The words of Glen Campbell’s sentimental, melancholy song roll through our heads, as Betty & I make the journey from the desert at Quartzsite to the booming metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona. The song is about leaving and going somewhere new, and that is what we are doing. While I had previously flown into Phoenix for a conference, I have never really been there – just from the airport to the hotel and back…
So this sentimental drive away got me thinking about this blog. It certainly wasn’t my idea to write a blog, and I didn’t think much about contributing to it. But once our son Andrew set it up, and Betty made the first post, I thought I’d experiment by adding something. Then something else, and by the time I get to Phoenix will have added over 40 posts! In some ways this surprises me, since I have added maybe only one post to my Facebook page in the past 10 years – I’m just not interested or experienced in sharing my life that way.
And it’s not that I’m unfamiliar with writing. I majored in English in university, but have almost exclusively written funding proposals and formal business correspondence in the past 40+ years. Journaling, or otherwise writing about myself, or our family life, has not been a consideration. (Yes, I was taught not to start a sentence – let alone a paragraph – with a conjunction like So, And, or But, but times have changed and grammar is a little looser now. BTW, if you ever watch a home reno show on TV, almost every sentence started by the architect, interior designer, etc. starts like: “So this is the look we were going for…” Whatever! I could write a whole blog post on how life is one continual conversation now, through a variety of media. Starting a sentence or paragraph with “So” just links what you are about to say to your ongoing life story, but I digress… LOL)
But this is different. My understanding is that the blog was established to help 
Betty & me keep in touch with our family and close friends during our travels. The content is not set up as “Google searchable”, so unless you know the exact address, you won’t find it. One of my goals is to improve my photography, and it turns out the blog is a good vehicle for adding and describing what we are seeing on the road. That provides a great amount of fodder for the mill.
I enjoy preparing these little vignettes, and hope that you also enjoy reading them. While it was not established as an interactive blog with an active comments section, any responses to Betty or my e-mail addresses are most appreciated. Hopefully it won’t be as sad as the note Glen Campbell left hanging on her door… LOL
Cheers!