We left Augusta around 1pm to go to Connecticut. Bill assured me that we would be in
Connecticut at 4.30pm or 5pm ready to pick up Roxana and then Sara at 6pm. Well, we got a phone call that Roxana would
be about an hour later than expected at Amtrak and Sara also would be late in
landing at Bradley air Port. As it
turned out, Roxana and all the Amtrak passengers from Minneapolis were
eventually bussed from Minneapolis to Chicago to catch their connection to other
trains. Even at that, she did not arrive
till almost 7pm. Sara’s plane was held
up due to bad weather. But we made it to
pick up everyone and get to the Motel.
The weather was terrible for our trip. Not only that when we got to rte 495 around
Boston, we ran into traffic that was nose to tail at 15 miles per hour. We finally got off the highway and moved to
another freeway and the rain kept up almost to blinding level. We narrowly avoided a crash into a bridge abutment due to splashing water and
pouring rain. This has to be the worst
travel experience I have ever had.
After we got to our motel, we decided to look for some place
to eat and took a wrong turn onto one of the highways and ended up in nose to
tail traffic. Found our way off the
highway and in the distance saw what might be a place to eat. Hooray for us. We had no idea where we were but we got some
food and also a sandwich for David. At
10.30pm we left for the airport to go get David and had to park the car to get
him. We had thought we would be able to
just pick him up on the curb but we are glad we parked. We waited a long time for his plane to land
and for him to deplane. Gave him the
sandwich and he literally inhaled it. I
guess if I had asked him what was the taste of the sandwich he could not tell
me.
Finally, we got to bed and had to get up early on Saturday
morning – 5 people and one bathroom makes for a difficult situation. The breakfast at this motel is
wonderful. Other motels in this chain
could take a lesson or two about hospitality.
We set out to go to the nursing home to see cousin Mary Ann Markham but we managed to take a few wrong turns and
it was a comedy of errors before we finally found the nursing home. We had a nice visit with her and her daughter
and the home manager came in and took a picture of all of us - mostly because we are from all over the
country to come and see their patient.
They said that the picture would be in the home newspaper.
David in observing the facial features of cousin Warren
compared to Grandpa Bill, and father Bill, David said, “Well, you can tell he’s
a full Markham. Just look at his
nose. They all look the same.”
After we left the nursing home, we went to Dairy Glen to eat
lunch. We love the cheese burgers they
have there due to the special treatment they give the cheese. Somehow they have figured out how to make the
cheese grill to perfection and stand out from the burger. We had a great time there at lunch but the
shock was that we had to pay cash instead of by card. Somehow we cobbled together the cash
necessary to cover the bill of 5 persons for lunch. We decided to go see Jean Galasso and she
called Pete (her former husband) and we got to see him as well. She still lives in the house on Henry
street. She has been over to France a
number of times to see Lysianne – she is able to do that because her son works
for the airlines and can get her a great deal (perhaps free flights but she did
not say that.)
We went back to the motel to rest and to prepare for the
family reunion. Preparing for this event
has been quite stressful. We left
Arizona last year in October and we did not dream of having a reunion when we got
here. Usually when senior missionaries
are called to work in various capacities, we do not leave our mission
assignment without special permission.
We obtained that permission to come here to Connecticut for this event,
but we are without all our Markham research and all we really have is what is
in my database on this computer. A
distant cousin who lives in Utah, has done really in depth research on Deacon
Daniel Markham and has settled the question of where he came and why. I would love to have had that book with me to
show the family.
Well, in any case, we did an hourglass chart and put it out
on the table at Angelino’s restaurant and I noticed many family members going
over to look at the chart. We had 21 people show up for the family
reunion and it was a great time of visiting and renewing connections. The food was wonderful and plentiful – too much
so. We made a skype connection with
Mason in Florida and he got to talk to the family members who were here.
The rain has held off until this morning (Sunday) and I am
really happy that we have had good weather after the horrendous trip down. According to the TV news, the storm we passed
thorough did some extensive damage in the area with uprooted trees and downed
power lines.
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