Day #73 – Digging Out

Pittsburgh, PA

Note: All photos on this entry by Nina Sowiski (http://www.pittsburghartistregistry.org/nksowiski)

We knew it was going to snow last night.  It started in the afternoon and just kept coming.  We knew it with our brains, but not with every fiber of our beings.  When I took my mid-night toilet run, I looked out the big windows to see the sky rosy pink above the pine trees – the lights of the city reflecting against and snow and sky.  At that point, I still hadn’t grasped what was happening.  Until we woke up and crawled off those wonderful sofas in Carolyn and Nina’s family room.  The snow was so deep I couldn’t tell how deep it was.

The sky was bright beautiful blue.  The world was quiet.  There were no car noises or radio noises or kid noises.  I wondered how the birds had survived the night.  We drank tea and ate oatmeal while moving from shock and denial to the reality of digging out.

Since a shovel of snow weighs more than four pounds, I was relegated to cheering.  They took turns and worked slowly to dig a path from the house to the curb.  I watched as neighbors helped one another.  Luckily, the neighbors next door had a clear path for the ambulance that came to take someone to the hospital.  Kelly moved the truck so she could shovel the snow from the bed to the front lawn.  Nina took lots of pictures. 

With lots of help from Carolyn, I finished two chemo caps.  These little caps are knit of soft cotton and used by folks who have lost their hair from chemotherapy.  The first year the Tuesday knitting gang worked on these caps, they knitted 1,000 for the Race for the Cure.  Now, more and more people donate yarn and make caps themselves.  The group makes at least 1,000 every year for the Race, but also gives them to hospitals and clinics – wherever they are needed.  It’s an honor to be part of that effort.

Saturday night we ate Nina’s famous turkey chili, followed by triple-treat ginger bread (fresh, powdered, and crystallized) and two movies.

Day #72 – Transferring the Truck Title

Pittsburgh, PA

This morning, we visited our chiropractor (and in the summer, kayak instructor), George.  There were lots of hugs, jokes, riddles, and puns.  Wow, I’d lost track of how much I missed him!  Anyway, he got us back in working order within a couple hours.  He put new shims in Kelly’s shoes and took some out of mine.  Then he tested my shoulder to see how I’m doing with my rehab.  I passed his tests with flying colors – officially approved to paddle!  I was so happy I cried!  And hugged him some more.  I really could not have made this recovery without him.  I’m cleared to do wall push-ups, but still restricted to carrying no more than four pounds.  I still have to avoid hard paddling, but this is sooo cool!

Since snow was imminent, we met Beth at AAA to transfer the truck to her today rather than waiting until Saturday.  It was an easy process, but I lost it when I handed her my extra key.  Kelly was all happy smiles and I was crying.  I love that truck.  It had a turn signal that clunked rather than clicked – like a truck should sound.  I loved to drive it at night.  The dash had a glow that was different from a car.  The steering wheel felt just right.  This past summer, I would drive home from Debbie and Linda’s with the moon roof open, with the radio tuned to a country station, and just feel like life was perfect for that short trip.  I’ll miss that truck.

Yes, I’ll get used to the new one.  It’s big enough to tow our trailer to Alaska with one tire tied behind its back.  It’s white like the old one.  It has nice round dashboard displays like a truck should.  But it’s so big I have trouble getting into it.  And, the turn signal clicks.  It’s gonna take some getting used to.

Day #71 – A Day with Carolyn & Nina

Pittsburgh, PA

Kelly gave me such a wonderful gift today.  She took the truck to the dealer for inspection, thus giving me several hours to visit with Carolyn and Nina. 

Carolyn and I have been friends since the late 1970s.  We met when I was working at a vocational rehabilitation center and she was a masters-level student intern.  We became good, close friends.  I switched careers, returning to school to pursue an MBA, but she took the rehab field by storm.  Our lives had taken us in different directions for a number of years, but several years ago, she talked me into joining the board of directors of Sharp Visions (http://www.sharpvisions.org ).  Now retired, she knits, reads, cooks (and a whole lot more!) and laughs when I go tilting at various windmills.  Even with our common community work, we seemed to never be able to find extended time to just be together.  When I retired, I asked her to teach me how to knit chemo caps so I’d have a connection my Pittsburgh knitter friends, plus a compact hobby for the road.  This brought us closer together, too.  Having a whole morning and afternoon to just hang out was such a gift.

Nina and I decided that dinner would take place at a new restaurant I’d read about, the Legume Bistro (http://legumebistro.com).  Kelly surprised me by ordering, and eating, a whole fish!  Generally, she goes for various forms of cow.  Sometimes she gets adventurous and orders seafood.  But, I’ve never seen her order fish with bones and skin.  She did insist that the chef remove the head – didn’t want to make eye contact with her dinner.

After dinner, we drove to a local theater to watch a live performance of Prairie Home Companion (http://prairiehome.publicradio.org) that was being streamed to movie theaters across the country.  Nina is a big fan of the show and was excited at the prospect of seeing it.  She and Carolyn had gone to opera events that had been streamed from the Met, so she was more familiar with the process than we were.  We had a great time!  The cameras did not show as much of the technical geekie parts of the show as I would have liked, but it was great fun watching the sound effect guys doing their thing.  In the right context, squishing Styrofoam plates can sound like just about anything else you might want.  They also used their voices a lot to make the various effects.  At times, during a skit, the sound effect guys would clearly ad lib a sound and wait for the actors to catch up.  At the end of the show, Garrison Keillor ad lib’ed a story and tried to make them screw up.  Despite their best efforts, everybody kept up with everybody else.

Day #70 – Driving to Pittsburgh

Lorton, VA to Pittsburgh, PA

I loved sleeping on the train!  Kelly took the upper bunk and because of the way the curtains were hung, I could keep them open all night.  For a long time, I just lay there, being rocked to sleep as I watched the trees fly by.  I slept really well!  I didn’t even wake up when Kelly crawled down for her mid-night toilet run.

We woke to snow – lots of snow.  Kelly decided she would not leave the train until it returned to Florida.  We dressed and headed to the dining car for breakfast.  It was simple, but good - tea, fruit, muffins, and cereal.  Because of frozen switches in Charleston, South Carolina, we got to Lorton, Virginia a couple hours late.  I enjoyed the treat of watching out the window a couple extra hours. 

When we finally arrived in Lorton, Virginia, we still had to wait for our truck to be off-loaded from the Auto Train.  We stood in the waiting area and watched as train staff drove each vehicle off the train.  I saw a police officer playing with his K9 in the snow - even sniffer dogs like to chase snowballs!

The drive to Pittsburgh was pretty uneventful.  We marveled at the snowy fields like a couple of tourists.  We ran from truck to rest area buildings very quickly because we had no winter coats.  Actually, dressed in layers of Capilene (thank you Exkursion - http://www.exkursion.com) and Polartec, we were quite warm. 

Our first stop was our little storage unit.  Our parkas were right where we’d left them and ohhh so warm!

Our second stop was Kathy’s house for the annual pizza birthday party.  Kathy and I are one day apart in age.  She usually hosts a bring-your-own-topping pizza party to celebrate with the Wednesday Night Supper group.  It was fun to crash it and surprise everyone.  Even though we’d told a couple people we’d be in town, the word had not got ‘round.  There were many discussions – one big one was the ethics of removing children from Haiti.  Needless to say, my opinion was not of the majority.  It’s a thorny topic and I was relieved to switch to Avatar and the hot (hot!) pilot.  We lingered after everyone left and settled down into easy chairs to hold cats and catch up a little with Kathy.

We stayed the night with Carolyn and Nina.  Like Carolyn’s kids, we chose to sleep on big comfy sofas in her family room, in front of a gas fireplace.

Day #69 – Auto Train

Sanford, FL

It was a hectic morning. First thing this morning, Suzie had a mammogram appointment at a place we had never been (results pending!). Afterwards, we bee lined North up the interstate towards Sanford to catch the Auto Train (http://tickets.amtrak.com/itd/amtrak/autotrain).

The drive took a couple of hours and we needed to get there as soon as possible so we could pick up our tickets and get the truck loaded on the train. We arrived on time, but hungry so we took the shuttle service from the Amtrak station into historic Stanford. The city offers free shuttle service, at 20-minute intervals, from noon to 2:40 p.m., which is really cool. Who wants to hang out at a train station lobby? At Stanford, we dropped our bags off at the welcome center and walked across the street to Hollerbach's Willow Tree Cafe ( http://www.willowtreecafe.com) where we ate a wonderful German meal! We would have liked to visit the art gallery, next door, but we barely had time to finish lunch and retrieve our bags before catching the shuttle back to the train.

Once onboard, we settled into our tiny sleeper car for the 856 mile trip to Lorton, Virginia. It was pretty comfortable. Basically two cushy seats facing each other with a little tray table between us. The seats fold down into a bed, with a bunk above. There is a sliding glass door on your booth to block out noise, and gain privacy. It was quite nice.



Suzie was very excited about riding the train – you’d think she was about to receive a pin-striped hat and little choo-choo whistle the way she was beaming!

We attended a wine tasting on the train with cheese, crackers and veggies in the Lounge Car. We speculated on the history of the Auto Train. Was it military? It runs from a town with an army base to a town with large waterways. Was it for tourists mainly, being so close to Disney? We had a good time looking out the window, and watching towns go by.

Later we had a steak dinner in the Diner. We finished up the evening watching the movie “Julie and Julia” in the lounge and then we went to bed. History of the Auto Train http://www.themetrains.com/html/auto-train-main.htm

Day #68 – Packing for Pittsburgh

Sarasota, FL

Today it is raining cats and dogs. It is a good day for doing laundry and packing bags. I’m excited about tomorrow’s train trip, but not really thrilled about the idea of snow. It is 70° in Florida. In Pittsburgh it is 21° F , but with the wind chill it feels Like 14° F. Oh joy and happiness....