#122 Nomad Diary. 18-24 February 2023. Last Days in Portland. Tattered Self-Published 1990 Cookbook. Portland, Maine to Kingsport, Tennessee. Denton, Texas Road Trip Begins.
Pancake breakfast with Quinn in Portland, Maine.
Saturday. 18. Pancakes at breakfast are a Darrell specialty. Quinn’s interest in the kitchen and enjoyment of eating pancakes makes this morning super special for us! We made pizza for dinner and I intended to take a picture. We ate it up and then I remembered I wanted a picture! Lol. no pictures today of our good homemade food! Jeremy and Andrea came back around noon from their overnight get-away. We were surprised that they came back so early. Darrell and I went out for long walk and ended up at Standard Baking company for one of the best if not the best pastries in town with a cup of coffee. Again no pictures! Lol.
Quinn enjoying Grandpa (“Paw paw”) reading to him.
Andrea painting Jamie’s nails with red! Their long time friends came for dinner: Rebecca with Evie(3) and Jamie(5).
Sunday. 19. Darrell is preaching the 3rd Sunday in a row. We are regulars now that we have attended 3 Sundays in a row. We had lunch out at a Thai restaurant with Pat, Gemma and their adult daughter Hannah. Gemma shared more about growing up in the Philippines with her father who was an herbal doctor. She is the youngest of many children and they lived on a farm. Now that her parents have passed on, the farm was divided among the children. She owns 2 hectares and has a niece who maintains it for her. She, Pat and Hannah go back to her home every few years to remain connected to her family. They have a month-long trip this year. At dinner time, friends of Jeremy and Andrea’s came over. Andrea made tacos. We have heard about these friends for several years and are now just getting to meet them. We even met some friends of Pierre and Rebecca’s who were tourists when we were in Edinburg at church! Pierre, Rebecca, Jamie and Eva. It was really nice to get to know this sweet young family.
Darrell and Jeremy walking ahead of me to Leavitt Deli for lunch.
We split the ‘small’ Reuben. It was fabulous!
Walking back to the house going the long way. Darrell standing by an old clock. To the right on the porch is a beautiful old light fixture! The sun came out too!
Monday. 20. At breakfast while I was eating my sourdough toast, which I enjoy, my bottom denture plate broke in half at the front middle. Bummer! I got these made in Alabama in December. Now I had to finish my breakfast with out bottom teeth which I did. Then I got on the phone and called a denture dentist to get a repair appointment. They referred me to the area denturist: Jeremiah at Inverness Dental Arts in Waterville, Maine. This is common: One person does most of the lab work for local dentures, but it isn’t always easy to find them. They don’t always advertise because they get enough business working with local dentist offices. This is the quickest most economical way to get a great repair. I got a Wednesday morning appointment that looks promising and we can still get on the road to travel toward Texas by mid-morning. Today the weather got up to 50 degrees. There are only a few piles of plowed snow left with the warming. The ice on the city pond is melty. Jeremy went with Darrell and I for a sandwich at a Deli on the other side of the park from their house. We enjoyed a sandwich together. Darrell and I shared the Rueben which had plenty of sauerkraut. Darrell eats Ruebens a lot! This one was a good one and not too salty, and well balanced. After lunch the two of us took off for a long walk around downtown and along the waterfront. We got rained on a little, but it soon stopped. We went to a coffee shop. I had a hot tea, Darrell a cappuccino. It was very nice. We walked back the long way to Jeremy and Andrea’s house taking a 5-6 mile circuit in total. The sun came out about 2pm when we arrived to the house. Quinn was awake from his nap and had a harsh, croupy cough. Within an hour or so, Andrea took him to a local clinic for evaluation and some quick relief.
A friend from the 1987 who is now a facebook friend IM’d me for this recipe (if I still had it). One of the few items I have kept in our downsize is a tattered copy of a cookbook that I self-published in 1990 full of family and friends recipes.
My tattered copy of my self-published cookbook in 1990 has it’s own value and important memories for me.
February 1990 Me and newborn Benjamin Taylor
Benjamin Taylor in Kansas City neonatal February 1990
Benjamin (with feeding tube), Wesley(age 3 years 5 months) and Eric (age 4 years 10 months) at home after heart surgery February 1990. Lived 16 days.
A Memory of Loss and Beginning of My Healing
In February 1990 I gave birth to our third son, Benjamin Taylor. He was born with a major heart defect (aortic stenosis with a small left ventricle) and passed away at age 16 days. Those 16 days felt like 4 months in my experience. My reality and the time perception was skewed through my trauma. We had two older children: Eric and Wesley. I remember some things now that were significant for me at the time and changed me as a mother. I stopped yelling at my children. Now I think I lost my will in my grief and could not express much with any energy. I saw my older children with more tenderness for their little lives, and my huge inexperience with life, death, loss, grief, continuing to live on and heal. Part of my self-proclaimed projects was this cookbook. It was 1990 and we owned a home computer because of Darrell’s work and use of it. I don’t remember the internet or sitting at the PC much. Darrell helped me alot. This cookbook publishing company was in Kansas City near where we lived in Leavenworth, Kansas. I learned about this company by seeing an ad in other self-published cookbooks. The company required a photo-ready copy to be turned in and then they would do a minimum printing of books of 100 or 200 etc. There was no online, electronic self-publishing that I knew of then. Once I decided on my project, I had to relearn how to type. I had learned to type on a manual typewriter in High School in 1980! I had not used a typewriter, keyboard, PC, or word-processing since High School. This was new learning. That High School keyboard skill kicked in and I was able to learn more skills quickly! Next thing was getting my pages to look photo-ready. After collecting loads of handwritten recipes sent through the US post office from family and friends, I began to get the look of the cookbook. Darrell and I figured out our word-processing and printer and making each page clean and similar. Then I had to trim each printed page evenly to a certain size and tape it to specifications within the larger heavy gauge page provided by the cookbook company for this “photo-ready” page. Because I was a quilter with roller cutting skills, this paper trimming was much easier for me. I did it. After weeks and months, I completed the hundred plus pages of heavy oversized, printed, cut, placed and taped. I drove them to the company to save on postage costs! Lol. Then some 1-2 months later, I got my first book back to check for edits before getting a final printing done. There were edits to make which entailed retyping, reprinting, cutting, centering, taping and turning in the redone photo-ready edited pages! Whew! Now wait another month or more for my 100 books! It’s amazing to know how this process has quickly changed and even how paper books are vintage now!
Quinn cuddling with Grandpa as they listen to music.
Tuesday. 21. Today I did our final load of laundry before leaving tomorrow. Darrell made blueberry pancakes for breakfast. Quinn slept all night and has a good appetite. His cough has improved. I began packing my clothes by separating out 3 days of travel clothes into a packing cube. This way I can have one packing cube and my toiletries and more easily find what I need on our single overnights during these driving days. We packed up our crates and trunks into the back end of the truck.
Winter snowing and a gray day as we travel as far as we can get away from the storm.
Wednesday. 22. Today we complete packing our backseat with our two pieces of luggage, a backpack with our pillows, a backpack with our electronics, an almost empty cooler, two other fabric coolers, and a couple of small blankets. It’s about 1900 miles. We have an airbnb in Denton beginning on Tuesday. Darrell’s parents are 88 and 89 and live with their daughter, Darrell’s sister Cyndy. I have a dental appointment a few miles from here, and I get in and out by 10:30 am.
Day One Road Trip: We begin our 1900 mile trip. There is a snow storm heading our way and we drive strategically in direction and distance. We drive about 400 miles to Scranton, Pennsylvania. We selected our hotel by way of www.booking.com. Darrell has a status level from using this app. Here is our spending and some details for today:
Lunch: Thai 36.
Tolls: 6.65
Coffee: 3.75
Baymont Hotel near Scranton, PA 111.80
Dinner: Wendy’s 20.
Gas: 3.79 per gallon, about 60. To fill up.
9 am, Darrell looking at the display in Dunmore Candy Kitchen!
The storefront for Dunmore Candy Kitchen in Pennsylvania
Our handmade dark chocolate candies.
With our niece Kim at Lincoln Diner in Gettysburg.
Me and Darrell being tourists in Gettysburg!
I took this picture from the rider’s side in the truck. It is looking back at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. There is sunshine and blue skies. This bridge is reminiscent of Europe with it’s beautiful arches.
Amazing library building in Winchester, Virginia.
Thursday. 23. Today we checked out of our hotel and found a breakfast restaurant. After breakfast in Dunmore, Pennsylvania, we were walking back to our truck and saw Dunmore Candy Kitchen. It was 9 am and they were just opening for the day! A small business since 1904! It was an amazing smell of chocolate and beautiful displays of handmade confections! Darrell picked out some dark chocolates while I toured the whole store. Then we got on the road. After arriving to our Winchester, Virginia hotel, we drove about 5 miles to the old downtown of Winchester. There is amazing historical architecture here! We walked through the pedestrian zone set up with restaurants for tourists. There were historical plaques to mark the buildings and the history associated there dating back to the early 1700’s! We walked up and down several streets enjoying the history and the beautiful weather. On our drive back to the hotel we passed the public high school and I looked it up online because it was an amazing looking historical building. This high school was deemed one of the most beautiful in the US! It has an amazing history and I’d like to go back and see it some time.
Day 2 Road Trip: Today we drove 234 miles to Winchester, Virginia. I drive in the morning because I am more alert then. It is 3 hours to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania where we have planned a lunch meet up with our niece Kim.
At the Baymont hotel in the morning we filled our coffee mugs and picked up 2 bananas and a tangerine.
Breakfast in Dunmore: 26.
Handmade chocolates: 9.
Parking in Gettysburg at lunchtime: 6.70
Lunch at diner in Gettysburg for the 3 of us: 32.
Cookies from bakery in Gettysburg: 4.50
Comfort Inn and Suites King room in Winchester, Virginia: 103.
(We used Booking.com to find and book this hotel during our day. We also use Google Maps to search for restaurants, gas prices, and see photos and ratings along the way.)
Dinner: Mexican 30.23
Picture taken from the truck in the Virginia Mountains.
Friday. 24. Today we are staying the night with Darrell’s brother Glenn and Phoebe in Kingsport, Tennessee. Phoebe texted me earlier in the week and asked if we could arrive by 5pm for dinner. She has a new friend from church she also wants to invite for dinner with us.
Day 3 Road Trip: Today’s drive is 335 miles from Winchester, Virginia to Kingsport, Tennessee. It’s a beautiful day and I drive in the morning.
Breakfast at the hotel, then we go to a Bagel shop for better coffee! Lol.: 2 coffees, 1 bagel with cream cheese: 9.38
Gas fill up at Exxon in Troutville, VA: 47.70
Lunch at Cracker Barrell: 20.09 (lunch specials with water to drink, and tip)
Arrive 2:30 pm to Glenn and Phoebe’s for dinner, overnight and breakfast.
My finished scarf. My first ever crochet project! Yay for me! Now we are in warm weather! lol.
Nomad Notes.
I have kept our distances and expenses on this road trip just for interest and information.
It’s hard to leave time and time again, but this is part of the experience of being a Nomad. On the flip side, it is lovely to meet people! At church on Sunday, Maxine teared up as she bid us farewell with her warm hugs. This past week I have crocheted a bit everyday but I am still working on the ball of yarn and stitching it into a scarf. I have learned one stitch and I’m practicing it on this yarn ball. Lol. This week I purchased a 12 strain probiotic and have taken on at bedtime for 6 nights now. The first three nights I slept through the night without getting up to pee. I know TMI! Lol. This is huge for me as I have been getting up usually 5-6 nights a week for years. I shared this info with my daughter in law and she has had better sleep with this method this week too! Out of the past 6 nights, I have slept through 4! Yay! I’m keeping this up.
Comments
Post a Comment