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We'd waited all day for the snow, and when it came the flakes were saucers—huge and slant, conjoined. We had had our time as a family of three, but the next day our boy would be headed back to the hills, to Literature and Advertising, to Probability and World Cultures, to a sound engineering booth and a dorm. So that we drove through the night on back country roads—the snow falling, the moon rising, the world bright and wholly bittersweet, for what does one do with the deep, rutted, impossible love for children who grow, too, who emerge, like us, into the age they are becoming? What does one do, but drive across roads and inside the shell of a heart-quelled silence?

“Forrest, sometimes people do things that just don’t make no sense.”
--Mrs. Gump, Quote from Forrest Gump.

But, sometimes we do them anyway. Like road tripping when gas is at all time highs.

Why Mt. Rushmore, you ask? Why now? There’s a story there. When I was raising the kids there were times when I would get a little, well, overwhelmed. And I would smile at dinner and joke, "If you guys wake up one day and I'm gone, don't worry, I'm just on my way to Mt. Rushmore." Mt. Rushmore became my idea of freedom/sanity. Needless to say, I never did take that trip. [OK, insert joke about my sanity here.]

After Candy graduated from SFSU a few weeks back, she asked if I wanted to road trip to Mt. Rushmore with her. This on the heels of a good friend’s mother’s passing, just days before graduation. Today Candy is attending her friend's mom's memorial service in Los Angeles. So I guess the trip will be about more than just freedom and sanity but also a celebration of mothers and daughters. I feel so lucky that we have each other and a little time to rewild. What will we find on the road? Hmmm...stay tuned.

Yesterday, while drinking Chinese tea that Candy brought home from Hong Kong, we ooogled our TripTik [THE most powerful road trip weapon in our arsenal besides a fully loaded ipod] and talked Gold Country. We discovered that Mark Twain spent some time gaining a life time of inspiration and panning for gold here, in California Gold Country before he became a famous writer. Love the things we are discovering. We also discussed how the Coppertone Logo is sweet and somehow prolly politically incorrect in this day and age. Candy said when she grew up it creeped her out a little.

With an eye to the road:

6 ways you’re wasting gas

And, we’ll have none of these [BTW, why or why isn't an ipod on the list? Well have one of those:)]:

7 top road-trip tech gadgets

GO LAKERS!

We head back down south tonight to go to a dinner for our priest who is leaving our congregation and heading to Santa Barbara. We’ve known Hank for around a dozen years. I love Episcopal priests and Hank in particular. Most people don’t know the very small town where Joe is from. But Hank knew right away, ‘cause he’d sold generators right after the big earthquake in Coalinga in ’83. Which, coincidentally, is coming up on its 25th anniversary tomorrow. Talk about an enterpriser. Bishop Bruno confirmed Candy and signed her prayer book on a surfboard. There’s just a lived-life quality to vicars that melts the barrier that sometimes come between people and their priests.

Then we drive back up north to scatter Ray’s ashes. It’s been about a year and a half since he’s left us. Never been to an ashes-scattering ceremony. Don’t quite know what to expect. Certain Ray’s ready to be roaming the hills with is dog Andrew though. A park is going to be dedicated in his honor this weekend too.

Then it’s back down south for a great meeting with my amazing crit group and a little trip to the dentist.

I’ve mailed and emailed queries and partials. It’s like Tom Petty says, the waiting is the hardest part. I love this story. Now, it’s time to shop it around, let it go. I’m going to miss working on it everyday. Even though I know I’ll still be revising here and there for a time. But soon, I’ll be moving on to my next novel, a YA contemporary that doesn’t have an ending yet. My other novels have beginnings, middles and ends. I really wonder why I stopped writing. Maybe I just wasn’t ready for The End. Maybe sometimes the writing is so fun I just don’t want it all to stop. Maybe I was trying to say too much with one story. Whatever it was, I’m excited to get back into it and see if I find my way to an ending.

Now that I think about it, so much about this weekend is letting go. Letting go of my story hoping it will find a good home. Letting go of Ray and watching him become a part of the desert hills he cherished. Letting go of Hank and keeping his words of wisdom close as he leaves. Even letting go of my kids as Candy is airborne on her way home from Hong Kong and Mx has been exploring parts of NYC that surprised her but left her with some great stories to tell.

I get kind of nervous when military family types say things like "I hate to drop a bomb like this...but...". Jill, aka The Crib Chick, has decided to stop posting to both of her blogs (here and here), When I started this blog, almost two years ago, it was a sort of extension of our circumstances; new location, new place in life. Now, the ending of it is much the same. Different time in life,