I hope all of us realize that every day is "the present" where we do stuff and just sometimes "go along with the flow", but every day is also a day to make wonderful memories. Chuck and I are on another adventure where we get into the car and hurtle over America’s highways, and cross big bridges over America’s rivers. Take yesterday for example: who knew that to get from West Virginia to Ohio there are only about 2 bridges? There might be more, but I had a little trouble finding them! We had stopped in Charleston West Virginia after 6 full fun days at Hilton Head visiting college and life long friend Karla McGinnis and her husband Mark. The first day of hurtling through America (from Hilton Head to Charleston West Virginia) was uneventful and easy… The second day involved crossing the big Ohio River…. as we left Charleston the GPS and I were in disagreement so we took my way. Wrong! We eventually drove around a big point of land and crossed the Ohio river where the GPS wanted us to cross. So there. Then I assumed traveling through Columbus Ohio would be like traveling through Atlanta so rather than taking the round about expressway as the GPS lady suggested, we plunged on into the center of Columbus. It’s not so bad, but it’s not an expressway like through Atlanta either… We enjoyed the "Main street" feel of what Columbus calls "High Street" and we passed Ohio State University and finally emerged on the other side of town and continued north. There isn’t a graceful way to get to Muskegon which is on Lake Michigan… The expressways are a little crooked, but we made it in 9 hours. I made sandwiches and crackers and cheese and crackers and peanut butter… and we drank lots of water. Now we are in a lovely hotel (the Shoreline Inn) that I found on the internet. Our room overlooks Lake Muskegon (which feeds into Lake Michigan), and a marina with very fancy boats. There is a waterside restaurant that I suggested we go to watch the sunset. We sat under trees that are covered with tiny delicate light green leaves and buds. It’s "just spring" here on the lake. The sun was shining brightly in a beautiful blue sky. As we finished our meal, I commented that the sky was changing color over to the west… getting a little gray against the bright blue sky and bright sunlight…. "Oh that’s fog," said our server. Then the temperature dropped about 10 degrees and by the time we got to our room and looked out, we couldn’t see the water below! About the sunset? I guess it happened!
How beautiful it is today! We’re wearing jackets though as we are Florida flowers in the cool breezes of Lake Michigan. Today at noon we’ll walk over to the Holiday Inn across Shoreline Drive and start our reunion with the men who ruled the waves from under the waves. The men of the Quillback, the Truta and the Picuda. I look forward to hearing great stories from "long ago" when I was not aware of our submarine heroes. God bless you dear readers, friends and family. Enjoy today and store up some wonderful memories!