It is almost 5:30. I have been home about 14 hours. I’m sitting in my chair, waiting for the Northbound Silver Meteor #98 to go through Ashland. I hear the train horn now, see the distant light on the screen. Cars and trucks are moving about the picture as Ashland stirs. The train is actually about an hour late. Here it comes now. The gates go down.  The interior lights of the train are off, except for the dining car.

J is getting ready for work. I will go back to sleep when she leaves.

We are in Macon, Georgia. I am eating a banana nut muffin, part of the breakfast that comes with the room at the Fairfield Inn by Marriott. We have one more night on the road. We could make Richmond in one day, only an eight hour drive but J says no. She is currently sleeping. It is 10 AM.

So much of America looks the same as every other part. That is all I am going to say.

I am in The Villages, Florida for the funeral of J’s brother. He died 29 March of complications of ALS. We spent the week driving down here. I am desperate to go home. I’ve been having an internal debate about the virtues and shortcomings of The Villages. I will say more later. Right now I am exhausted. I want to be home.

But we have the funeral and the drive home. I have been told we will spend two days driving back, through Atlanta, then Charlotte.

Let this end.

I don’t travel well. After Savannah, we drove down to St Augustine, Florida. It is a nice town, as tourist towns go. We ate at a seafood place last night called O. C. White Seafood. We had a nice meal at a fair price. I had Wahoo, J had shrimp in a cream sauce over linguini. The weather is still cool, a real blessing. The leaves are out down South, a couple of weeks ahead of Richmond

Sixty or so years ago, before Disney dominated Florida tourism, there were places like Cypress Gardens with water ski-ing shows and the glass bottom boat tours. There were alligator themed attractions and the Bok Bell Tower. We never went. But kitsch reigned. Now it is a different kitsch; consider Machine Gun World or Indoor Skydiving.

Tourists are different, I suppose. Last night at dinner a lesbian couple with their two children sat near us. They didn’t seem that much different from any other family, quite frankly. The tourists wear their tee-shirts and cargo shorts. Some wear hijabs. Most are obese.

Tourism is about convincing people to stay a while and spend some money. It started on a large scale at the turn of the Twentieth Century when large numbers of people began to have money to travel and experience something new, if only a Ferris Wheel at Coney Island.

When I began, I said I didn’t travel well. My life has structure built into it, swimming pools, grocery stores, a kitchen. When I am away from that structure, I am at loose ends. Even when I write this blog, I feel I am under different conditions, but the smartphone I use is the same. The stories I write are on hold. My imagination needs a space to, well, imagine.

Today involves driving to The Villages. Tomorrow is the funeral. Saturday and Sunday are for the drive home.

But right now, at 8:00 AM, I need more sleep.

I’m sitting in a motel room in Lumberton, North Carolina at 1:15 AM. (Eastern Time North America). We drove four hours from Richmond to arrive here last night around 7:00 PM.

It isn’t a bad room. The last time I stayed in a hotel/.motel was six months ago when we visited Dan, in what would turn out to be the last time we saw him.

There were times when I traveled for business a lot. When I sold insurance, I traveled. When I was doing store sets, I traveled. I had one gig when I would drive to places like Pawley’s Island, North Carolina to set out a new line of paint in Ace Hardware stores. It wasn’t a bad deal. Of course, it wasn’t the kind of job someone with spinal stenosis needed to be doing.

J still considers travel an “adventure”. She likes it. I think driving or riding in a car or flying in an airplane is kind of boring.

I miss my home, my YMCA. my friends, and my routine.

I do like being with J. This is the good part of the trip.