New Jersey

I have some down time right now, so I'll write about the trip so far. I haven't mentioned it in here yet--so FYI, Stephen and I and his family are in New Jersey for a family reunion on his mother's side. They picked New Jersey (even though none of them live there anymore) because that's where Steve's grandpa (who has passed away) and his siblings grew up. His great-grandparents are buried here, across from America's Keswick Retreat Center, which is where we are staying.

After spending Monday night at Steve's parents' house, we flew out Tuesday at 11:30 AM for the East Coast. Our first flight was 4.5 hours long, from Sea-Tac to Nashville, TN. We had a 1-hour layover in Nashville, which was just enough time for the seven of us to snatch lunch/dinner and get to our gate. The second flight was about 2.5 hours, from Nashville to Philadelphia, PA. Both flights were without problems, although there was slight turbulence as we came into Philly and a rather hard landing that shook everybody awake.

We arrived in Philadelphia at 9:00 local time (6:00 our time!) and took a shuttle to Avis, where an 8-passenger SUV with decent trunk space was supposed to be waiting for us. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, they did not have our SUV waiting for us. What they did have would not fit all seven of us and our luggage, so we instead rented a tight, but sufficient, mini-van. Using Steve's dad's GPS phone, we drove it from Philadelphia for about an hour and a half to America's Keswick. We got in about 12:30 AM. Stephen's great-uncle Dave was there to meet us and give us our keys, and two of his Georgia cousins, Victoria and Lauren, came running down the stairs to greet us. It was kind of entertaining, because they know Steve and his family very well--I'm kind of on the "outside"--but they hugged me anyway. :)

The humidity of New Jersey surprised me. It felt like Portland on a muggy day. I keep expecting the weather to turn around and be not-muggy anymore, but I don't suppose it does? Anyway, it's tolerable. It feels a lot like Hawaii to me, and like Korea to Stephen. Tomorrow is supposed to be 87 degrees though--we'll see how tolerable it is then! :)

Tuesday at 12:00 we all went to see the great-grandparents' gravestones. I thought that was a good thing to do; it gave meaning for the trip to me, reminding me why I'm here with all these people with names I'm not familiar with, LOL. One of the people--I can't remember his name, EEK!--gave a short message there about the legacy the great-grandparents left by passing down their faith in Christ. It was kind of neat to look at the people there and know they are all connected to those two people, Ida Marie and Bob.

After lunch, most of us headed down toward the Point Pleasant Beach boardwalk. We got to experience a lot of East Coast driving firsthand, and Stephen's dad was doing a lot of it. :D Kind of terrifying!! On the way, we stopped at the house Ida Marie and Bob had lived in, and one of the houses Stephen's grandma lived in as a child. It took us a long while to get to the places because Steve's grandma couldn't quite remember the addresses. We made lots and lots of turnarounds! But we did eventually find the houses. Steve's mom said that they had a picture of Stephen when he was a little, little boy sitting on his great-grandma's lap at the house they lived in. That was kind of cool too--a tie-in to my own life.

When we got to Grandma's old house, e-ver-y-body got out to take pictures and stare and wonder and everything, in this small East-Coast neighborhood... The neighbors were really giving us odd looks!! A few of them finally came up to us and asked who we were and what we were doing. We must've looked like the news come to town or something, pulling up in two vans and pulling out cameras all over! LOL!

After seeing Grandma's old house, we tried to head down to the boardwalk, got a little lost, and wound back up on Grandma's old street. And just as we were pulling through, a woman about 65 years old with tight white curls frantically yelled and flagged us down. She knew Grandma and her sister when they were young--Grandma's sister taught her how to swim. That was all I caught... Grandma was in the van behind us, so the woman went back there to talk to her through the passenger seat window. I watched through the back window of our van, and Grandma's expression when the woman introduced herself was totally enough for me. :) It was worth it. They held hands, enraptured by the joy of finding each other after so many years... It was really, really sweet. I think both women will remember this meeting for a long, long time.

After that, we finally made it down to the Boardwalk. Nobody rode any rides, but we did stick our feet in the Atlantic. Now seeing the Atlantic was sure different!! I'd never seen it before, and the first thing that struck me was how insanely close the waves crash to shore. It scared me to death for a minute until I realized that the waves come very regularly, slowly and only one at a time--which was also bizarre! And it was really strange knowing that to my left was the North and to my right was the South. It was a little disorienting, in all truth. LOL.

I had to avoid the waves, sadly, because I scraped up my ankle pretty bad on a bike (or rather, falling off a bike) yesterday, and I had bandaids on it. But I let the seawater wet me up to the bottom part of my ankles. It felt like California water--very nice!

The sand was really different. Somebody said they probably trucked a lot in. What I noticed was that it was dark yellow, not white like the West Coast. It looked for all the world like yellow cake mix to me! It also felt different, though I could never pinpoint quite why.

We went in a couple souvenir shops and I realized something else different. They wrap their saltwater taffy in rolls instead of blobs. I should have bought some, but looking at the way they were wrapped, my brain kept saying, No, I don't feel like caramel... LOL. I did buy some souvenirs for my mom and sister, and a beautiful little sand-sculpture castle covered in glitter for me. It looked so perfect! I wish I could have bought a couple others too.... They're just so cute and pretty!

Wow, that's all yesterday--I haven't even gotten to today yet. Today has not been terribly eventful, really. We took group pictures galore mid-morning. We had lunch on our own. Stephen went canoeing with one of his cousins and I took pictures. There's stuff to do but none of it jumps out at me, I guess. Dinner is in about a half an hour, so I think I'll wake Steve up. He's been sleeping for the last hour and a half. We're a tired bunch! I took a long nap earlier. Jet lag catches up to us on the second day, I guess. :)
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Tomorrow we go to Lancaster County, PA, where Stephen's dad grew up.

Oh, and I have a possible job interview coming?! Crazy?! I got a call today from CampusPoint saying that there was a temporary (3-week) proofreading job available for a software company. It starts Monday. Yeah. Insanity. We're getting back Sunday, so I could do that--but how insane, right?! I kinda hope I get it. It's a possible foot-in-the-door for that company too, in whatever positions they might have for me. So pray for me! Wisdom and guidance and strength too.

Also pray for Stephen's brother Jon. He's been sick for about a month, and nobody's quite sure what's going on. Stephen thinks it's mono. Please pray that we'll sort that out. Thanks everyone!