When we came back from Louisiana, we only had a few days to get everything done before we left. Somehow, even though we had been there for nearly a month, there were a couple of people we hadn't seen yet and several errands to do so the next part of the trip would be easier. We spent Sept. 29-Oct. 4 doing mundane things like making sure that the car was clean, the new battery was installed correctly (our car died in the driveway right before going to Louisiana), and all of our camping/cooking gear was organized. On the creative side, I made sure I had all the photos I wanted, and, nostalgically, I went through about 8 boxes of toys and Breyer horses that had been residing in the attic for 25 years or so.
Seeing old friends was wonderful, and I will always be amazed that there are people that I can still have thoughtful, inspiring, and hilarious conversations with even though I haven't seen them for months or years. William and I and my friend Deb had lunch on Friday of that week; we started out with a serious conversation about insurance and then lamented that in high school we would have scoffed at anyone having serious conversations about insurance. Then we went on to once again solve the problems of humanity and decide how best to save the world. That evening, we went out to dinner with my oldest friend Leeanna and her family and then went back to her parents' house to catch up – I played Bach on their vintage 1924 Steinway player piano and William played Rodrigo on a lovely-sounding classical guitar that, surprisingly, came from a pawn shop many years ago. Then, we got out the flute and fiddle, and Leeanna's dad got out his video camera, and we recorded some videos of us playing tunes. That is one of the things I envisioned before we began this trip: that we would not only see new places together, but that we would introduce each other to people and places that we already knew and wanted to share with each other. Sharing our music and stories and ideas with people that I've known for years was the best possible way to bring all of this together.
And then, there was the weekend whirlwind. On Saturday, we went to Oklahoma City with my parents for the day. We started at Centennial Park with the Land Run sculptures, took a short detour to Bass Pro to get a tent repair kit, and got to the Oklahoma City Art Museum for lunch just as the EXCRUCIATINGLY loud tornado siren went off over our heads. From there, we went to the bombing memorial which is extremely well done and quite sobering. On Sunday, family friends came over for an hour to say goodbye and I talked to another family friend who was not going to be able to see us but wanted to wish us well. That afternoon, we went up to the library to return a few books and, on a whim, I decided we should stop by Gilcrease Museum to see if they had any Alexander Hogue prints. Unbelievably, they did, and I now have a print of Crucified Land that is hopefully the first in my collection. On the way home we stopped at Barnes and Noble and I picked up a wonderful photography book by David duChemin. That took care of all the artistic requirements...all we had to do then was pack and play a few more tunes for my parents.
Monday, we went from Tulsa to Wichita, KS, stopping once again at Johnny Walker's so that William could look at wood for the guitar-in-progress. Then we went to the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve and had some close(ish) encounters with buffalo. I have several more photos from Oklahoma to post before we get on with our travels, so those will be next and then we'll move on to Colorado!
We spent September 24-28 visiting my dad's family in and around Lafayette, Louisiana – it was still a road trip, but we left our car and 90% of the stuff we brought with us in Tulsa and traveled in style in my parents' SUV. We drove down on Thursday and back on Monday, about 10 hours each way, and those were long days even with three drivers trading off. East Texas and northern Louisiana are, frankly, not that interesting, but I have a newfound appreciation for the rolling wooded hills (technically, mountains...?) in southern Oklahoma and I think I'd like to explore that area one of these days. The last part of the trip south was distinguished by what we think was the same rainstorm we drove through coming home from Bartlesville on Monday the 21st but it wasn't quite as bad as before and we got to Lafayette at a reasonable time. When we left Tulsa it was 56 degrees, in Lafayette (at 7 pm) it was 82 degrees with 77 % humidity. This is the second time on this trip we've gone from fall back to summer...
On Friday, there was a family meeting in Abbeville and some of us ended up at Shuck's for lunch – 2/3rds of our table ordered gumbo so William and I balanced things out with crab and corn chowder and stuffed shrimp. Abbeville is a small, picturesque town featuring at least one intersection of Lafayette and Lafayette and a complicated traffic pattern around the courthouse square; we spent a few minutes taking some pictures (next post) but the heat drove us back into the car. We had dinner that night at Johnny Carino's which managed to accommodate 1 omnivore, 1 gluten-free diet, and 2 vegetarians...very impressive. Saturday was a lazy day for us, we stayed at the hotel reading and taking it easy while my parents drove out to Crowley to pick up one of my aunts and then met up with my other two aunts at Don's back in Lafayette. We did go for a walk around the area near the hotel that evening after it had cooled down a bit – as far as we could tell, the only things nearby were other hotels and some office parks, but only a few blocks away we found a family of raccoons, a large field of sugarcane and a patch of what can best be described as jungle. It doesn't take long for the plants to get out of control in that climate. Dinner that night was at Bonefish which was loud and crowded but quite good overall.
Sunday, my parents and I went to Mass at St. John's Cathedral in Lafayette and paid a visit to the live oak tree on the grounds which is a member of the Society. Afterwards, we picked up William and visited my Aunt Eve for coffee and fabulous homemade cake, and then went out to the community of Leleux (too small to have a post office!) and the farm where my dad grew up. It was a beautiful afternoon, there was reminiscing and pointing out of landmarks, the puddles of water in the recently harvested rice fields shimmered gently in the sun, and...I stepped on a nest of fire ants. I didn't realize that this had happened until I got back in the car and noticed that my ankle hurt. REALLY hurt. I squished the ants on my leg and a few on the floor, and then panicked and grabbed the (dark red) floor mat and banged it on the side of the car a few times because I could see far too many dark specks crawling around on it. About 24 hours later on the way home, William woke up with an ant biting his neck (he got to it before it did too much damage) but I think I got most of them out in a timely fashion. Incidentally, it's now two weeks later and the bites on my ankle are still blistered. DO NOT STEP ON THE FIRE ANTS.
We suggested dinner at Masala for Sunday night and everyone enjoyed it, which of course made us very happy. Monday was a lovely day for driving and we got to Tulsa around 6-ish, foraged for dinner in the freezer, and collapsed. I'm very glad that we got to do this trip so that William could meet some of my family and see southern Louisiana, and my only regret is that we didn't go out and find some good Cajun music while we were there. Just like everywhere else on this trip, we hope that someday we'll get to go back.
