We started off leaving when I got home from work (not everyone has a job like my husband where he can take a few shifts off and it works out to 3 weeks vacation...) so I rushed to gather the things that I packed and get on the road....seriously by the time we got to Ocala (roughly 3 hours away) I realized I forgot my camera!!! How in the hell can you go on vacation without a camera? We stopped for the night in Georgia, somewhere around Tifton, just past the barrage of billboards that advertise "We Bare All" and some horribly misguided church proclaiming that "homosexuality is an abomination"....hey I'm all for freedom of speech, but don't throw it in the face of kids traveling with their parents. Anyway, off topic (I tend to do that a lot, I am easily distracted by shiny things) I ended up buying a cheap camera from a superstore...14 megapixels for $59, yep it was too good to be true! My 2 megapixel camera phone took way better pictures! So here is where my picture tour begins! We drove through some of the prettiest country ever, I am so torn at this point between Kentucky and Pennsylvania as to which is my favorite. By far they were the cleanest states of the whole trip, with the nicest roads. I drove through both states almost entirely by myself! Our first sight-seeing tour was just across the Illinois border (where the first picture was taken in my game post). We arrived on Friday night around 6 o'clock. I had planned on us grabbing a bite to eat, not ever expecting that small towns (even tourist attraction towns) completely fold up their sidewalks at 4-5 o'clock! It was so weird that on a Friday evening we saw maybe 2 or 3 cars in the city center! A concept so foreign to me..but as we traveled further into Illinois, and stayed for a while, I realized this was quite the norm. It was so neat to see small town America, whole towns with one traffice ligt, some with none at all. We met my husband's dad at the Huddle House in Greenville, IL, the apparent happening place there, they were packed! We left to make the 12 mile drive to his house in Coffeen, through corn and bean fields and lots of dark country roads! So glad that he was there to guide us, cause these Floridians cold think of nothing else but, Children of the Corn and Jeepers Creepers...scary! Over the next 3 days we drove everyday into Greenville for breakfast at the Huddle House (yes it was the closest restaurant...and my father-in-law is a 12 year bachelor so food in the house was scarce). Everyone was so friendly, and in St. Louis Cardinals country, his new Crack Tops were a huge hit! I have never seen so many people in a a town so serious about their baseball! The weather was beautiful and the relaxing laid back attitude was cathartic for both my husband and my son. I can't believe that my husband (usually a squirrel on crack) could sit still. We spent three days sitting under the big shade tree, walking to the lake (an interesting by-product of the power plant...and a story for another day). We bonded over doing nothing at all. We got to see the tiny house where my husband grew up and meet some of his childhood like-family friends. Driving through the corn fields my youngest (who is inheriting her father's quick wit) said very seriously, "This looks really familiar, where have I seen this before?" and then quickly followed by "Oh yeah, that's right, EVERYWHERE!" After 20 years of marriage it was time for me to see where my husband came from, and it was quaint, and simple, and....not for everyone. my son said he wanted to live here...because it is socially acceptable to just sit in your yard all day under a tree...such ambition!!! All in all it was a great experience, and I truly believe that everyone should experience small town America, if even for a short visit.
