Let's Go Somewhere-8/26/2014 Seabrook Beach, New Hampshire

Aleathia says:

I am a fan of beaches...or maybe it is better to say I am a fan of the ocean and its byproducts.  I can do without the glaring sun, the sunburns, the sand in my bathing suit, and throngs of people.  I love a good brooding beach, the kind that writers dream about, that makes you want to walk for miles mesmorized by the sound of crashing waves and seagulls.  The kind of beach that requires a sweater.

This is Seabrook Beach in New Hampshire.  One summer when I was 11 my mom and her boyfriend Tony took me with them to spend the week.  It was an amazing time.  I spent long days walking the beach, playing with kids, making sand castles, and picking shells that I would not be able to take home with me.

I had my first ever summer love.  That summer they were dredging out an area of the shore and we sat on the jetty and watched thousands of gallons of ocean floor sand pile up on the beach.  There were loads of nasty looking creatures and mystical giant purple sea cucumbers that the workers would pull out with their gloves so we could see them.

This was also the same summer that my crush and I went "rafting" on our new Budweiser rafts being shy and making twinkly eyed chatter at one another as we drifted out on the current into the ocean.  His mother became a speck on the beach and we worked hard to try and swim back to shore without drowning.  I was scared to death to lose the rafts my mother had just bought despite keeping them hindered our ability to swim.  I didn't find out until my mother saved us by swimming out that his mother did not know how to swim and was afraid of the ocean.

I felt at home there cradled in the immensity of the ocean knowing it was filled with wonders and dangers and possibility.  I have thought of that beach every summer for the last 30 years.  I have never been back.  I think it is time.

Let's Go Somewhere-7/22/2014 Wanderlust

Aleathia says:

My whole life has been spent moving from one place to another.  It started when I was small, a baby really, and pushed on through my late 20's.  The last 13 years have found me making roots and my soul is pretty happy about that.

Michael and I were watching a documentary last night on areas of the planet that were ravaged by either natural or man made disasters.  One of the towns was Picher, OK.  I remember my mother telling me that we lived in Oklahoma once and I have minimal memories of it so I sent a text to my Pop to see if he remembered the name of it. Tahlequah. Huh?

Let's start from the beginning:

I was conceived in San Antonio, TX according to my father.

I was born in Bristol, CT where most of my family still lives today.  This would be a returning point over the years.  We always came "home".

I got my Social Security number in Mayberry, CA before we made our way back to Bristol, CT.  I am told that in this mix we also lived in Florida and Massachusetts.

I know my mom and pop stayed together until I was 4 years old.  Apparently she got a wild hair up her ass (which wasn't unusual) and decided he had to go.  I would not see him for another year until my mother would become gravely ill and I was sent to live with him.

In Port Allen, LA

and then to Tahlequah, OK.

When my  mother recovered  I was sent back to Bristol, CT to be with my mother.  I faintly remember a small stint of moving through the midwest....staying with my Aunt Patty in Michigan.

Terra Haute, IN and somewhere in Iowa and somewhere in Wisconsin.

Again we would go back to Bristol, CT where my mother would decide she was in love with my a man who would become my evil stepfather.  He would move us out to Sahuarita, AZ by way of Puma and Amarillo, TX.  I would stay in Arizona for the second half of second grade, all of third and fourth grades.

Things would go sour and my mom moved us back to Bristol, CT where I would be reunited with my Pop for the first time in 5 years.  I would spend another 2 years here before my mother moved me up to Elmira, NY so she could get back together with the evil stepfather.

I made her promise to not move me around for high school.  I wanted real friends.  I wanted some stability. We stayed in Elmira, NY until I graduated high school.  I moved to Corning, NY to go to college.  This wouldn't last too long as I met a friend who would later convince me to move out west to Seattle, WA.

I stayed in Washington from 1993-1995 when, like my mother, I decided that I would move across the country to be with someone I thought I loved.  This time I would end up in Atlanta, GA.

We would be there a year before we moved back to Washington.  Once back in Seattle for 2 years, he decided he needed to be in Georgia so we packed up and moved to Athens, GA.  We were there only 6 months before he wanted to move back to Seattle.  When we finally got back to Washington we settled down for about 4 years.  I got pregnant and we knew that our families would never be able to afford to come west to see the baby so we packed it up again and moved back to Corning, NY.

Now I have a lovely home with my wonderful family in Corning, NY.  My home.  The place where I get to create my own personal driven memories.

In all of my years of travel I have driven through, stopped at, camped in, or eaten in every state in the continental United States except North Dakota.  I have never been to Alaska or Hawaii.  My bucket list is to have visited all the states before I die....and maybe enjoy it this time.  In addition, I have been to several parts of Mexico and Canada.  I have been to England.  I think traveling is fun, but home is better.  It is where my heart is.