Last night I slept in my own bed for the first time this summer. That’s a bit less melodramatic than it sounds, but I feel like it’s true!
But really, I returned last night from a whirlwind trip that started June 21-the first day of summer.
My trip started with me driving to Tulsa to stay with friends overnight. There’s a saying that friends may kill for you, true friends help you hide the body. Well true friends also take you to the airport at 4:30 a.m.! My flight left at 6:45 a.m. and I made it to Chicago by about 9:20 so we had the whole day to spend there. I stayed with my online friend Sonya and her daughter and roommate/caretaker. We had such a wonderful time! I don’t have time or the energy to go into detail with all that we did but we saw: the views from the John Hancock building’s 94th floor, the Millennium Park (AWESOME!), Magnificant Mile (Pottery Barn was a disappointment LOL), Lake Michigan, Navy Pier and a quick look at the Chicago River. We also went to see Sonya’s school where she’s getting a masters in pscychology.
I left Chicago the evening of Saturday, June 24 and we landed in Atlanta during a bad storm so we had to stare at the terminal from the plane for a very long time! I didn’t make it to my hotel in downtown until about 1 a.m. Then when I got there, it took three rooms before we found one that my wheelchair fit into.
The Spina Bifida Association conference was fantastic. It had a lot of information that I had never heard before, some I had heard but didn’t understand and then a lot of stuff I already knew was confirmed. I learned a lot about the learning disabilities that accompany Spina Bifida and one of the sessions about it seemed to explain many of the problems I’ve had the first 28 years of my life. I literally cried during that session because light bulbs went on in my head about a lot of things. I also got to spend some time with several online friends who attended the conference. A few black jack lessons were also involved! All I’m going to say about that is, it’s lucky I was playing with play money!
I didn’t leave the hotel at all until the last day when I crossed the street to see Centennial Park. That’s the park that was built for the 1996 Olympics (where the bomb went off). It was really pretty and I felt my trip to Atlanta was complete after being able to actually leave the hotel LOL. The hotel itself was really cool. It is attached to the CNN studios and there’s a foodcourt between the hotel and the CNN offices.
I left Atlanta Wednesday, June 28 and stayed in Tulsa for a few days. I stayed with the Terrells of course and we went to a friend’s wedding, I went to their kids’ VBS program, Valerie had a birthday party and I got to spend time with a few other friends. All in all it was a wonderful time.
I got home late Saturday night and am glad to be home for the most part. My neighbor of course brainfarted that I was gone so my outdoor plants went 11 days without water. She said she was going to buy me new plants because she basically killed my plants but I was so tired I didn’t care.
I head back to work in the morning so I had better hit the sack. I will hopefully find a way to post a few pictures in slideshow format for all to see!
Jamie