A busy month to unpack and share

 Has it really been a month since I last posted?  Well, it has been a bit less than a month, but we may as well call it a month!  Life has been crazy!  There is so much to share.  I need to give an update on my Noon experience.  I have been out exploring the world around me a bit.  Zoey had a birthday.  We had a wedding anniversary.   Last but not least, I really need to discuss the elephant in the room in regards to my weight and fitness journey.  I’m telling you, there is a lot to unpack and share.   I am not going to have time to get into everything today….so let me give you a run down on what I’ve been doing in the last month.  Buckle up and let’s see where the last month took me. In no particular order!

Zoey Turned Two

As I am writing this post, it is super early in the morning and Jason is still in bed sleeping.  Zoey has come out of the bedroom to hang with me and has commandeered the couch, where she is stretched out, upside down, hogging pretty much the whole couch and snoozing away.   To say she is a bit spoiled is a serious understatement!  With that in mind is it any surprise that we spoiled her like crazy for her birthday?   On the day of her birthday, she got a new toy and I made her a doggy cake.  (It had apples, peanut butter and an egg as the main ingredients).  She did share that with the bird (who also loved it).   Then on the weekend Jason made her a steak dinner. Ok, I think he may have wanted to just make himself a steak dinner and Zoey was the excuse.  Especially considering he is still talking about how good HIS steak was and her birthday was more than three weeks ago!  Zoey gobbled that steak and sweet potato down!  There was no hesitation there!   She also got three new toys over the weekend and I bought some doggy cookies for her. (They smelled and looked like fig newtons…but were supposed to taste like bacon and cheese…..No, I didn’t try them personally!)  I would say that the dog had a pretty good birthday! 

 

Staying Busy

In my last post, I talked the fact that I have more vacation days allotted to me than Jason, meaning that I have random days where I am off work by myself with nothing to do.   Those days have been difficult for me as I used to spend them with my mom, they now open me up to that all encompassing grief that overtakes your soul.  And grief is ok, it’s part of life, it’s part of loving someone and having been loved by someone. But I decided a while back to not sit around the house and wallow in the grief.  That would not be honoring to my mom. Although, I can hear mom jokingly saying, “I expect you to sit and cry each of those days that I’m not there to go out to lunch with you.”   You think I’m joking?  This is the woman that was apologizing to me the night of her stroke. She had been airlifted to a different hospital  I had just driven the four hours to be with her in Pittsburgh hospital and we were sitting in the ER there when she apologized.  Of course I told her not to worry about it, and I made a comment to the effect that, ‘this is what family does, and if it were me laying in the hospital bed, I know you would be here beside me”   She looked at me and clear as a bell said “No I wouldn’t, I would be at the beach”   I KNOW that comment was a joke!   SO yeah, I can hear her jokingly say that she would expect me to mourn and cry on those days.  But I also know that mom wouldn’t want that.  She would expect me to go on living.  She would demand that I get out and go to lunch and do something. SO, that is what I have started to do.   I wrote about this grief and how I handled a day off at the beginning of September.  I wrote about how I sent exploring and had a great day. (You can read about that here.)

I was riding high on my successful day of not succumbing and allowing grief to overtake my day and started to think about my next day off, which would be two weeks later.  I came up with a tentative plan and then had the brain child idea to ask my oldest nephew to ride along with me!   We visited the Old Jail in Chambersburg and the John Brown House also located in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. Jason and I had visited the Old Jail back in 2017 and while I had already experienced it, I knew it was worth a second visit. The John Brown house?  Who knew there was a John Brown house in Chambersburg, so that would be a new tour for me!  Our tour guide was…..well, he was nice.  He led us on both the old jail tour and the John Brown house tour.  He knew the tour information amazingly well.  However, extraneous questions that we asked were hit or miss in terms of getting an answer.  We walked away happy that we had visited.

 

Before the day was over, my nephew and I had made tentative plans to do ‘something’ on my next days off.  Yes, two weeks later I had two days off without Jason.  (Seriously, he needs a job with more vacation time!)  We didn’t know what we wanted to do so we spent some time researching.   We settled on Renfrew Museum and Park in Waynesboro.  The grounds are open free for public use, but they had a farmstead tour that would give you access to the interior of the buildings and we were interested.  Sign us up!   

 

This farmstead tour was another guided tour with a tour guide.  And I don’t know how in the world my nephew and I got another one, but we did.  We got another tour guide who was AMAZING at conveying the information on the official tour.  She had memorized the tour and did a great job.   She however was not able to answer a single solitary extraneous question that we asked.  “Can you tell me about that table beside the window”.  Nope.   “What is that device in the kitchen used for?”  I have no clue was her answer.    Seriously, items in the house and on the property were not marked and the workers didn’t have a clue about what they were.  Things in the museum we asked about and they had no clue!  NO worries though, we still enjoyed the tour and our visit to Renfrew.      Renfrew made me truly appreciate the museums where they have a notebook in each room with information about every item so that if a tour guide is asked a question about an item that they do not know that they can readily supply an answer!  

 

My nephew and I may have been done for that day, but our grand tour was not complete yet.  The next day we reconvened at the Hagerstown, Maryland City Park.   We have both been to the City Park numerous times.  In fact, both of us have toured the Train Museum and The Hager House before.  But we chose to go hit up the City Park due to the fact that the 202 may be going away.  What pray tell is the 202?  That is  a steam engine that was gifted to the “children of Hagerstown” by the Westen Maryland Railroad back in 1953.  I can not tell you how many times I visited the 202 in my life.   Way too many to count.   Seriously, we have pictures when my parents brought my brother when he was a baby…and the visits continued through all the years.  My brother and then my two nephews have always been intrigued with trains, is it because of the 202?  Quite possible!    So, this steam engine has been part of my life for each of my (almost) 52 years.  It has been announced that the City is in negotiations to divest itself of the 202 once and for-all.  (They tried once before about 20-30 years ago, but the engine ended up back in their possession after a few years.)   The train hub museum was closing for the season and who know if the steam engine would be there next year, so I knew I had to go see it for maybe my final time…..my farewell visit.

SO off we went!   We visited the Train Hub Museum.  The employee at this museum was the worst one yet.  He actually had no clue and gave us incorrect information on at least one instance.  This museum was small.  So very small. We are not sure what they will do with that museum if they take away the 202.  Because the 202 is the focal piece of the museum.  Other than the steam engine there are only  few caboose (or is it Cabeese  or maybe Ca-bi for plural) and a few artifacts .  And even with the caboose, only one is there for touring, the others are in a state of disrepair.  So, farewell said.   Although, it may not be a final farewell.  I did learn that they are in negotiations with the Western Maryland Scenic Railroad to have them take the steam engine, refurbish it and use it for one of their train excursions.  So conceivably, I could at some time in the future ride on a train that is pulled by the 202 steam engine.   That is the silver lining.

 

We walked through the park and took a stroll through the Mansion House Art Gallery.  This is an art gallery that is dedicated to local artists.   We enjoyed ourselves there also.  We did like some of the art, but admittedly, may have been a bit critical of some.  But to each his own!

We also decided to tour the Hager House that is also located in City Park.  The Hager House is the original house that was built by Jonathan Hager, the founder of Hagerstown.    Here is where we struck gold in terms of tour guides!  Our guide was FABULOUS!  There was not a question that we asked that he didn’t have an answer for.  And I will tell you that we asked a lot….and some of the questions I had a vague idea of the answer and he confirmed it and expounded on the information (letting me know that he wasn’t blowing smoke and making up answers.)  Both Riley and I were impressed with him and his knowledge.   He knew his stuff and that is saying something when it is coming from two people that are fascinated with history and two people that have life long roots in Hagerstown.  

 

My nephew and I have started to talk about our next adventure.  Because yes, there will be a day or two upcoming before the end of the year where I am off work while Jason works!  Aviation Museum?   Finding Fort Duncan?  Who knows!  But stay tuned.

Jason and I have also gotten out a bit.  We took the dog and went hiking at Kings Gap Environmental Center, which is considered a state park in Pennsylvania.   It was the first time we had been hiking in a LONG time.  Neither of us had been to this state park and we were both impressed with the area and plan on going back.   It felt good to get outside in nature again!  Zoey was a trooper but SOOO tired after hiking! 

We also explored the Mont Alto State Park.  This is the oldest state park in Pennsylvania.  It’s only 24 acres, and we have used the parking lot to hike in Michaux State Forest but we never actually explored the actual park. We did walk in the woods but it was very short as the park is very small. 

 

Last but not least, Jason ad I also headed to the Pine Grove Furnace State Park.  This park is also in Pennsylvania.  This was a drizzly wet day so we didn’t hike far, but we did walk around and explore a bit. But the main reason I wanted to go there was to visit the Appalachian Trail Museum.   We had also been to that museum years ago (which I talked about here), but I wanted to see it again.  I am so glad I did, they expanded it quite a bit! And it was a great way to spend a drizzly day.  

 

Wedding Anniversary

I have laughed and said that I celebrated my wedding anniversary with my nephew and not my husband since I spent the day with my nephew!   The day we went to Renfrew  Park and Museum was my wedding anniversary and my husband had to work. Jason just recently just switched jobs and couldn’t get it off…no worries, we are both off on a week-long vacation now.   I still celebrated with my husband when he got home that night though.  I had a nice dinner.  I purchased a cake and of course there was a gift waiting for him.   Weirdly enough, he walked into the house and didn’t see the cake and gift sitting on the counter.  Zoey kept running to the counter and then back to him.  Is my dog that smart? 

So, we have been married for 3 years!   Later this month we will hit the anniversary of our meeting which will mark 9 years that we have been together!   How time flies by.  I was reading through old posts from the time when I met him.  From the beginning when I just casually mentioned ‘a friend’ to when I started to refer to my mysterious friend as “J” and then onward to actually talking about him by name and admitting that I had fallen in love.   It has certainly been a fun ride. 

There you have it!  The last month has been a good one.  We have had celebrations.  I’ve gotten out and explored both with Jason and with my nephew.  There is so much more that went on, but this is a start in the process of unpacking what has happened since I last wrote!    Stay tuned for updates on my weight loss journey!