Road trip

Of course, the visit to Georgia wasn’t really about hiking or parks or Six Flags. I went to hang out with Dani because I missed our conversations, and the old simplicity of the early years of our friendship. Twenty years ago Dani befriended my awkward, prickly, socially inept eighteen-year-old self, and with that simple (and complicated) act of personal generosity I began to understand that there was so much more to life than what I’d seen of it so far. From Dani I got my first real glimpse of how people are supposed to treat one another. I already knew what kind of person I wanted to be, but Dani showed me how to start getting there. That’s not to say that we agreed about everything, because we certainly didn’t, but in a way that was a big part of the point: that people can hold wildly divergent points of view and still like and respect one another for who they are. That friends can disagree without being disagreeable, and without damaging their relationship. This was an extremely new concept for me at the time, but it’s been a marvelous blessing for me in the years since then, in all of my relationships.

So…fast forward. I now have a happy life, a happy marriage, happy kids. But a few months ago a vague sense of discontent started to creep in, and I didn’t know how to address it. When it got to the point where I was picking fights with Steve over meaningless crap, I knew something had do be done to fix things. But what?

Well, twenty years ago Dani helped me to get my ducks in a row. I figured maybe she could do it again. And if not, at least I’d get a nice change of scenery. ;^)

So I went to Georgia, and Dani and I spent two weeks talking about shoes and ships and sealing-wax and gardening and food and the true meaning of happiness. We agreed on some stuff and disagreed on a bunch of other stuff, just like the old days. We grokked that we’ve both changed a lot since we were teenagers (well, duh). And somewhere in there I found the fresh perspective that I was looking for. I realized that I’d been avoiding some issues in my life that really needed to be addressed, and stubbornly confronting some other issues that aren’t really worth my trouble at all. I realized how thankful I am for the good things in my world. Whatever it was that needed adjustment in my outlook got adjusted, and I (eventually) returned home with a new appreciation for my life and all its many blessings.

Good friends are a gift from God. I love you lots, Dani. :^)

On Sunday the 14th we all went to Six Flags Over Georgia! (Well, all but Jonathon. Poor boy was sick that day)

The place was dressed up for its annual Halloween Fright Fest, and was deliciously spooky.

Luke was unmoved by the fate of the campers at Crystal Lake…

…but Elizabeth had a run-in with Jason later…

…and various other shadowy creatures.

Of course, there were the regular theme park pleasures to be had:

There was one ride that was just plain odd. I can only describe it as a cross between Disneyland’s It’s A Small World ride and Maurice Sendak’s “Where The Wild Things Are.” Boat ride through monsterland. The kids loved it.

Toward the end of the day Mikhael and I slipped away from the kid-friendly stuff and braved the impossibly huge Goliath I’d love to incude a pic of this coaster, but it’s so ginormous that there’s literally no place you can stand to take a photo of the whole thing; you can only get bits and pieces of it in the frame. Goliath was an adrenaline rush of the highest order.

But if I ever go back there again I’m totally going to do THIS next time.

Six Flags Over Georgia gets three enthusiastic thumbs up from the Traveling Silkotches!

Once the kids and I had exhausted the immediate walking-range radius around Dani’s house, she suggested that we check out a nice local park for more hiking ops.

Turner Lake Park turned out to be exactly what we wanted: a playground…

…a pretty lake…

…and acres of hiking trails through scenic woods.

What a great park! We went back once more before we left GA, with Dani that time.

Speaking of which…Dani requested that I not post images of her or her family to the blog, so I’ve edited those pics out of the pile. I mention it just in case anyone’s wondering where the pics of the Schubert clan are. :^)

We stayed in Georgia for a total of sixteen days. Dani’s house is tucked into a lovely little neighborhood that’s not quite suburbia and not quite the boondocks, but combines the best of both worlds in the nicest way. This is Dani’s backyard (on both sides of the fence):

Inside the fence she enjoys such rural pleasures as chicken-keeping and gardening…

…and outside the fence is a lush wilderness where deer come to browse from time to time.

Until we began this road trip Luke and Elizabeth had only ever been in desert places, so I wasn’t sure how they would react to such a woodsy environment. To my delight they embraced the forest with great enthusiasm, and we spent the first few days of our visit exploring everything within hiking distance of the house.

I was overwhelmed by the sheer wealth and diversity of life in this place. Everywhere I looked there were sweeping vistas and tiny unexpected gifts of beauty that sent me scrambling for my camera.

Elizabeth found this little guy in the driveway:

We did other cool stuff there too, but I think this page is big enough, so…

To be continued!

I knew nothing at all about Shreveport, LA before I began planning this trip; I only chose it to stop in because it’s a convenient distance from DFW. I got my first clue to Shreveport’s “personality” when I was looking up hotels there and noticed how many of them are also casinos.

Since gambling wasn’t part of the cultural enrichment I’d planned for the kids, I settled on a nice comfortable-looking Best Western:

The thing that stands out most about our stay there was how incredibly friendly the whole staff was. Well, that and the in-house café. See the red double-doors off the lobby?

Those doors open into a little Creole place called Guillaumes’ (pronounced (gee-yaums) where the food is prepared with great love and skill from scratch–and will set your head on fire if you’re not careful what you order. Poor Elizabeth ordered the child’s mac and cheese, which certainly sounds safe, but she couldn’t eat it because of all the cayenne pepper in the sauce.

Having delicate taste buds myself, I was careful to question the waiter closely about each dish, and greatly enjoyed my choices. I suspect that the chef took some of the heat out of them for me though; the waiter made a passing comment to that effect when he brought out my chicken pasta alfredo.

The waiter, Terry, was wonderful by the way. He was there when we went in for a late supper Thursday night, and there again Friday morning when we had an early lunch after checking out the nearby Revel. He chatted cheerfully with us about food, road trips, the DFW freeway system, the New Mexico Highway Patrol, the Revel…in fact he had an amusing and articulate viewpoint on pretty much every subject that came up. It’s a great little place, and the service couldn’t be friendlier.

So, the Revel. I’d never heard of it before we arrived in Shreveport; apparently it’s a big local event where artisans can come and display their wares. We went to take a look, but it turned out to be the sort of thing you need to have a big chunk of time set aside for, which we didn’t, so we didn’t stay long. Looked like fun, though.

We’d planned to make one more stop on the way to Georgia, but we were all eager to reach our destination, so we drove straight through and arrived very late that night.

It was great to see the Schubert clan again. I couldn’t believe how tall Jonathon had grown–he’s pushing six feet tall! Hard to believe he’s the same guy I used to roll into a sunbeam when he was a fussy baby, to make him happy again. And Mikhael’s in his twenties now, that just blows me away.

Georgia was awesome…but that’s another post. :^)