevent freezing. In St. Louis, it found a cozy kitchen window with our friends for two days, high above the reach of curious cats. It lived for almost a week in my parents' south-facing windows and for a week and a half in the shadowy light of Bed #16 with the great view.
Over the five weeks (FIVE WEEKS) since the pea joined our traveling circus across the country, it has survived and occasionally thrived. It wasn't getting enough sun at Bed #16 and had grown pale, but it is soaking up the rays in abundance at Bed #17. I expect it to make a full, deep green recovery.
Like the pea, the pea's caretaker-in-chief has also demonstrated her resiliency over the past five weeks. She misses being in school and we hope to have her registered next week, as soon as we know which house will become our next permanent bed. She has put up with all 17 beds with grace and (mostly) good humor. She has entertained herself with a limited collection of her own things and has taken opportunities as they've been presented (anyone else been massaging fan-tail pigeons recently or riding their bike around a hotel's empty parking lot?).
We hope to hear today whether our offer on our first-choice house is accepted and then the pea and the girl can settle in for the long haul and put down more permanent roots.
Bed number 16 is quite comfy and has a beautiful view in the morning:
It has its own bridge that leads from where we can park to the house:
And it has more beautiful views from the dining table. The first day, Darcy and I watched an osprey flying around while we ate lunch:
This view includes my car (on the left) and the bridge (on the right). And of course, the stream. I think we figured out what the stream is, but I've forgotten again.
What our house does not have, most unfortunately, is internet service. It's supposed to and it has a wireless modem that flashes its seductive lights at us around the clock, but there is a password required for access and nobody seems to be able to tell us what that is.
Although it's hard to be completely sad that I have to come to the lovely Patisserie Fauchere for internet, there have to be some limits on how many of their pastries I consume for the sake of using their free wi-fi. This morning, I tried to be restrained and had one of their homemade English muffins. A revelation of crispness! But I can't pretend that I can still blog every day when I am constantly seeking internet connections. The patisserie isn't open on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, for instance.
I'll blog when I can and enjoy the views of bed number 16 while we search for bed number 17, which will hopefully be our own!
There are many jobs in our modern era that are much easier to imagine having if you were childless and preferably single, so you didn't have to worry about the amount of time you were spending at your job.
I think in previous eras, there might have been even more of those sorts of jobs and if I were choosing one of them, I would choose working on this mobile post office. This is one of the cars we got to tour at the Steamtown National Historic Site in Scranton. It's a car that was leased to (or by? I don't remember the exact relationship) the railroad, but it's a fully self-contained post office. It is amazing, but I get the feeling that the postal workers pretty much lived their whole lives on the train. Not good for maintaining relationships.
What do you say, Auntie Best? In the days before airplanes would have let you teach yoga around the world, would you have joined me on this post office car?
Permanent housing may still be beyond reach right now, but we will be moving into semi-permanent temporary housing Friday afternoon! We finally found an available vacation rental at an affordable price. It has some interesting quirks, including a long, wooden pedestrian bridge from the parking to the house, but it is reasonably well-located and definitely beautiful.
One of the other quirks? Dial-up internet. Oh goody. Haven't had that since Alaska. Hopefully, I can get photos to upload to Blogger without timing out constantly.
While I can still post photos (although it took a long time), anyone recognize these two trees?
Woo-hoo! I didn't even have to stay up past midnight to see our President re-elected to a second term! Good work, American voters! President and First Lady Obama, congratulations -- so glad you get to stay in the White House for another four years!
When we were in St Louis, we drove by our old house on Liermann Ave. It was looking about as we left it, although with new basement windows, I think. The house wasn't perfect, but we enjoyed it.
Today, I started looking at houses in our new home. It was a bit of a reality check. I visited five houses and only one was a realistic option for us. I will be continuing to look.
Unfortunately, I'm also having to continue to look for a temporary living situation as well. We had hoped to extend in our current hotel for another few nights as it has a kitchen, but when we asked, we found that they already have booked it. So we're moving to bed number 15 tomorrow, but I booked it through Sunday because I'm having so much trouble finding a longer-term temporary house.
Keep your fingers crossed for us!
Ok. So I am tucked in bed and it is very comfy. It is also the 14th different bed I've slept in since October 18th. There's something slightly wrong with this picture. We were supposed to be in a medium-term rental (like 30 days) last Tuesday.
However. I am grateful that I have a bed to sleep in, with electricity, heat, and running water. We passed through so many communities without power on our way from my parents' house back to the Delaware Water Gap. A week after the worst of the storm and there are still huge trees being held up by nothing but the power lines. There are major intersections that still don't have power for the traffic lights. It is unbelievable.
