A Trip East

We left for Philadelphia pretty much as soon as we’d finished taking pictures for Lauren’s prom, the first road trip we’ve taken since the pandemic hit. But you don’t forget how to do these things, really – the slanty pedal means go, the square one means stop, the goal is to get where you’re going without changing the shape of anything else on the road, and if you do it right you get to see people at the other end. Simple.

It’s hard to find time to do half the things you want to do these days, and that week was the window we had to get everyone to go see my mom. So we said our goodbyes to Lauren and the Squad, filled the minivan with bags, and headed east away from the (eventual) sunset.

We made it to Ohio before we called it a day, stopping in Maumee. If you draw a line due south from Toledo until it intersects with I-90, that’s pretty much where you are. I’m not a terribly religious person, but I’ve long felt that if there is indeed a Purgatory it will look a lot like Maumee, Ohio – a perfectly pleasant place, neither here nor there, with comfortable hotels and restaurants that will serve you food that is decent but unmemorable and there’s nothing particularly anything about the place at all. You end up there rather than go there. You think about how your journey landed you there and you look forward to whatever comes next, in a mildly inquisitive sort of way. As soon as you leave you have no actual memory of being there other than a vague notion that you didn’t drive all the way through so you must have stopped somewhere. And now you’re headed somewhere else.

We got to Philadelphia on a Sunday evening and spent some time hanging out with my mom, which set the tone for much of the time there – we did get out a bit, but mostly we were there to spend time together.

Monday we went to Longwood Gardens. If you like plants of all kinds, Longwood Gardens is the place to go. It’s huge and reasonably accommodating. It has fountains and a massive conservatory full of flowering this and green that, and if you search long enough you’ll find the stone tower – what in the UK is called a “folly” – that has the carillon. You can, if you are so inclined, go up the stairs inside.

Lauren flew in Monday night, after her AP test that morning. I picked her up at the airport and it all worked out pretty well though it still is strange to me that this is possible. Ah well. People grow.

Tuesday we went down to Winterthur, which is not actually all that far from Longwood Gardens but it’s closed on Mondays so we couldn’t have visited both that day anyway, and at least Lauren got to come along this time. Winterthur is a 9-story house – one of the smaller DuPont mansions, it seems – stuffed to the brim with antiques and furnishings of all kinds and set on a large piece of ground that does not have a single stretch of level ground longer than eight paces anywhere on the property. You can tour the 5th floor (which is at ground level from the door we went into) and, if your life is as surreal as mine, run into a docent who used to teach at your old middle school back in the early Reagan years when you were there. You can also walk around the grounds and even get a tram tour – the place is that big.

This is not the first time I have been to either of these places, but it is the first time I remember going to them. I know I went to Winterthur once before but all I remember is getting into the car to go there, and I have no memory of going to Longwood Gardens at all though Kim insists that we went together and I have no cause to doubt her. When I finally do officially lose my mind nobody will know the difference.

Beyond that the trip was mostly quiet time spent together. There were card games – Uno and Phase 10 being the family favorites. There were cheesesteaks and water ice and soft pretzels, the foods of my native land, and one night we all went out to eat – the local Italian place has a big tent outside for those of us who are not quite ready to dine in yet as the pandemic wanes, and it was good food in good company. Kim and Lauren went to Center City at one point and then got their hair cut in the town near where my mom lives. My mom and I picked up her new glasses, and I spent a fair amount of time trying to get watch batteries replaced (hint: when the department store clerk starts off as a jerk, just go somewhere else – it’s not worth pursuing further).

Our last night there my brother and his family came down, but I have already written about that.

We left the next morning and drove back to Wisconsin in one go, skipping Maumee this time. It’s a long drive made longer by the State of Indiana’s utter inability to manage a construction zone or a rest stop and by Chicago being Chicago even as far out as I-290, but we made it back successfully.

It’s been a year and a half since we took one of these trips and that was too long.