Our drive to Kansas, across golden prairie speckled with wind turbine forests, was long - 10 hours long to be exact - and was the dose of clearing my head that I desperately needed. Road trips are certainly different now that we have two little passengers. But those little crew members add a whole new ingredient to the recipe of fast food, loud tunes, mile markers, plenty of time to clear the mind. They add things like strummed up conversation with the local farmers in Burlington over greasy hash browns and watery orange juice, a flavor in my old road days traveling alone mostly that I would've avoided. And they add things like detours through Case and John Deere dealerships powder sugared with words like whoa, dude, look at the size of that hopper! and Dad, can we get a double dualie monster tractor? Because, you know, we really need one of those.
Today we walked to my nephews school to walk him home. It seemed like a fantastic idea until I saw my nephew come walking out with a dozen or so other twelve year old boys only to have his aunt and uncle waiting for him. But quickly us totally uncool adults were forgotten amid the sea of those boys knuckle bumping my two little ones making them feel totally rad. I hung back on the walk home (with my camera!) and snapped a few pics; thought a bit about the day my boys will walk home with their friends, eying girls, slipping into our house and kicking up the grocery bill.
Tomorrow, more family arrives. A time for being thankful indeed.
