Golden Corral

     I love opening this blog and seeing that picture, even though sometimes it makes my breath catch.   

     Erin took the picture one day on our family trip in early October, 2011.  I love the twinkle in his eyes in this picture, even though he was already so sick.  I believe that it was taken outside of a Golden Corral restaurant that we found by accident just on the other side of a civil war battlefield site. It was literally a half a block away from a battlefield.  Dad has always loved a good buffet.  He likes the variety and the value for the buck.  And Golden Corral has been one of his favorites. None of us can see a Golden Corral without thinking of Dad.

     For those of you that don’t know, we took a family trip.  9 days on the road, in a van, with the five “originals”.  Mom, Dad, Bill, Erin and myself.  It was a trip across a big chunk of the country. It started with plans to see Civil War battlefields.   We saw Gettysburg, Manassas, and Appomatox.  We also saw the United Flight 91 memorial, Shenandoah National Park, Washington DC, and Mount Vernon.  It was 9 days of 5 adults in a car and it was so much fun.  We were only about three months into the diagnosis, but he was already so tired and weak. We found out that handicapped accessible is not always convenient or easy. 

     We are all so thankful for this trip.  We had a ball.  If we had waited even another month, I don’t think that we would have been able to go.