A Change of Pace

The Ohio Valley continues to swelter. All our construction-working neighbors here in the campground leave between 4:30 and 6:00AM in an effort to beat the heat. The poor guys return home later and later each evening, sometimes after 8PM, so deadlines must be looming, too.

Denny and I haven't been doing much as we both get nasty and short-tempered in the heat, plus I have tend to suffer from heat exhaustion easily so we've been staying inside the rig. We figured this was a good week to go visit a former co-worker who has had recent surgery with some unfortunate complications. "D" is finally back home with his wife in the hills of southern Ohio and ready for company, so Denny and I drove down to see D and J.

D and J also traveled fulltime for a few years by RV, but they fell in love with southern Texas in the winter and traded in their RV for a mobile home and bought a summer house in southern Ohio. They have a lovely home set on a few acres of land back in farm country and they love the peace and quiet that it provides. Their Texas mobile home/RV park provides a lot of activity in the winter, so summers are for kicking back and enjoying the wildlife and the tranquility. The Amish neighbors raise goats and Tennessee Walking horses and the farmers down the road share their fresh sweet corn.

The four of us talked for hours before it was time for us to head back home. Denny and I don't like to drive country roads after dark because that's when the nocturnal animals are on the move and crossing the roadways and we'd just as soon not run into a deer. We chose to return home by a different route and enjoyed the change of scenery. Our hot, dry summer has affected the trees and vegetation; leaves are starting to brown and drop early this year. But the gentle rolling hills of southern Ohio are still pretty and will be prettier still in the fall.

It was a longish drive to visit with D and J, but after losing my friend Marilyn without seeing her on our winter visit like we normally did, Denny and I decided that we'd never again pass up the opportunity to visit with friends while we had the chance. It was a sorely learned lesson.