I decided to push things up a bit for two reasons. First, the sooner I leave, the sooner I’ll be coming back. Second, I want to get the long drive over with. At my age these drives are terrible. Well, I guess a 1200-mile drive is not fun at any age. It’s just that my old bones begin to freeze if I sit in the car too long. So, I have to stop every two hours to do some gentle stretching and walking. That does help. Also, I hate doing the drive alone. When I was younger and made long trips - back in the day when I refused to act on being a gay man - I had Rebecca and the children with me. Rebecca always spelled me and did some of the driving. This being alone and single is for the birds.

Back to my trip – I’ll take the Florida turnpike up toward Orlando but switch to 95 down around Port St. Lucie. I hate 95 down here for reasons I’ve discussed previously in my journal. * From there it will drive 95 pretty much all the way up to Washington DC. then the beltways around DC, and Baltimore, and 83 up to York county, 30 across the Susquehanna to Lancaster County, and I’m home. Well, not home, but, having been being born there, and living most of my life in Pennsylvania Dutch country, it’s still home. We call Lancaster county “God’s Country” because Lancaster is so beautiful, the soil so rich, and the valley so blessed and protected from the vicissitudes of the outside world that it seems to have a prosperous life all its own. I just don’t like the cold winters anymore. My body hurts from head to toe from November through March. I don’t know why Ruth refuses to understand that.

Anyway, I’ll be gone from Palm Beach County for about two weeks, no computer available, so I won’t be writing until I return, dear journal. I’ll miss you.

*The April 8, 2006 entry of this journal discusses in detail a particular incident on 95 that cemented my dislike for the highway.

Blowing Rocks

Oh, one last picture before I go. This is another of the series I took on Jupiter Island. Aside from being the wealthiest chunk of real estate in Florida, Jupiter Island has Blowing Rocks park, a beautiful stretch of beach on which the ancient reef has been exposed. On this particular visit, Thunderstorms had passed to the South and North. The Atlantic was thoroughly roiled, and the waves made great “whumph” sounds as they crashed into hollowed out pockets in the reef rocks. Spray hissed out and surf splashed all over me.



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