The quest for 50!

Rachel and I are on a 1 month road trip at the moment, that first began as a trip to see the rest of the states that I hadn't seen (Kansas, Oklahoma, Michigan, Arkansas and Kentucky) and to be in New Orleans for Fat Tuesday (the peak day of the Mardi Gras Festival).

Once the planning for the trip began it began to take on an entirely different angle, and now it seems to be resembling a trip with the mission to re-unite with long lost family members....or something. Our first big stop was in Kearney, Nebraska to meet my Uncle Calvin, and his children Amos and Tessa. I was sort of nervous to meet up, since I had never even spoken to Calvin, and I had only chatted with Amos and Tessa via Facebook. We all decided to meet up for Thai food. Rachel and I were the first there and got a table ready for all 5 of us. After waiting for a few minutes, and glancing out the window everytime a new car pulled in the parking lot, a man walked in. I whispered to Rachel, "oh my god, that guy looks just like my Dad, that must be him". Sure enough, he walked over and introduced himself. The resemblance was uncanny. My Dad hasn't seen his brother in over 30 years, but they both have the exact same haircut and color, dressed the same, even had the same style of eyeglasses. The only noticable difference was Calvin is a couple inches taller and a bit thinner (sorry Dad). We got to chat a few minutes before Tessa and Amos arrived, who's appearances weren't surprising as I had seen pictures of both of them online. The nervousness dissapeared immediately, and it instantly felt like I was sitting at a table with family members that I had know for years. Tessa even somehow knew that I was interested in finishing her food for her.












After we were done eating, Amos and Tessa had to return to work, but Calvin invited us back to his house to visit for a couple hours. That's when the similarities between him and my Father became very apparent. The first obvious thing was the huge record collection that took over an entire wall of his home, the "funnies" that had been clipped out of newspapers and posted over various areas of the house, his entertainment center was the bottom half of a wood stove with a big slab of redwood attached to the top of it, his wood counter tops are actually wood that was salvaged from the floor of a bowling alley, walls with cast iron displayed on them, wind chimes made out of old silverware....I could go on and on. They even shared the same saying's and bits of wisdom, "I always told Tessa to speak her mind, what's the worst anyone is gonna do to you, kill ya?".  My own Father had been telling me that same thing for my entire life. I even caught him once saying "from the get go", which is a phrase my Dad said my Grandpa always used. He also shared some thing's that I had never heard my Dad say such as "it's easier to change a condom than a diaper". I had to laugh at that, but also realized that would of been great advice to a much younger version of myself. All in all, it was a great visit, and if this is the only good experience I have for the whole road trip, it will be well worth it.