MOTLEY COLLECTION THE FIRST

November 2021 and May 2022

There are just some events in life that are bittersweet – the juxtaposition of happy and sad, a reflection on that something of great meaning in your world that now has passed. Maybe it’s as mundane (?) as the end of a great vacation, or the excitement knowing that what just happened is a true once in a lifetime experience. Maybe it’s knowing at 18 or 21 or 40 or 70 years of age (finally!) that you can never go back to that childhood home again (damn growing up). Maybe it’s after your best friend has passed after a long, long time of illness and pain and exhaustion, and you get to give their eulogy. It’s saying goodbye to your old life as the new becomes all encompassing – you should never look back.

Barbara and I have made a bittersweet decision. We’ve been traveling the past 4+ years full time with our constant companion and home, Aimee Motorhome. We’ve made it to visit family only a couple of times a year – 2020 the exception due to Covid. We found that we missed our family terribly and longed to be closer geographically. But then again we loved our travels so very much, too – the places we’ve seen and the people we’ve met. Bittersweet…

We’re set to buy a summer condo somewhere near Ann Arbor, Michigan, sell Aimee, spoil our grandkids as often as we can be with them in person, settle down for a year and then find a way to keep traveling.

Bittersweet too because there may be only 2 blogs remaining of this generation of blogs.

There have been times with grandkids not officially recorded in previous pages, some pretty cool events we’ve attended, and just some beautiful places and sights never recorded in print. It’s time to right the wrong.

Let’s start with Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

Daughter-in-law Jaimee has been more than obsessed with The Battle at Gettysburg for quite some time and had dreamed of becoming a National Park Service Ranger and forever working at the Park. Life takes some interesting turns, and, well, for the last 21 years or so she didn’t find herself able to pursue those dreams. As happens life took on another interesting turn in 2019 and enabled Jaimee, spousal unit Jordan and our granddaughter Helena to became residents of that historic city. As a matter of fact their house is less than a quarter of a mile from Robert E. Lee’s battlefield command post! Jordan can work at home, Helena does fine with the Gettysburg schools, and Jaimee is in line to become the Director of The Gettysburg Foundation’s Children’s Museum. We’re not sure that a week goes by that there’s not a special lecture, walking tour or reenactment relating to the Battle at Gettysburg or other local battles of the Civil War that doesn’t occupy their attention (well, we suppose that there are house things to do too?).

Helena’s birthday is in November, and once free from Covid’s restraints we made it a point to visit their new home. Celebrating her birthday was special. Being together was special. Having our own private 6-hour tour of the battlefield with the uber-knowledgeable Jaimee as our guide was overwhelmingly wonderful.

Other cool sights and places to visit near Gettysburg…

Sometimes we bumped into places that should be noted in Atlas Obscura. Mr. Ed’s is one such place…

8 miles west of Gettysburg and built in 1914 the Historic Round Barn and Farm Market is one of “only a handful of truly round barns surviving today.” The architecture of round barns is the result of American creativity – it costs less to build and has a greater volume to surface ratio than rectangular barns (i.e., holds more stuff). Some historians speculate that there’s more to it than that, but worrying about designing a living environment that makes for happy livestock may be more myth than fact!

While at the round barn these little fellas made themselves known!

And there just happened to be farmyard animals around – this fella liked posing to have his picture taken -or- maybe he thought we had a treat?

While we were living in Pennsylvania Brian would often travel to Hanover, PA; Baltimore, MD; DC or Richmond, Virginia for business, and on occasion we would head down to Fairfax Station to spend some time with the Duckenfields. We preferred to stay as far away from Interstate 95 as possible, and to get from here to there State Route 15 south out of Harrisburg was a whole lot less stressful a trip. We’d pass by the Catoctin Wildlife Preserve and wonder what all the fuss was about. Jordan and Jamie bought a season’s pass to that very same Wildlife Preserve and this August we were treated to an afternoon at the zoo. This is a small well-tended, family-friendly attraction with a wide array of well-kept animals grateful that you stopped in to say hi!

Graham, Leigh and Rowan moved back to DC a couple of years ago. Last November we just happened to find ourselves on the “Mall.”

It’s May, 2022 and we found ourselves in Ohio, and Aimee found a home at a campground in Lebanon. Lebanon is a town of about 21,000 people with a terrific downtown – lots of quaint shops and eateries. However, the true find happens to be Ohio’s oldest operating Inn and Hotel, The Golden Lamb.

Lebanon is only 32 miles to Cincinnati, aka The Queen City of Ohio, aka The Paris of America, aka The Fountain city, aka Porkopolis, aka, The City of Seven Hills…

Our traveling companion, Atlas Obscura, listed a few jewels in the Queen City for us to check out. Let’s begin with the “Mushroom House,” which was the genius of architect Terry L. Brown who is memorialized by a plaque on the foundation of the building. It is privately owned and is indeed someone’s family home.

Every wonder about those chubby waving cat decorations frequently found in Chinese Restaurants? Us neither, but then again who would have thought that there’d be a museum honoring the Lucky Cat?

When Atlas Obscura lists a statue worthy of visiting, and gives the reason as “Mussolini gifted it to the City” we should have known it’d be a little off center. But in pursuit of “The Capitoline Wolf” we found another statue gifted to Cincinnati by Gifu, its sister city in Japan.

We guess the gift from Mussolini and the people of the City of Rome ought to be under the heading of “how thoughtful” rather than seeing how creepy it really is…

There are only a few statues of a beardless Abe Lincoln around the Country. Commissioned by Ohio native President William Howard Taft the statue was meant to honor his fellow President. However, the statue was poorly received both here and abroad. President Taft wanted to gift England a copy which was summarily rejected, and Honest Abe’s son Robert Todd called the statue “a monstrous figure, grotesque as a likeness of President Lincoln, and defamatory as an effigy.” Somehow and in spite of all the criticism it has survived all these years.

Opened in 1933 Union Station is an art deco building that was the hub for Cincinnati’s rail service to the rest of the Country as well as within the city itself. Time passed and as the railroads became less and less important many wonderful buildings such as Union Station were scheduled to meet the fate of a wrecking ball. However, and with foresight of the city fathers Union Station was resurrected as a home for several museums. It is a beautiful place to see.

The lobby is home to historical murals…

It seems that everywhere we go, we find something interesting to see or do. Guess the old adage applies: “If you’re bored, it’s your own fault!”

We wonder whether we’re driven by curiosity or some need to absorb as much of the places we’ve been as might be possible? So many friends and acquaintances are amazed at what we’ve experienced, even when we describe their own backyard, neighborhood, city, region or state.

Who knows what can be lived if the time to “see” is taken?

Barbara and Brian

“It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.“ – Henry David Thoreau