Driving on and on and on

As JRR Tolkien wrote, the road goes ever on and on. And on, and on, especially when the girls and I took a road trip from our house to Luther College in Decorah, Iowa. There is no four lane highway that goes to Decorah which made for an extremely long drive. That evening, we were going to attend a concert by the Lutheran Summer Music concert band. They were performing a piece that my sister composed, and we could hardly wait to hear it in person!

My sister lives in California, which is even farther away from Illinois. I rarely get to go to one of my sister’s concerts in person. I’ve heard recordings of her concerts, but actually being able to attend a live performance was a chance I couldn’t miss. Ed stayed home to work, but the girls and I piled into the car on a Thursday morning for our long drive.

Ginny driving

We drove through 62 miles of construction on I90 and made it to Madison in time for lunch. We drove through cornfields, passed a row of wind turbines, and went over swollen Midwestern rivers.

turbines

We had good conversation and listened to music. We had fights over blankets and the temperature in the car. We had quiet time and coloring.

bored emmy

We had Pizza Hut for dinner, since it was next to the hotel in a small town and we were hungry. Finally, we were seated in the concert hall, and I fought back the tears as the music washed over me. As my sister stood up and applauded the conductor and concert band, Emmy whispered in my ear, “I have to go to the bathroom.” The band had more music to play, and as we stood in the hallway waiting for the applause to begin again so we could go back into the auditorium, Emmy confessed that she had to go during my sister’s composition. “But I knew it was important to listen, so I waited until it was over!”

Well played, Emmy. Well played.

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15 Replies to “Driving on and on and on”

  1. It was so nice meeting you at BlogHer. Thank you so much for helping me to feel welcome there. I am excited to follow your blog and hopefully we can stay in touch as well!

  2. I saw your comment over by Mara and I realized your posts have not been coming into my Feedly. Sorry I have been missing your posts. Sounds like you had a wonderful time.

  3. Wow, how old is she? Most adults do not have that much maturity when it comes to a live performance.

    1. I’ll have a post up soon about BlogHer! I would love to go again next year, but I’ll have to see where it is and if I can afford it. I’d love to meet you in person!

  4. Very lovely 🙂 It’s so nice that you made the trip to listen to your sister play. I can only imagine how much that must have meant to her as well.

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