Beautiful quiet morning….still dark, frogs croaking in the golf course across from my Dad’s house. I’m all set up in his kitchen, drinking the Earl Grey tea he put in the cupboard ‘specially for his first child so she would have all the comforts of home. ♥ Here we are, last night after dinner at Nic’s, me, my dad and his darling, wonderful wife, Jeannie. It’s a fuzzy photo Joe took with my iPhone, but we’re all there together, on a gorgeous starry night in the old town of Cottonwood, in the high Arizona desert.
We brought Dad his belated birthday present, an iPad, which we’ve been practicing up on while on this trip, trying to learn it, so we could “teach” him.
This is the blind leading the blind. But together, we ended up seeing the light. What a fun little machine this is! First stop my dad made, Youtube, to hear Johnny Cash singing I Walk the Line.
My dad’s fingers are big and wide and hitting the keys just right on the iPad looks like it might be an art! Something learnable and doable with practice, but at first, not so easy.
My dad’s name is John Patrick Stewart, Jr. But most people call him Jack. His fingers are wide, but his hands are square and strong and beautiful to me. These are two of the hands that raised me. I like to put mine in his still, to this day, all warm and pure comfort in there. When we hold hands, I feel six-years-old again and I don’t want to let go. They are the hands that made my childhood safe and secure; they’re the ones that tied the tent on the roof of the car so there’d be room inside for his eight children when we went camping to the High Sierras every summer; they planted the plum tree in our backyard, and built the playhouse for my sisters; they dug the hole for the swimming pool, and held us while we learned how to swim. Strong enough to fix anything, soft enough for putting babies down for naps.
He sends me his favorite recipes, written in his own handwriting. His hands helped to build the house that is my life.
Here he is with his dog Daisy, feeling the morning sun. We leave here today, back on the train overnight to California, with more memories under our belt. I wish we could stay. Just one more hand-holding will have to do for now. ♥ I love my Daddy.
Here we are amid the hustle and bustle of arriving in Flagstaff last night! Joe is getting the car that’s waiting for us, and I’m just waiting for him. This is why I love trains. It’s just like this getting on too, like a little secret, everyone settling in their rooms, or just stepping off the train into the night.
The other thing I like is that train travel is so civilized; here we are having “tea” in our room. We always bring a string-bag full of treats, to have with our newspapers and books in our room with a view.
We love the weather we see from our window. . . this was last night, crossing the New Mexico desert; none of that ever got close to us . . .
We love the people we meet in the dining car. This lovely Amish woman is the mother of, e l e v e n children. She has 50 grandchildren. She travels by horse and buggy, and train. She and her husband were so nice and fun to talk to as we crossed over the Mississippi River together in the dining car. You never know who you will meet on the train. 
There’s time for everything on a three-day cross country train trip. I bring my journal, a good book, the tea pot, my pillow . . . the basic necessities of life. But it’s the view that is most compelling . . . America the beautiful . . .
Someday I’ll have to tell you the story of my first train trip and how I discovered, by accident, this wonderful way to travel. We always have so much to do at home, places we have to be, things we have to do, these three days of “down time” are the only way to fly!
It’s lovely in all seasons. We are cozy in room with view, while this rages outside our window (on another trip of course).
The train passes through woodlands, along rivers, through little towns with white church steeples poking high above the trees; it creaks as it moves slowly through high mountain passes, and makes a blur speeding along the coastline; we have moon lit starry nights, and sun rises that wake up the whole sleeping train.
Our country is in danger of losing the train as a way of travel, what a terrible loss that would be…I’m a one-woman band (not really, there are lots of us) marching to say, hey look at how wonderful this is. Let’s never let it go away.
That’s all for today. Thanks for coming on our virtual train trip. I have so many photos, I could do this all day. But, now it’s playtime, with my dad . . . off we go. You have a wonderful day. Hope you’re all loving Willard . . . so happy we were able to manage that and be on the train at the same time! Computer miracles never cease. xoxo
