The move…

Well, our move from Colorado is mostly complete.  I pulled out of town with Melanie on Saturday morning at 6am with a ton of crap in the car and the dog in back on doggie “downers”.  Our good friends and neighbors, Alison and Brian came to wish us farewell at the crack of dawn.  That was just the icing on the cake.  We finished packing the cooler and off we went.

Archie is was not a car dog.  Even drugged he managed to wine the entire first day, poor guy.  Mel did have a good point in that the only two places he’d ever gone in a car was to the vet or to the groomers.  Neither of which is he a big fan of.  He was having nothing to do with sleep, though.  He fought it off with ever fiber of his little being.

Our first stop was Salina, KS.  Melanie spent part of her childhood growing up there and her good friend Bevin still lives there.  We stopped in, got Archie out of the car for a while and went to lunch.  Not before we toured the place a bit.  Some beautiful old homes there I will say.  Like old time Mayberry on some of those streets.  There was one part of town, called “the Hill” that boasted fully bricked Georgian-styled homes.  5-4 and a door traditionals.  Beautiful.  We stayed for some time and then it was back on the road again.

We crossed over into Missouri and everything was going smoothly until around sundown.  My car suddenly indicated it had no oil left???  I had just had it changed.  We drove about 30 minutes off the freeway to get to a Walmart that was still open to find out they never reset my oil gauge when they changed the oil last time.  Stupid electronic cars!  We were pretty relieved to hear this was the only hiccup.  We made it to St. Louis about 9 that first night and were ever so happy to see our beds.

We were up early the next morning, had breakfast and got on the road.  Day two I drugged Archie again, but he was better about the car for sure.  He wined only for a little while and laid down for most of the trip.  He was starting to understand that there was no vet or grooming involved this time.  We made it through Nashville and on to Knoxville that next night with no excitement.  Just a smooth as silk ride.

Along the way we talked and laughed and made the most of our time together.  Melanie is my split-apart.  Literally.  She’s my other half.  We finish thoughts and sentences and go on amazing roller coaster rides of life together.  I am still so amazed things worked out like they did — that we got to take this major milestone journey together.  I am blessed to have her in my life.

Along the way in between chatting, Melanie would play the “road kill” game.  I swear, if there was something dead on the road, she saw it and could mostly name what it had been.  Me, I never see road kill.  No joke.  I look straight ahead and see license plates for the most part.  And a dead tire here and there…it was funnier if you were in the car, I suppose.  We laughed and laughed about it.

Day 3 was a quick drive through the amazing Blue Ridge mountains.  Wow — just lovely.  Trees, hills, changing leaves.  It was simply beautiful between Knoxville and Ashville, NC.  And by day 3, Archie had finally calmed down enough to not need drugs and to enjoy the ride.  No more whining.  From Ashville it’s only a 2-hour drive to Clover, SC.  We went straight to the model homes so Mel could see where we were going to set down our roots.

I even willingly got in a picture.  I never do that!!  After the tour and meeting with Linda, our salesperson at the house (who loved Archie and took a picture of him for her FB page).  From the house we headed to our new apartment because Mel wanted a feel for that.  It’s cuter then I remembered.  Which is good.  From there we went to the hotel and then lunch and then around town a little.  Later that evening we hit the nail place one last time to finish the trip.  Weird.  All the time I had living in Castle Rock I feel like I took for granted.  There were so many more things she and I could have done together…I’m so glad this drop off isn’t the end and that I’ll be back for visits on the quarter.

Mel left on Tuesday morning and then I returned to the airport later that day to pick up Frank and Kenzie.  Archie was so happy to have his family back together in one place.  We’ve shopped for the comforts we needed and now we’re just waiting for our furniture to be dropped off on Monday.  Life is good.  And so far — we love our new home.