The Road

Editor's Note: The next three posts are part of a series describing the details of my road trip to Washington D.C. The trip began on Wednesday March 19 and ended Saturday March 22. I ended up taking the trip with two Vanguard seniors, Tim Latimer and Brennan Bailey. Tim and Brennan needed a third to come with them and asked me to come. With the blessing of the Vanguard administration, I took two days off of school and went to D.C. The purpose of the trip was to witness Baylor's first NCAA tournament game since 1988.

Thursday (written on the road): Today came quick. As I went to bed last night, I couldn’t help but be excited for the trip. I had completed a long list of tasks, including making two tests and cleaning up the house in which I was babysitting. I still find it odd that this trip was even possible considering I have a job and everything, but that decision is miles away at this point. After staying at school for a stress-filled two hours, Tim, Brennan and I met at Brennan’s house and began the journey to Washington D.C. at 10:30 a.m. We made a few quick stops, but we have recently made up some time in Arkansas. We are soon to be in Tennessee and my enjoyment of this time continues to increase. After getting through Ft. Worth and Dallas, we headed northeast on the tree-lined I-30. The road resembled I-20 East to Atlanta. It brought back images of my cousins and my sisters playing in the back of a suburban for 12 hours on our way to Grandma’s house. We continued into Arkansas and I found myself falling asleep very easily. I slept for an hour or so before Texarkana and then immediately fell asleep again after our stop for lunch. We missed the exit for Subway in Texarkana so we went to the po-dunk town of Mandeville. There appeared to be a bar-b-que place on the left, but it looked a little run-down and untrustworthy. So, we went to The Cookery at the Flying J across the street. It was an interesting little restaurant to say the least. I walked in and the hostess smiled at us and told us to sit anywhere. I glanced at the buffet and saw the thinnest chicken legs I have seen since Carson went swimming with us last summer. Needless to say, we ordered from the menu. Our waitress came over immediately and got our drink order. She was older, had black lining the outside of her eyes and wore some sort of black lace shirt underneath her Cookery uniform around her neck. She had on a glittering belt that was adorned with small rhinestones. It looked like something Avril Lavinge would wear and not a 60-year-old waitress. Another obvious immediately recognizable trait of the restaurant was the number of people eating by themselves. There were 10-15 people just sitting at their own tables for four. The man in the booth behind us was wearing brown velvet pants with some sort of racing stripe down the side and a leather vest. It was an interesting combination and I truly felt I was in a different country. The food took a while to get to us and it was a frustrating first stop.
We hit the road again and I hit the pillow. I don’t even remember driving through Little Rock. Brennan and Tim talked and we used the video camera to highlight the one-third mark. It will be fun to go back and look at the video footage of this weekend. I awakened just in time to see the sun set at our backs. The trees created the choppy view of the sun, dispersing its light and giving me the ability to look directly at it. The Lord is so faithful with every sunrise and sunset.