Home sweet home

My last official stop of the road trip was at my college roommate Amy's house. She got married about a year ago and was having a little get together for a few of us Keuka alums that had last been at the wedding together. She lives in Jamestown so I didn't cross over into New York until about 15 minutes before her house. I actually had to stop and turn around because I missed the welcome sign. I'd missed a few on my trip but I did not want to miss the home state. This was the first time I'd been to her and Jay's house and it was really cute. They also have a new puppy named Ritz who is adorable despite his propensity to constantly bite people. Of course it was raining so we stayed in and talked most of the afternoon. I found it funny that the talk consisted of mortgages, loans, insurance, salaries, rent, grad school and other "grown-up" topics. Oh how far we've all come. Except me. I'm the trail bum who after moving three times and having 8 jobs, quit the only consistent job I had to go on a six week road trip by myself. And I used to the the responsible one.

I headed out the next morning, eager to get on the road. Of course, it was still raining all the way down the Thruway. I got a voicemail from Kyle saying it's very important so I called him back, very concerned and he asked if I had room for any passengers. Obviously I didn't, seeing as how I'd been living in my car for six weeks but he apparently wanted me to pick him up along the road in the pouring rain. I did and he started filming me which I thought was cool because it'd document my trip up to the house. Well, lining the field leading up to the house I saw a bunch of signs and when I slowed down, I saw that they were huge signs of the major milestone of my roadtrip! I was floored. I thought they'd been up awhile but Devin and Kyle had painted them only last night and put them up that morning. Then I go to pull in the driveway and Grandma and Devin are unrolling a banner that said "7000 miles and finally home" (or something to that effect). I was supposed to drive through it but it ended up just drifting over the top of my car.

Grandpa Doyle, Grandpa Burns and Aunt Kathy were there along with Mom, Dad, Don and Amber. I was so surprised. Of course my first order of business was seeing Max. He was the one I missed most (sorry, everyone). After hugging everyone and going inside I found out that Kyle had contacted Jess to ask her how to make that amazing tortellini salad she brought me at the Grand Canyon. It was a great homecoming and I'm grateful to everyone that had a hand in it.