We’re home from back-to-back family reunions (Lea’s mother’s family, Lea’s mother’s mother’s family) in northern southern Indiana. Essentially we hung out with warm, wonderful people and gorged on country cooking for two days.
I’ll tell you, I’ve never been a fan of sustained exposure to a very large city. Generally I enjoy myself for about three days, and after that I can’t stand the noise and the crowds. (If I ever rolled in cash and decided I could spare enough for a high-rise penthouse in a megalopolis, I’m certain I’d enjoy the quiet even more than the view.)
However, I took a long look around Washington, Indiana this weekend, and realized how badly I’d miss sushi, Thai, and Vietnamese food if I lived there. So call me at least somewhat gustatorily urbanized.
Rural southern Indiana reminds me very much of rural northern Alabama. You’ll see a barn or a tractor in every direction. Folks are genuinely polite and unpretentious. Church is important. I think the biggest difference is the terrain. Around here there are usually distant hills; up there you only see more corn, or even part of the next town.
The trip is right at 330 miles door to door, which is easy to pull off in 5 hours even with a quick meal stop, as all but about 50 of it is limited access highway of one kind or another. We all stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night, but I’m not sure we’re any smarter. It wasn’t quite as hot there, but I think it was a little more humid. We did some geocaching, so we get to color Indiana on our map.
We had a good time, but there’s still that whole hitting-your-own-pillow thing that’s sounding awfully good tonight.
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