Under 30 Hours

Saturday night at 10:30 – after 29 hours away -- a disheveled-looking half of my family arrived home. They’d been to St. George and back. They’d left late (six people piled in Mike’s dad’s truck – which he’d suggested they borrow), stopped for pizza (where Jesse made the mistake of asking for Mike to help him “cut the cheese” on his slice), slept in sleeping bags on the floor of a cousin of their grandpa’s, woken early to get to Abe’s final high school bike meet – state championships (where he chatted at the starting line – unbeknownst to him – with the son of my old elementary-school best friend), climbed a tall . . . thing (???), visited with Mike’s sister and her family (whose son bikes on the Vernal team), climbed boulders in Pioneer Park (a photo opportunity I am loathe to have missed), returned to “Uncle Ed”’s to bid farewell, stopped to do a little shopping (where Anders became the lucky owner of a sweater with a fiercely-growling bear on it and where some winter-themed pajama bottoms were thoughtfully purchased for me), ate all they could possibly manage at Chuck-A-Rama, and . . . drove the five hours back home.

It was a fast and full adventure and, while all that went claimed it was worth it, I’ve rarely seen such a bedraggled and exhausted-looking crew. They looked ready to collapse, but . . . were in desperate need of showers so bed had to be slightly delayed. When I went to their rooms to tuck them in shortly after prayers, not a one of them was still awake to be tucked. Goldie’s leg wasn’t even on her mattress. They’d all simply collapsed as their bodies began to fall towards their beds.

(Meanwhile, Daisy and I ate Chinese food and Kneaders raspberry cream-cheese pie, and spent every chance we could – getting the three little ones down for bed or naps so that we could watch Dickens’ Our Mutual Friend and read in a quiet house.)