south georgia christmas

highlights:

the ice on the trees (on EVERYTHING) in southern iowa --->

stepping out of the house at gramma's first thing after gettting off the road...the stars and the smell of pecans and country soil

falling asleep on my feather bed looking up at my 14-year-old-self's ceiling of glow in the dark stars, and surrounded by my many unicorns. i've always loved the fantastic.

mom constantly threatening (believe me, it's not an empty threat) to "pinch stevie's hiney". steve is my oldest sister's husband. that's weird, right?



convertable rides in mom's cabrio on christmas eve --------------------->


mrs. marilyn's sweet tea and the smell of the tea olive trees in her yard








<---- the ridiculous extent to which my mom and stepdad spoil their new-ish dog, prissa. (or priscetta, as my mother calls her)

walking around the downtown square complete with christmas carols playing and a wonderfully eccentric woman who took photos for us and showed us her long-johns

christmas breakfast on the porch at gramma's in short sleeves

a long walk....and a long nap

the 16-layer cake gramma kept hidden so she could ration it out

walking home under the bright south georgia stars through fields and ponds and wonderful sounds and smells. i love the farm...

-- HAVEN'T SEEN ENOUGH? --

reference point

maybe it's the nostalgia of being at mom's in georgia, but today i felt the need to gather all my old posts and update letters in this one place. i started reading a few, but haven't made it through all of them. i love looking back and seeing where myself or others have come from.

posts are organized by date over there somewhere ------------------->

• letters while living in italy: (february 05 - may 05)
• the 'in between': (june 05 - april 06)
• first trip back to europe after living there: (may 06 - sept 06)
• more 'in betweens': (november 06 - april 07)

worlds collide

after two days traveling, caylin and i have finally arrived in moultrie, georgia for christmas. we should have left iowa on saturday, but were unable to make it out because of blizzard weather saturday and sunday, so we arrived in nashville monday night after a long day on the road filled with This American Life.

yesterday we started our second leg of the trip - nashville to moultrie - only to be held up in stop-and-go traffic before entering chattenooga. we debated, but pulled off at a rest stop to pick up a map and find an alternate route. as we were pulling out i glanced over and noticed a couple men to the side. one looked unnervingly similar to a friend of mine from nashville...
...and his brother
...and his dog.
ok, we're stopping.

i guess jamie and his brother, brian, were making their way home for christmas on the same route same day. and the funniest part? not one, but both cars (urged on in each case by the younger sibling) had been spending the day listening to This American Life.

as we came into atlanta we were undecided about staying on 75 or taking the 285 bypass. jamie and brian took the bypass, so caylin and i decided to do an experiment and stay on 75.

sitting in absolute stand-still traffic at the bottleneck in atlanta, brooding over our poor decision, we got a call from my older sister and her husband. their news?

they were stuck in a traffic jam in atlanta.

we all knew we were meeting in georgia for christmas, but didn't know one another's travel dates. and now here we were... about 20 car-lengths (we did the math after comparing what we could each see) behind them.

oh i do love smallworld experiences...