Prologue, part two

Prologue, second day.

This morning started out early, mostly because the first morning on central time means we haven’t adjusted yet, so we still wake up the usual time as we do at home.  There was no need to hang around the lodge, and we had a lot to reload into the car after taking out all the food, so we got to it.  Thankfully it was so much cooler and no humidity when we tackled this task.

We normally travel up I-59 to I-24 across Monteagle to get to the greater Nashville area, but after making that trip last week, we decided we wanted to find a better way (for us) to go – one that didn’t involve three lanes of traffic driving at insane rates of speed along winding roads up and down the mountain.  That kind of driving just stresses us out!  So last week I spent some time with the map and found a way to go a little further west and then north to avoid that.

And I have to say, I found a pretty good route.  GPS says it would take about 30 minutes longer, but I’ll drive longer if it means I can arrive without being so stressed.  We headed west through Fort Payne, Alabama, and then over towards Huntsville, before turning north to get to Murfreesboro, Tennessee, where we were spending the day and night.

While planning the route, I had noticed a marker for the North Alabama Railroad Museum.  This is mostly an outdoor park with old trains, but they do have volunteers who docent for the place some days of the week.  During the fall and winter, they also offer special train rides.  We were there early today and took a short walk to look around and stretch our legs before getting back on the road.  We found another Publix for a rest stop in Meridianville, Alabama.

This part of Alabama was all new territory for me, and I have to say it was really beautiful.  I can see why people like living in northern Alabama.

We arrived in Murfreesboro around 11 AM which still gave us plenty of time to get to the funeral home for family visitation.  We stopped to gas up at Costco, which you will probably notice later on becomes a theme!  Gas today was $3.36 per gallon.

We stayed at the same hotel we stayed at last week when we made the trip to see DH’s sister before she passed away.  The hotel was gracious enough to let us check in early (11:30 AM) which gave us time to unload everything we needed for the night and get changed and freshened up before heading to the funeral home.  Our contingency plan was to just change into our dress clothes in the restrooms at the hotel, but we were thankful to not have to do that!

I won’t write about the funeral except to say it was a beautiful tribute to DH’s beautiful sister.  And it was wonderful to see so many people there who loved her dearly.  And to also see our nieces and nephew and great-nieces and great-nephews, and even a great-great-nephew!  (Wow, that makes me sound old!)  And some cousins from various sides of DH’s family.

I’ll leave you with this picture of one of the flower arrangements.  My sister-in-law loved flowers, and these are a lovely reminder of how much she loved each one of us.

~ Cindy D.