Home Videos Can be Dangerous to Your Health

For those of you following, I posted video on Day Four. So, if you haven't seen it, you should check it out.

Day five starts at 6am with Luke waking up and Mom and I heading down to the lobby for a free breakfast. Erin is staying with our Aunt and Uncle, so it is just the three of us for a while. We play with Luke, he takes his morning nap, and we head up the mountain. I am driving so that I know the way in order to get back down to give Luke his afternoon nap.

Aunt Connie makes a wonderful brunch of spaghetti frittata, and I have a huge piece. If you haven;t seen me eat lately, I am like a lumber jack. We chat, Luke crawls around their house, and son it is time for me to head back down the mountain.

Luke takes an ok nap, and we go to Kroger to stock up on more baby food and wipes. We would probably be ok without the extras, but I don't want to get home with a limited supply. Then Luke and I head back up the mountain.

It really is a mountain for those of you who have never travelled through West Virginia. This is coal country, and it is nothing but winding skinny roads and mountains and valleys. I am a very slow driver compared to those who live here, and I quickly have a line of cars following me up the mountain. I can hear an audible sigh with every turn I make that causes them to stay behind me for a little while longer

The afternoon is spent with me taking pictures of my Aunt's incredible yard, my Uncle walking around with Luke, and a bocce game between Aunt Connie and my Mom on one team and my cousin Frankie and Erin on the other. Ashley is in charge f cocktails, and Audrey is holed up in the house. It is a rainy afternoon, but it is really nice. The Moms beat te kids, and we head inside to chat and watch old home videos Aunt Connie has dug up of one of the last trips we took there as kids.

The video is from 1992, and I am 16, Erin is 9, Brad 12, and Jennifer 20. Ashley is 10 and Frankie is 13. Home videos can be dangerous because they have a tendency to bring up old issues amongst siblings. This particular one is of an Olympic series of games my Ant put together to keep the four youngest ones busy. Jennifer and I are apparently out shopping with my Mom and cousins Patty and Stephanie. The games are funny things like croquet, basketball, bubble blowing, and egg and water balloon tossing. What strikes me is how little the four: Brad, Erin, Ashley, and Frankie have changed. Jen and I come at the tail end of the video, and we are the same too. Jen does a backhand spring for the camera and I sort of play a supporting role to the chaos which includes finishing off the water balloons from the earlier games. I am thankful that there is very little of me on this tape as home videos can be dangerous to your health, reminding you of the stupid things you did when you were young and well, stupid.

We head to Cincinnati tomorrow and then we are home on Monday. One more city, one more hotel, before back to normal. I am happy to have had this time to look back at my childhood summers, but I am anxious to see the people we left back a home.

Today's video is primarily of my Aunt's flower gardens. She planted everything, weeds religiously, and even laid the brick, which was salvaged by my Uncle and hauled up the mountain.