Today was pick up from camp day for Evan. Evan's camp is about a three hour drive from utopia. Pick up was from 11 to 12 and since I didn't want to be the last parent to pick up her kid or have to make an embarrassing phone call that I was in traffic I left utopia at 7:30 this morning. There as no traffic at all, and aside from a strange phenomenom where every car in every lane was travelling athe exact same speed for a while and one other incident where a driver was clearly dozing off behind the wheel somewhere in Pennsylvania (what is the right thing to do in that situation BTW? Do you call 911 or quickly pass and pray the dude has enough sense to pull over before anyone gets hurt?) I got there in record time. So I stopped by the local grocery store for some peppercorns I'd need to prepare the special meal I was planning for Evan's first night back dinner.
Since purchasing peppercorns is not a lengthy process, I decided to just get to Evan's camp early and park in their lot and wait. Which could have worked out fine if Evan's camp had opened the gate. Instead I sat in my vehicle right outisde the gate watching some kids in the distance play basketball. Evan was sadly not among them. One mom who pulled in behind me left her car and wandered over to peer over the gate and she did see her son. Her son saw her too and waved and was about to run over to greet his mother when a counselor stopped him. My car window was open so I said to the mother "I'm jealous." and she turned to me and we both began to cry. She asked "Why are we crying?" and I said "Because we want our babies back."
Luckily Evan's camp did open the gate a few minutes early and I drove straight to Evan's bunk. Evan was standing right on the road and boy did he look great. He saw me, ran up to the car, hugged me through the window, said things that were candy to my mother ears, like I MISSED YOU SO MUCH, tossed his stuff in the car and introduced me to all of his friends.
Twenty minutes later we were back on the road. There were a few frustrating patches of traffic on the way home, but they were totally worth it because 1. my baby was coming home and 2. there is a view from the bridge that crosses the Hudson on I-84 that is my fantasy view. As a matter of fact, every time I get the chance to enjoy that view I fantasize about moving to that spot and spending all of my free time standing on that bridge watching the light move over the hills on the NY side of the river.
We got back to utopia aournd 2:30.
My BIL pulled in right behind me. He had called the husband this week to see if we were going to be around today and I thought it might be nice for the two men to spend the day with Josh, but instead he came later and we all had dinner, which was even better because the BIL loves to cook and when I told him I'd be making one of Evan's favorite meat choices my BIL said he'd make pasta and vegetables. How irresistable is a man who cooks?
I was pretty burnt out from all the driving and all the coffee I drank to be hyper alert during all the driving so I had to veg out for a bit while the men socialized, but then we all had a nice low key family meal and a little fire with roasted marshmallows and it was all good.
Except for the part where Evan has spent half the time he has been home on the can and I am praying he did not come with a stomach virus.
But 2/3 of my offspring are here and that is better than 1/3. Three more weeks and I'll have a full house.
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