Day Three: Home, with Plenty of Baggage

Over a thousand miles left their stink on our tires today, in spite of us not waking as early as we wanted.

We gained an hour changing time zones; we tried to keep gas stops and food stops and Howie stops as short as we could. Strangely, we only hit two construction zones that slowed us only down to 65 mph, unlike the aggravating mess of endless road works that lost us a full day on the way East. Huh. Maybe they were trying to tell us something, like "Don't go back East, it's the pits."

We hit the road at 6:30 in Rawlins, Wyoming, and we were home by 8:45 pm. Ooog. Long day, good time.

The travel revelation for the day was that Nevada looks much more interesting and varied and charming after you've spent most of a day driving across Nebraska. In Nevada we saw rain showers and a dust storm, a rich river valley and mountains that could just about be from the moon. In Nebraska, we saw fields of corn and tiny towns and more corn and tiny towns.

Nevada is a welcome sight when California is just the other side of it.

Sadly, Nevada was when I got the call from my sister's house manager. On Wednesday night, when Jan was given her shower, the caregiver noticed that Jan had a lump on one of her breasts. They took her to the doctor the very next day, and subsequently made appointments for Jan for a diagnostic mammogram and a surgeon. Shit. Jan doesn't deserve this.

And then I thought, but if Jan hadn't gone to the group home to live, the lump would never have come to light at all. My poor sister.