Hey la, hey la, the blogger's back

Arrived back in Y-town early last Wednesday morning. It's been busy since then, but I've finally had a chance to sit down and give vent to more of my usual undisciplined outpourings of ill-considered prose.

To grandmother's house we go

The trip to Missouri was relatively uneventful. I rented a car, since the Ol' Whitey had recently adopted the habit of dribbling steaming green coolant out from under the dashboard on the passenger side. This is not a reassuring prelude to a 1500 mile 'round trip in late July, so I left it in the care of a trusty local mechanic and tried to rent a car from these folks.

Bad idea. And I won't be doing business with them again if I can help it. When I mentioned that I was travelling to a funeral several states away, their sales representative suddenly decided that the absolute minimum daily rate was $70.00. Apparently their corporate policy is to price-gouge customers travelling to funerals. (Actual quote: "Yes, unlimited mileage is included in our regular rate, but if you're going to drive it a long way you have to pay extra.")

These folks were much more reasonable. The car they rented me bore a rather unfortunate resemblance to a silver-toned Batmobile, and the windows were small enough that I kept feeling like I was peering out of armored slits in the sides of some kind of military vehicle, but it got me there and back in good order and reasonably economically. Figures for thought:

Estimated fuel cost of driving truck to Missouri: (1500 miles / 11 mpg) * $1.85/gallon = $252.27.
Approximate fuel cost of driving rented car: (1500 miles / 28 mpg) * $1.85/gallon = $99.11

The difference between the two is fairly close to the weekly rental rate they charged me, so, considering that I got the benefit of having air conditioning and a CD player for the trip, as well as a reasonable assurance that the vehicle wouldn't blow up somewhere amidst the cornfields of Illinois, I suppose I came out ahead.

Across the river and through the woods

A few impressions from the trip: Rural Indiana and Illinois are as monotonous as ever, at least the portions visible from the interstate. The Big River and the Gateway Arch are still impressive, even when seen on a dismal grey afternoon. The Ozarks are as beautiful as ever. The ubiquitous plague of "adult superstores" along the interstate is found there occasionally, but, unlike elsewhere, they're frequently adjoined by towering billboards from local church or political groups proclaiming the evils of pornography, suggesting that the culture war is being contested more fiercely in the hills than elsewhere. (The one that announces "Pornography Hurts Women And Children" sounds plausible and might conceivably shame away potential porn customers whose consciences are vulnerable to such appeals, but the one a few miles to the west, which shouts in giant-sized letters that "Pornography Destroys Everybody", seems to be overstating its case just a bit.)

A country funeral

I can't honestly say that Great Aunt H. was my favorite relative, for reasons which have been touched on previously. I won't restate them here. Little planning or preparation for the funeral was required, since she had spent a substantial amount of time over the past few years writing her own obituary and planning her funeral in great detail -- a blend of practicality and narcissism that seems quite characteristic of her. The obituary she wrote contained enough interesting memories of her early life, growing up with my grandmother, learning to read, riding on horseback to various jobs teaching at country schools, fording flooded streams at night to make it home, and so forth, that I wished I had been able to hear more such memories while she was alive.

The service was held at the church she had attended for most of her life, and she was buried at a rural cemetary only a few miles from the farm where she and her two sisters grew up in the 1920's. Most of the people who attended the funeral, I expect, have relatives buried there. A short graveside service and prayer was held, during which the Biblical phrase "Death, where is thy sting?" was accompanied by a slow, meandering reconnaisance flight by some very large bees investigating this unaccustomed invasion of their pastoral home. Afterward, most people spent some time wandering around the cemetary, the older ones pointing out certain marker-stones to the younger ones, telling stories and taking pictures. Another reminder, I suppose, of the way that life has changed over the past fifty years or so. Who, among those who read this blog, lives anywhere near any kind of "ancestral home" or has any particular intention of moving back to one?

It was good to see and visit other relatives. Politics, understandably, was not the chief topic of conversation, but I found it interesting to hear that a certain aunt, who has heretofore been the very archetype of a conservative rural voter, has stated that she may not vote for Bush. I can't help but wonder whether this is at least partly because she has a son who is of draftable age. Perhaps there is hope for the country yet.

North toward home

The trip back to Y-Town took longer than the trip south and west to Missouri, but that was my own fault since I indulged in my habitual love of exploring obscure back roads and railroad grades -- in this case, the rather eerily quaint former railroad division point at Newburg, Missouri, and the stiff climb up Dixon Hill that caused the Frisco so many operational headaches in the days of steam. Unfortunately, the Newburg public library (right across the street from a two-story wooden boarding house advertising rooms at daily or weekly rates) was closed for lunch when I blew through town, nothing was moving on the railroad, and the yard and the roundhouse facilities for helper locomotives are long gone thanks to the greater operational efficiencies of the diesel locomotive. Progress. Hmph.

I did get one minor side benefit from the trip: I was able to retrieve my television, VCR and DVD player, videos, and various framed pictures and posters that had decorated my previous abodes and offices. I have no idea where all this stuff is going to go, but at least most of my possessions are in one place, rather than being scattered between Y-Town, Marquette, and Missouri. (Except, of course, for that storage compartment in Texas....) If Huron State deigns to honor me with an office of my own this fall, it won't lack for attractive library propaganda on the walls. And I'll be able to spend hours and hours of my scarce time at home watching videos instead of doing anything useful like blogging.

As I mentioned before, I got back home just in time to catch a few hours sleep before going back to work on Wednesday and preparing for MythCon on Friday. That's going to have to wait for another post, but don't worry. I took notes. (I am incredibly considerate of my Devoted Readers' need to know, aren't I?)