Home, Sweet, Home

After over 16 hours in the car, we arrived home last night at about 12:30 a.m.(central time). On the trip home, we logged in over 1200 miles (roundtrip= +2700 miles). And I might add, that the kids did really well.
On Monday morning, we left somewhere in northern Virginia and headed home. Hills turned into rolling hills, and then into the Shennandoah area - it really was much, much more beautiful than I ever expected.
As the hills and mountains moved closer together, we veered off the main interstate and onto some two lane highways. Instead of heading directly home, we chose to travel through Welch, West Virgina. We were going through the Appalachia area - considered to many the poorest area in the U.S.





For generations Welch has been a coal mining town. It is situated in a very narrow valley - so narrow Runcie and I felt extremely claustrophobic. Most homes are dangling on the side of a mountain and there are a handful of streets, town buildings, and a few homes on level ground. Like most in the Appalachia area, Welch was very impoverished - as you can see from the pictures. The reason I wanted to travel through this town was a book that I recently read (Lauren's choice for book club). Titled, The Glass Castle: A Memoir - it's an autobiography of one of MSNBC's writer's who spent much of her childhood in this town. She recalls unbelievable details of her life of poverty and neglect. It really is a must read for everyone - even though her parents gave what most would have considered abuse and neglect - she tells her story objectively and movingly. (If you can't tell, I loved it)






She often talked about her home on 93 Little Hobart Street. - So we programmed it in the navigation - and it led us up a very steep curvy road. Her home was almost at the end of the street (in the book it was on the end, but someone had built a home on the end of the street since she left). Her home had fallen in. You can still see that roof, now on the ground, that kept leaking on her and her brother when they were forced to sleep under a raft so they could stay dry during rain. And you can also see the steps. I had heard an interview with her, and she had heard that some went looking for her home, and it had fallen in, but they did find the rubble - and the hole for the foundation of the glass castle (still filled with the trash that Rex Walls dumped). In some ways, it was so very sad - but I know how it ends - and what an amazing person she has become.


As we drove out of the Appalachia area, we talked about the great disparity within America. Homes in Welch held together with plywood, duct tape, and cinder blocks weights - and estates boasting of conspicuous consumption - one estate was rumored to have 5 million in stonework and landscape alone. I was sad - realizing that the American dream isn't as attainable for all - but - who says that the American dream is the key to happiness.
What we did come away with from our trip was an experience - an education of where we live and why we love it here. We also recognized how blessed we are and how relative struggles can be. We even - on our 16 hr. car ride home - started thinking of other adventures and mysteries to explore in trips to come.