By the numbers:
- 18 – days since my last blog. Turns out Jacob fractured his C5 vertebrae in 2 places and needed surgery to fuse 3 bones in his neck. Dropped all prior plans and drove across country to be with Jacob before his surgery which was scheduled for Monday the 20th. We got there on the 19th. The surgery eventually took place on the 23rd, a week ago today. All went well and he is likely to have a full recovery with no paralysis and only a little loss of neck flexibility. Between the driving of 600 miles a day and then dealing with all the issues at the hospital no time to blog for awhile. See Peg’s blog at gracedmoment.com for more details on the time between day 29 and day 44.
- 113 – degrees. We thought we had seen the worst of the heat but we find ourselves through central California during a record heat wave. 109 degrees yesterday in Fresno. 113 today in Red Bluff. Feels like standing in front of the oven when you take the turkey out to baste on Thanksgiving. Only all around, not just on the side facing the oven.
- about 3,600 miles since my last update:
- A speed drive across country, mostly on I-20, then I-10 from Savannah, Georgia to Long Beach, California.
- Back and forth dozens of time between our hotel and the Harbor-UCLA Hospital.
- one trip to Long Beach airport to send Jared home after he had spent a week with Jacob in the hospital until we got there.
- eventually another trip to John Wayne airport to send Jacob home to be with his brothers and friends as he begins to recuperate.
- Beginning our trip back to Seattle up the Valley in California.
- No new national parks or license plates spotted. Done with that kind of vacationing for this year I think.
- Other numbers: about 30 additional national parks, a dozen other museums, 13 other states, several meetings with friends, which were part of the planned vacation. All of which will still be there at a future date when we pick up where we left off this time.
- One missed family reunion with the 5 generations of descendants of Nick and Mary Goeser, which will be taking place on August 8th in Panama, Iowa. I hope to see some pictures of all the 100 or more cousins (1st, 2nd, and 3rd) who will be attending. I hope you have a wonderful time. Sorry I couldn’t make this one but be sure to look me up if you make it out to Seattle at a future date.
Here’s a brief photo sampler from the past 3 weeks:
The texas plains:
One of many Starbucks stops:
Rain in the Arizona Desert and the Interstate 10 bridge near Desert Center in California that was washed out in a flash flood a few hours after we drove over it.
First view of Harbor-UCLA Hospital exterior and the all too familiar lobby:
Jacob with his neck brace – protecting him from further damage after a 2 part fracture of his C5 neck vertebrae.
Jared and me at a Starbucks across from the Hospital, which was about the only decent choice of a place to eat within walking distance. I think we sampled almost every type of sandwich, parfait, and snack they offer over the course of 8 days.
At the Rodeway Inn, 4 miles from the hospital. The closest reasonably priced place we could find with a vacancy. There were 2 major events going on in the area and most hotels were booked. 8 days at one hotel is the longest we have ever stayed at one location we didn’t call home.
Some flowers we saw through many stages of blooming while walking from where we parked the car to the hospital.
Waiting for 6 hours in the Surgery waiting room. Hoping to see a doctor come out and tell us how the operation went. Instead we got a security guard asking for the family of Mr. Andrew. (Just one of many stories from the week.)
Jacob and X-ray after surgery:
First post-surgery walk.
At John Wayne Airport in Santa Anna to send Jacob home.
Across the Mojave Desert on the start of our trip up to Seattle.
Take that last comment with a grain of salt from a partially color-blind observer. However, my non-color blind, photographer wife agrees with this observation and took this lovely picture:
He was a prolific artist and I won’t even try to comment on his overall work. One I found interesting was titled: “Gala Comtemlating the Mediterranean which at Twenty Meters Becomes a Portrait of Abraham Lincoln.”
Close up it looks like a typical Dali from that portion of his career when his paintings were jammed full of many apparently unrelated objects.
Also took this picture.
We had heard the World War II Museum was a must see place to go and we were not disappointed. Spread out over 4 large buildings it is a pretty amazing collection of the 
President Eisenhower said that Higgins “won the war for us.” Without boats that could land on open beaches, he explained, “the whole strategy of the war would have to be rethought.” 
of the day we discovered that there was to be a fire works display near our hotel over Lake Pontchartrain. We haven’t been to a live fireworks show for a long time. It was more fun than expected.
It began as a animal and game path 1000’s of years ago, then became a hunting trail, then a bit of a trading trail, but took a more permanent form in the late 17 and early 18 hundreds. Farmers and traders from the Ohio and upper Mississippi Valley who wanted to sell their goods to people in the more populated Eastern cities would bring their products down the Mississippi on small wooden boat. After selling their goods there was no inexpensive way back up the river. Many sold their boats for the wood and then walked back up to the Ohio Valley. The primary route followed was the Natchez Trace. It took as long as 30 to 40 days to walk that trail and for a time thousands of people made that trek every year.
tal issues going on and trying to put myself in the place of the people involved in historical events is what I tend to find myself trying to do. Today, that effort to put ourselves in the shoes of the participants took on a special significance. Peg’s Great Great Grandfather, David Underhill, and 4 of his brothers all served in the Union army during the Civil War. They enlisted with regiments from 4 different states: New York, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Michigan. 3 of those 5 brothers were here at Vicksburg. After the Civil War memorials and road markers were put up all around th
e area for each regiment that served here. We found the plaques listing the individual soldiers for 2 of the 3: Monroe and Arnold.
hills over which the battles were fought. The one we were looking for was several tiers down from the main road. After trying to climb down the tiers and barely making it back up we sought another way around and ended up walking almost half a mile to get all the way around the hill to the marker. 
Illinois soldiers who served here. I don’t often think about the fact that I was born in Illinois, but today for some reason that fact struck me. If I had been born 110 years earlier I would possibly have been one of those soldiers listed here.
