M-I-CROOKED LETTER-CROOKED LETTER- I . . .

It has been a while, and I know I am much overdue with my updates.  Our first Thanksgiving and Christmas on the road brought a lot of emotions and kept us quite busy so I decided to wait until after the first of the year to continue with our adventures.

In mid-November we moved from Alabama to Meridian, Mississippi.  For the first time since we started out, we found ourselves having a tough time finding things to do.  First of all, when we arrived at the campground - it was all gravel and not very level so we made the decision not to even unload the motorcycle.  We had done a little research on the area and knew that the roads were not very "motorcycle friendly" so we were comfortable with the decision. 

We did the high point of Mississippi which was a nice drive and very little hiking to get to the top.  Okay..we stepped out of the truck and we were on it.  We did find though, that as we drove, there was very little to see in either direction.  We have been in plenty of "out of the way" places in other states, but we always run across farms and small towns or villages.  Here, it just seemed like vast areas of nothing on either side of us.

 We had a gorgeous park right in the city we were in, and we were able to do a five mile hike through it.  It was such a gem surrounded by the city - we were very impressed with how well it was maintained and how interesting they made it. 

We also stumbled upon an old store out in the middle of nowhere.   It was truly like stepping back in time.  We spent some time chatting with the owners.  His family had owned the store for generations and if stuff didn't sell it just got left on the shelf.  Part of it used to be a shoe store and there were shelves upon shelves of old deteriorating shoes still in their boxes.  I can't imagine how many people walked through this store over the decades and how many stories the walls could tell.



It was also fun to watch the Christmas season come alive in the different towns.  One night in the RV we heard noises outside and went out to be treated by the village Christmas parade marching right by us. 

One thing I have noticed about some of the states that makes me miss NY is a difference in the respect that people have for their roadsides.  Having lived for so long with bottle return laws - I had no idea how much of a difference it actually made. Between that and the lack of "highway adopted by.." road signs, there seems to be an abundance of trash and litter along the side the roads, which is very sad.  A book I just read had an interesting comment in it - "you can't tell how poor a town is just by looking at it, you can only tell how much pride they take in it."  It astonishes me that there are still parts of the country where people think nothing of throwing bottles or cups or fast food bags out their window.   It seems like such a simple thing to fix.

  I guess the best way to sum up a visit to Mississippi is the conversation I had with a woman in the mall.  I asked her what was the best thing to do in the area and she said.."drive to Atlanta, GA".  I hate to say anything bad about places.  I know the small areas that we cover don't mean that is what the whole state is like, but we did spend a good portion of our 2 weeks getting RV maintenance done, getting our wii set up (which is quite interesting in the "scaled down" size of our living room)  and doing lots of indoor stuff.

The highlight of our stay in Mississippi was our first Thanksgiving in our new little house.  We certainly missed our kids, and it was very strange not being surrounded by the huge family Thanksgiving traditions that we are used to. But there was something very special about celebrating, just the two of us, in this new, simplified life that we have set off on.  We played games, had a tiny turkey and only 1 pie (which, in my family is unheard of) and we just enjoyed each other's company.  Maybe the quiet solitude of it gave us a chance to really understand just how much we have to be thankful for.