Day Seven

Today we drove from right outside Indianapolis, Indiana to right outside St. Louis, Missouri. I'll be honest, today was not the best day. We had a good breakfast at the hotel in Indiana, boys went swimming, we did a load of laundry at the hotel, and hit the road. The trip was about 5 hours total, Josh drove it all, and we made a few stops including lunch, and to see several of the world's largest attractions in Illinois including the world's largest wind chime, rocking chair, ruler, mailbox, and pencil. While we had every intention of getting out at each stop, the boys whining and generally frustrating behavior made this impossible. There were very few naps from the boys, endless whining, and short fuses. Oh and did I mention the whining? We survived...barely. And as a result we are planning on taking the day off from driving tomorrow. I made a trip to the grocery store and to a pizza shop, and we had a low-key night and my guess is that we will all be asleep within the hour. I knew going into this trip that days like this would happen and we would need to be flexible, which is why we purposely did not make any specific travel/hotel reservations ahead of time. I think I read about this somewhere on a blog about traveling cross country. To whoever it is that recommended not making any reservations or specific plans, I adore you.

Today, however, did have one major event happen. We crossed into the next time zone! It's only one hour behind the east coast, but it made the trip feel like we were really making progress and actually getting somewhere. Speaking of somewhere... I'm trying to stay open minded but I really am unsure what the appeal is of living somewhere like this. The highways are lined with miles and miles of fields and various crops (corn? soy? who knows) but even when I look on various sights to find things going on... there is really very little. While chatting with the male staff checking us in at the hotel tonight, he commented on my NH drivers license and we started chatting about Missouri. I asked him why someone would live in this area and his answer was pretty classic. He responded, "I haven't a damn clue. This place is the worst." He mentioned if you're a farmer this is a good area to live in, but agreed that there is very little to do and in general it's a boring part of the country. I'd like to think that people who live here find a joy in the solitude, and I recognize not everyone's desires in life are congruent with my own... but wow, this is a part of the country I am very unfamiliar with and could not ever imagine living in.

Sidebar: If you're from this part of the country, I would love to hear what you like about living here.

Goodnight <3