800 Miles Into The Trip

March 10, 2008

Our reputation precedes us. Tonight after I checked into the only Marriott in Pocatello and was returning with our cart full of suitcases, pillows, ruffler duffler (Reagan's blanket) and Mr. Minkie (Reagan's bear), I heard the woman at the front desk ask to be put in a quiet part of the hotel away from any little families like the ones coming in the front door. How come it never occurred to me to ask for that? The kids in one wing of the hotel and me in the 'quiet part'.

This is our fifth night in a hotel and room numbers are starting to blend together. Tonight I ran down to the desk to get some juice to put Dane's Melatonin in and came back up to room 403 and couldn't get my key card to work. I knocked on the door so the kids would let me in and wouldn't you know I interrupted a nice young couple. They were very friendly but they had no children and were in a hotel room ALONE. Lucky ducks. Oops! I am in room 314. Maybe next time I can get lost a little longer.

My dad told me he drove from Boise to Pocatello in 2.5 hours the other day. I figured it would take me 3 then. Baloney! It took me 4 hours to get to American Falls. This is where my revenge on Kale begins. Making him see the things I did as a kid and other great historical sites across the country. We stopped at Register Rock which sits next to the Snake River and was a popular place for the pioneers travelling on the Oregon and California trails to stop and engrave their names on various rocks. There is a picture of this if I can get it to work. Well my revenge backfired because the kids loved climbing all over the rocks. They even made me promise to bring them back here when we come back to visit family.

We stopped to see my Aunt Alaina and she spoiled the kids with peanut butter/honey sandwiches and heaping bowls of ice cream. The kids had a great time seeing all of the farm trucks and tractors. Alaina even has one of those farm dogs that run next to the car when you try and leave and the kids were freaked out because they were sure we were going to run right over Faithful. Oh the life of city kids. I had to explain farm dogs, cattle grates, trailer houses, why there was no traffic, how my family lived in such a tiny house with one bathroom when I was young and how my Grandma Bruderer was the head cook at the grade school when I was a kid and made the rolls and bread fresh everyday. Kale automatically assumed there must have been a pee tree in the back yard of the house I grew up in because surely no one stood in line for the bathroom. Reagan was in awe that the food didn't come frozen to the school so all they had to do was heat it up.

My kids were really freaked out by the American Falls Reservoir. There is a huge old grain elevator that stands out in the middle of it and the kids wanted to know what that was. I took it for granted that they would think it was cool when I explained that they flooded old town American Falls when they build the dam. Of course they moved all of the people out first but if you dive down you can still see some of the old structures. Kale and Reagan thought that was the worst thing they had every heard of. Things like that do NOT happen in the big city.

We rolled into Pocatello about 5pm to Aunt Teena's house. Aunt Mary and Uncle George, Jeff and his wife and two kids and Uncle Bob sat around talking just like the old days. Somebody in the family is driving a foreign made truck now and that is causing havoc. Debating Obama, Clinton and McCain was a hot topic. The final decision was not something I should quote here. My cousin Jeff and his wife had a new baby girl just a few weeks ago and she is just beautiful. She is what I thought my babies would look like. Lots of pretty dark hair and brown eyes. Instead, there sit my three blond haired blue eyed Sorensen children.

We have been very spoiled in Washington and Oregon to live in such beautiful green space. We pay for it with rain but it was pretty dramatic to hit the drab brown nothingness after leaving Boise. It was a little depressing until we dropped into that beautiful canyon and begin to follow the Snake River that I assured Reagan did not mean it was full of snakes.

We are swimming in the morning and then headed to Cookie Grandma's house just north of Salt Lake.

Cia, I sure wish you were here to help me figure out how to make this thing look cool and add music like yours. Maybe something like the country song that says, "If you're going through hell keep on going, don't slow down, if you're scared don't show it, you might get out before the devil even knows you're there."