Back-to-Back Trip Highlights

In the last month, Ping-Hwei, Murray and I took two trips over 18 days, five days to Missouri and four days to Omaha. Just writing that sentence makes me tired, but I am so grateful for the chance to visit.

 

First, we were able to visit with one sister, three brothers, four aunts, and other family members between us, and we drove to four different places in Missouri.

 

Murray’s 50^th high school reunion was on September 19, outside, 96 degrees. Always good to be reminded why I usually don’t visit Missouri in summer time.

 

Murray only went to this school for a year and a half, so he doesn’t know a lot of people from there, but he said he recognized a lot of names.

 

Before we left home, Murray found a sack of fifty cent pieces under a pile of something in the bedroom, so we took these with us. He’d shake hands with a person, hand them a coin, and say, “Fitty for our fiftieth.” Everyone laughed. One lady said she’d keep it for the rest of her life.

 

There was a man there who wasn’t from Murray’s class—we know that because he wasn’t wearing a button with a senior picture on it—who looked at Murray and said, “Did you used to work at Spielberg?” This was a purse factory that Murray once worked at.

 

Murray said, “Well, forty-eight years ago I did.” This guy worked there at the same time Murray did, and he recognized Murray. So, altogether, Murray got to talk to a lot of people, and I think he had a good time.

 

While we stayed at Murray’s brother Myles’s and his family’s house, Ping-Hwei slept on an air mattress in the living room. At one point, one of their cute small dogs crawled up on top of Ping-Hwei, and he called to Murray to take their picture. I know that was a highlight for Ping-Hwei.

 

After we had lunch with my brothers, Rodney gave me some banana peppers and cherry tomatoes from his garden. I ate probably way too many of them that night in the hotel room with my hamburger instead of French fries.

 

Murray’s Aunt Melody took Ping-Hwei and Murray down to the lake to watch the evening sunset with a group of friends who gather there. Melody often shares these lovely sunset pictures on FaceBook.

 

The second trip to Omaha was to visit our daughter Rebecca and her husband Steve. They’ve moved into a new house this year, so it was fun to get to see that. Rebecca showed me all around the house and yard, and was able to find five ripe cherry tomatoes for me from her garden.

 

They’re working a lot this summer and fall on setting up their yard the way they want, planting healthy plants for the local creatures and environment. Besides a bird feeder, they have a squirrel feeder, a tiny picnic table with a nail which will hold an ear of corn.

 

We had a lovely time with them, sharing good food, watching movies, and playing spades.

 

Before we started the spades afternoon, Rebecca informed us that she would be the winner. Although I led for most of the time, with Steve as a close second, Rebecca did indeed end up with the winning score. She said, “I told you I would.”

 

Murray came down with a bad cold the last day we were there, and their internet went out for most of that day, but those are the kinds of things families share.