The Great Adventure, Part 3: A Quiet Interlude

DIARY

Jess had been feeling reluctant to leave throughout the day because we'd have to miss our families and friends at their brightest. As we stopped, briefly, in the granvel road leading out of ArmCo, to adjust the lights and mirrors, she said, "I'm so glad we left!" We followed the twisting roads out to Maple, turned left, and angled out toward Dresden. We passed Adornetto's and Wade's and the Colony Square Mall, where we had spent so much of the past week, and soon we were in the rolling farmland and countryside, sometimes tree-lined, sometimes pasture, in the Muskingum Valley as it stretches to the north of Zanesville.

This drive couldn't have been choreographed to have been more be more beautiful: the sun was setting off the the left, and the are was just dence and thick enough that the light had that golden, liquid quality that spilled out over all of the trees and roads and grasses, undulating, dripping down and gradually dimming as everything sunk towards night. The wind was tearing all around the car and the aluminum cans banged along behind us, Jess in her dress and I in my tux. We arrived in Dresden, a little slip of a town in a part of the valley where the banks are particularly steep.

The Inn at Dresden is a bed and breakfast, a massive house on a huge hill formerly owned by David Longaberger, founder of Longaberger baskets. The car reluctantly took the slope, which must have graded at twenty or more degrees, no kidding, and we pulled alongside. Jess and I stopped in front and checked in wearing all of our wedding gear. The desk clerks congratulated us, gave us our keys, and directed us to our rooms, part of the same building, on a lower level.

We'd reserved the "Wild's room," patterened after the exotic wildlife preserve to the southeast of Zanesroom. The room was massive and boxy, tan painted, with an explorers cap and palm frond fan and comforter of swayde. The bathroom was almost as huge as the main room, and featured a jacuzzi and shower, while the front porch was enclosed and fitted with a hammock.

The first thing Jess and I did, after taking a moment on the porch with the purple fading to gray in the twilight, was change out of our wedding gear, microwave the leftovers of our heart-shaped pizza, and watch Jurassic Park. We came in at the appromate moment of Genarro's devouring. The jacuzzi was psychotic, not obeying commands, with the jets sometimes coming on at unexpected moments and sending sprays of foam and water out over the floor. Later, we went upstairs, where the cook was tidying up the kitchen area, and we talked with her for several minutes about the wedding and the Inn. We bought a couple Sprites, got a couple cookies, and hurried downstiairs. We borrowed the movie Big Fish, which I'd seen a year earlier, but had largely forgotten. We put the movie on, but fell asleep.

Sunday, when we woke up, we went upstairs for breakfast overlooking the rolling hills and ridges spreading out to the North. We had eggs and sausages, and sat in the enclosed porch in the sun, then went back downstairs to catch some more sleep. Except I couldn't sleep. So I watched Big Fish, and it made me upset, because the old couple in the end reminded me of Jess and me. When Jess woke up, we watched the movie again, together. With the same result. We were late checking out at 1:20, and spent several minutes walking about the porches and on the veranda. Then, we got in the LeBaron, and cruised the short way back, already feeling like days and weeks had passed since we weren't married.

On the corner of Blue in Zanesville by the gas station and elderly couple in a giganticar congratulated us (the LeBaron was still decorated, though I'd cut off the clanking cans and set the pew bows in the trunk); they'd just been married over fifty years. Back at the Brighton house, Jess and I were alone, so I showered, and got down just as Jeff and my family arrived: it was mom, dad, Caitlin, Cody, Aunt Liz, Aunt Sue, Jeff, and briefly Jeff and Chelsea.

They told us about their adventures at the reception, and we opened and tracked our gifts, and said goodbye to everyone heading back to Michigan that night.

Jess and I stopped in new Concord, reading our cards along the way, to get Jess' wallet from her moms and pick up Bill's tux. We arrived back in Zanesville in dusk, noted the 24-hour mark, and shopped for our honeymoon neededs: first KMart, then WalMart. We'd gotten gift certificates. Back home, Jeff was sleeping. We packed through the rest of the night, doing laundry, and briefly taling to Julie when she got home. It was a wonderful day, relaxing after the crushes of the day before, but animated with the excitement of what was on its way. I went to sleep at two.

The alarm went off at 3:30, and I went to the basement to grab the last load of laundry. They weren't dry. In horror, I told Jeff, and he discover that the head had been left off the drier after the last load. Meanwhile, my dad arrive a few minutes past four... evidently, the Vibe had died from an obscure electrical mishap. With improvisations and mostly-dry laundry, Jess, Caitlin, Cody, dad, and I crowded in and rolled through the fog toward Columbus. Our flight was set to leave at 6:30. We spoke to mom on Caitlin's cel; mom was stranded in the dead Vibe. After a couple smaller adventures in the airport, including my neurosis about missing our flight and some equally neurotic dogs yapping from their carrier cases, we managed get checked in and said some more goodbyes. "Go make some memories," my dad said.

We boarded the plane to Houston, and ultimately, Belize.

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