Driving in the Lehigh Tunnel yesterday, I couldn’t resist taking shots both ways. There was fog in parts of both directions — the worst was last night north of the tunnel, when it was like pea soup and I couldn’t safely drive more than 50 mph (80 kph). I think that was pushing it a bit.
I drove much of the Pennsylvania Turnpike yesterday, from the top to the bottom, and looped through all manner of principle and secondary roadways to get where I needed to go. Armed with MapQuest and Google maps, David’s Pennsylvania mapbook, a North American road atlas, and a Tourism PA map, I still needed to stop and figure out which one was up-to-date!
I drove through the heartland of Pennsylvania — Amish farmland, feed stores, small villages, roadside restaurants — and made a point to travel through Lebanon, where David lived for a short time. I passed by names like Kountry Kitchen and Nearly-Nu Thrift Shop, and borough names ending with -ville or -town: Virginville, Halfville, Walnuttown, Slaymakersville, Rohrerstown, Adamstown, Buyerstown. I saw signs for places like Smoketown and Safe Harbor.
Some Unusual Town Names of Lancaster County
David and I wrote a bit about it back in March of last year, after we made a trip to Philadelphia.
I drove around 370 miles yesterday, about the same distance between Toronto and Scranton, and visited with some people who knew David in college. It was very therapeutic, in ways that can’t be achieved by traditional therapy methods. To a counsellor, my husband is an abstract, a name, a relationship. We are not peers. When I’m with people who can talk about David as a person, and feel the loss themselves, it is an entirely different dialogue — and not necessarily a sad one, either. There are jokes, stories, revelations. There is an understanding between us, an exchange.
“There are lessons to be learned from our story,” I said yesterday. “I’m still learning them.” Life lessons take a lifetime to learn, but I feel better today, and today that is all that matters.
Technorati tags: Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania Turnpike, Lehigh Tunnel, cameraphone, Nokia 6682, driving
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