A No Worries Vacation!

You haven’t heard from me because I have been traveling.  We have been in Missouri since June 29^th.  Similar to Arizona it is hot.  Unlike Arizona, there is crazy humidity, which makes it feel hotter.  And even more unusual is the amount of rain that happens.  I love that it rains often.  I love that there are crazy thunderstorms.  This state is so beautiful with its rolling hills, and everything is green, and the trees are huge, and colorful flowers are abundant.  That is what I miss about Missouri.

We took several days to get to St. Louis.  Stopping overnight for travel in Santa Rosa, New Mexico and also Wichita, Kansas.  Our first two-day stop was Columbia, Missouri to visit with Dennis’s family and some mid-Missouri friends.  On July 1^st we arrived in St. Louis to spend time with family and many friends.

I need to make something clear about my hometown of St. Louis, Missouri.  I actually never lived within the boundaries of the city of St. Louis except for the first few months of my life.  When I talk about St. Louis, it encompasses the area of St. Louis city and all the suburbs surrounding it.  My life in St. Louis was lived for the most part in the suburbs of the city.  St. Louis has a bad reputation for being a dangerous city, which in some ways it is.  For the most part it is certain areas of the city.  The St. Louis area is, on the whole, a beautiful city with gentle rolling hills, and lots of huge trees, and very green.  It is so refreshing to see the beauty of God’s creation even in St. Louis.  It is the home of Forest Park which was the venue for the 1904 World’s Fair—the same World’s Fair that is about the musical “Meet Me in St. Louis.”  It is also home to the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team, one of the best zoos in the world (and its free), and famous folks such as John Goodman, Chuck Berry, Jon Hamm, Nelly, Jenna Fischer, and Cedric the Entertainer.

One of the highlights was our date night at the St. Louis Muny.  The Muny is an outdoor theater that seats 11,000 people, with 1,500 of these seats in the back nine rows are absolutely free.  If you choose to take a free seat, you better bring binoculars with you.  This is a professional theater which produces Broadway musicals.  There is usually a new show every week.  The venue is only open in the summer for obvious reason of weather.  We saw “South Pacific” the night we attended.  They announced at the beginning of the show was that it was NOT a sing-along!  Really, I know the music, and I wanted to sing along.  I’m not telling if I did or not.

We had lunch with three of my adult grandchildren (their idea), which warms my heart to think they wanted to do a lunch.  We ate at Fitz’s which is a company that manufactures its own root beer, and their floats are a work of art!

We attended a monthly lunch with my high school classmates.  We have a 60^th reunion coming up in October, but there is a group of classmates who meet monthly for lunch. I think that says a lot about our class.  If you are a follower of this blog and were in my class of 1966 at Lindbergh High School in St. Louis, Missouri, know you are invited to join everyone for lunch on the third Thursday every month.   I am determined that I will be back in St. Louis for my 60^threunion.  We also had lunch with some of my college friends.

While here in the St. Louis area, I met up with family, and many old friends.  The only disappointment is that I do not have time to make a short trip to Chicago to see family.  Since arriving in St. Louis on July 1^st, we have visited with exactly 69 different people (family and friends).  I would have liked that number to be 100, but we ran out of time!

We attended a St. Louis Cardinals v. Arizona Diamondbacks baseball game.  My son and his girlfriend had a guest that stayed with us since we arrived.  She is a 15-year-old young lady from the Czech Republic.  She has been shown everything the Midwest can offer, from Kansas City to Chicago.  It was her last night before flying back home.  During the game, I went to the stadium store to buy Dennis a St. Louis Cardinals tee shirt with the name Walker on the back.  Jordan Walker is the star player, who won and broke league records at the All-Star game this year.  As I walked back, and young man was sitting on an aisle seat with some major camera equipment.  I asked him if he was an official photographer, which he said he was.  I pointed to our European guest and told him that she was going home the next day to the Czech Republic.  Sure enough, he was official.  A few minutes later all of us, with the exception of Dennis because the photographer was too close to get him in the photo—we were on the Jumbotron at the stadium!  I was so happy that his young girl could have this opportunity to see herself on the Jumbotron before she goes back home.  What a fun evening it was.  The Cardinals did not do well.  That had only 2 runs to the Arizona’s 10 runs at the middle of the 9^thinning.  When the Cards got up to bat and the bottom half of the inning, they scored 4 extra runs which made their loss of 10 to 6 much better, and what a fun way to end the game.  We kept yelling for extra innings!

The last big get-together was a graduation party for my granddaughter who graduated from the Missouri State University back last May.  It was basically a family gathering with great food, laughter, and just good times.

Tomorrow I will have lunch with my three sons on Monday—just them and me.  Dennis flew back today because he had a dental issue and his dentist could fit him in first thing Monday morning.  Southwest Airlines is no longer the easiest way to fly.  They charged $150 to change tickets (we were both supposed to fly out Monday).  We decided Dennis should go a day ahead for the appointment, and he will pick me up at the airport Monday evening.  Therefore, I have the day with my ¾ of my children.  Since it is a workday for all except me, we will meet up for a quick lunch.

As I may have mentioned before, I can no longer make long term plans.  My plans are pretty much shortened to a few weeks at a time.  On Tuesday July 28, I have a CT scan and brain MRI.  Then the following day I will have meetings with my oncologist and my radiation oncologist, and my immunotherapy infusion.  I am praying that all is good, but as we all know, those scans can tell a different story.  If all is good in my doctor meetings, Dennis and I will fly back to Missouri on Thursday for a couple more weeks.  I have pledged to myself that we will make a trip to the Chicago area to see family.  Also, my uncle passed away a few days ago and his funeral will be in Missouri, so hopefully I will be able to attend a couple days after we return to St. Louis.  

How we make our trip home in the car with the dog, and hopefully, a bunch of fresh Midwest peaches is still an open discussion.  If the doctors want to do any immediate treatment that would keep me from returning to St. Louis, Dennis will fly back to St. Louis and load up the car with the dog and drive back alone.  Maybe someone would like to volunteer to be a travel companion?  

This has been a great no-worry trip. No doctors, no hospitals, just lots of family and lots of friends. I have so much for which to be thankful.