We had a 3 1/2 hour stop in Chicago, and of course it was raining. We attempted to put our stuff in a locker, but it only took exact bills which of course we did not have. So we decided to eat lunch, and ended up sharing a table with some really interesting people from Mississippi. After lunch, it stopped raining, so we went outside and sat on a wall, watching people go by. A woman came by and started talking to us, because she saw my HomeGoods bag. I ended up telling her all about moving Andy and then going home to start the drive to Arizona. She thought we were crazy to drive our truck all that way and risk having it break down. She suggested we mail all of Kira’s stuff instead. We hadn’t thought of that!! Duh!
We caught our train home and called Kira about our decision…it wasn’t pretty. She had to go through all her boxes and decide what she needed and how much would fit in her car, along with trying to see though all the tears that were falling down her face. But she pulled through! David was soooooo relieved he didn’t have to drive nearly 2000 miles that there were tears in his eyes. It was a great weight off our shoulders.
About 11:30 a.m. on Sunday, Kira and I and a loaded down car took off for Arizona. We made it to Witchita Kansas and stayed there the first night. A storm was coming in the morning from the west, exactly where we wanted to go, so we ended up making a little detour and went south instead, right through the Bible Belt! Driving though the ‘Bible Belt’ was a little frightening and uncomfortable, ‘Jesus Saves’ signs all over the place, the largest cross in North America, southern accents. We stopped at a KFC for lunch and while listening to the southern accents, I felt like I should cover up my tattoos. Strange! We stopped for the night in Albequerque, New Mexico.
Once out of New Mexico, as we were driving into Arizona, we noticed one of the mountain peaks had snow on it. I knew that it had snowed not too terribly long before that, but I didn’t expect to see any. We drove down the Oak Creek Canyon again…breathtaking and stomach dropping going around those curves in the road. Sedona was gorgeous! On and on we drove, I kept waiting for the flat desert to appear. We started to see cactus here and there, and all of a sudden, we went over a hill and saguaro cactus all over the mountains, growing just like trees. WOW! I was not expecting that.
Shayna was texting Kira to see how much farther we had to go, as we were supposed to be at the Apartment office by 6:00 p.m. We got there just a few minutes late. Shayna said Hi, then went to Kira and said, ‘I don’t know…do we hug?’ so they did and it’s working out just great. It turns out the manager used to be manager of an apartment on 63rd and Boone here in MN. Small world!
They got all checked in, and we started moving stuff, what little they actually had. They still don’t have very much, but Kira’s waiting until she gets paid so she knows what she’s got to work with. She did get a full size mattress and a desk/wall unit and two chairs from IKEA, and a small kitchen table from Gramma Goettsch. We went for a visit to Jean and Carl’s trailer and had a visit with Gramma too. I told Kira that Jean will talk your ear off, and she now agrees with me.
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