Leading up to March 13th, 2008, I was preparing for my life changing trip. My car had been looked over, new tires put on, tearful goodbye’s said, boxes packed with what was being shipped, car packed and everything else was snugly tucked away at my parents. We even went to the Lincoln Inn in Essex to have a final Tuesday night ritual listening to bluegrass. My roommate and I were regulars, they would save us a table and know what we were ordering every week – oh what was I leaving behind?! On the 13th, I woke up around 4am, planning to begin my long journey around 5am. The temperature outside was around 10 below. Just a little on the chilly side. (It’s amazing how weather is, I talked to my mom today and it was 75 degrees in Vermont!). Alright, back on track… my car was packed, and ready to go. I did my tearful see ya laters with my parents and brother and we were off. I say we – Sy had flown up to take the 2,000 mile drive to Texas with me.
(This picture was taken a couple days before we left at Oakledge Park in Burlington, VT.)
The first leg of the trip was going to take us from Northern Vermont over to New York and down to Philadelphia where we were going to stay and catch up with my friends from college Audrey and Dave. Seriously, I haven’t seen these two since this visit and it’s long overdue but I was so excited to spend some time with them. Looking back, I remember this surreal feeling like “am I really about to do this?”. Moving out of state was always something that I had in my mind. “If I move and hate it, I can always come back so why not do it” was really what I was thinking. I also remember this feeling like, once we get through Kentucky, I can have a sigh of relief. I’m not really sure why, I think I was more nervous that something was going to go wrong with my car than anything else. Have I mentioned I’m slightly paranoid?
After an eight hour drive over Lake Champlain, thru the Adirondack Mountain where the snow was so high we couldn’t see the picnic tables at the rest areas, trash flying around in dirty Jersey and over the Ben Franklin bridge, we finally arrived at our destination in historic Philadelphia, where there was no snow. And most of all – Hello Audrey and Dave!
