For all of you looking for super-cute stories of our adorable boys...you may want to close the browser and wait for another post. =) I haven't posted many personal stories on the blog, but this week I encountered an experience I thought others may enjoy (especially if you knew us when we were first married).
As many of you know, I travel frequently for the company I work for. My travel takes me all over North America and as you can imagine, there are drastic differences to the experiences found in each place. For example, in Alaska, I went for an early-morning jog and later found out from my client that wasn’t the smartest thing to do. Evidently Wolves and Grizzly bears frequent the edge of the city. In Hawaii, I’ve found the culture to be very family-friendly and have been invited into the homes of my clients, experiencing the Islands as a local. And speaking of family friendly, there is New York… I’m convinced they eat their young. Okay, okay, that’s probably a bit harsh – my apologies to all the New Yorkers reading our blog.
With all the travel I do, I’ve been looking for some way to keep track of the places I’ve been. I’m not really sure why, but for me, there is a certain appeal of being able to tell my kids stories of where I’ve been and hoping that logging those locations will bring back the stories. I often take for granted the experiences I have on the road, and with just under 800,000 air-miles on American Airlines alone, I have a lot of stories! I’ve heard of many ideas on how to chronicle my travels: marking every city with a pin on a map, magnets, coffee mugs, card decks, postcards, etc. However, I’ve decided I’m going to journal. So, the story below will mark my first entry of 2010.
Carey and I spent the first few years of our marriage in a tiny, one-bedroom apartment in Bolivar. We had no money, school and work was tough, but we have good memories of the apartment and life as newlyweds. With one exception. Our neighbors cooked every night and I swear they used a half-pound of curry with every dish. We decided the neighboring apartment’s fan over the oven must have eventually connected with ours because we could always smell it. We could smell it so strongly it was like a curry-fog in the Bethell apartment. After a few years of that smell, I learned to hate the smell of curry.
Last night I was in Richmond, VA visiting a client. After a long day of travel and grabbing a burger and fries at Five Guys (a must if you ever have the chance), I check into a Marriott Residence Inn. Generally, the Residence Inn is great – lots of space, small kitchen, and most are newly renovated. This one, however, was not. Old bed, worn out furniture and it had a funny smell. The kind of smell that would have me asking for another room if it hadn’t been the only room left. So I manage. About midnight, I’m in bed and another funny smell begins to come into my room. I can’t tell what it is, but it’s faintly unpleasant. Another thirty minutes goes by and I really smell it now – so strongly I can almost taste it. And then it hits me – that’s CURRY!!! While incredibly unpleasant, I just had to smile. I immediately had thoughts our sweet Indian neighbors, the tiny apartment, and all the other adventures that we had in that phase of life. I realized how thankful I am for what we went through together…and how thankful I am for our house!
