It seeems that keeping up with this blog has escaped me in the last couple weeks. :) As we keep telling everyone we visit--we're on a whirlwind tour. It's been wonderful, but I've been busier hanging with people and taking in what's around me than I would have realized. So, needless to say, I find myself already in Florida and looking back at my last post from Portland, OR.
Where have we been since then? We took a sunny and misty tour down Oregon's coast on Hwy 101 before arriving in California's Redwoods. California's mountains, cities and coast welcomed us, and our many friends and family in CA were happy to see that our truck had safely carried us all the way out there to see them. Visiting California is a rewarding goal on its own, but for us, meeting up with new and old friends was an essential part of our time there. Nate had not met many of his dad's brothers and sisters before this trip and was happy to discover that many of his cousins have that same curious drive towards playing music, just like himself. We were able to visit four of the five Butler siblings that live in California; each visit left us feeling blessed and excited to finally meet the larger extensions of Nate's family.
Between the cable cars in San Francisco and Sunset Blvd in Hollywood, we also managed to get an introduction to California's famous cities although both of us ended up feeling like we could have spent more time in both. Besides the Butler family, we were hosted by the Metz family in northern California and Nick and Margie in Reedley, CA. We met Jenny M for breakfast, and met up with Nate's old tour mate Ryan Hahn in West Hollywood who treated us to a quick inside look at the Roxy on Sunset Strip ... thanks so much for taking time to connect with us guys, especially since we had such little time.
Nate's continued picking up tracks from friends on the song he's working on, besides the tracks from Ben Metz and Christian Groves, Nick McIntyre added vocals and Ryan Hahn contributed a tasty guitar lead. I know he hopes to add a few more in Charlottesville in the next week.
We left Los Angeles last Tuesday noon after getting our brakes freshened up by Nate's cousin Bill who owns an automotive shop in Montrose, CA. We were sent on our way across the Mojave with plenty of water and invitations to return anytime. Turning our noses east was also an internal turning point... we knew we only had a little over a week left in our journey. The driving time has been ramped up a bit this week as we arrived in Texas's panhandle late Wednesday evening at my uncle Randy's house. We got the full tour of their new-to-us home and the great art they've taken to collecting. They're just about done with that as their walls are full and their second daughter plans on marrying this January... but Randy was still scheming on how to rearrange in order to hang a few more pieces in the dining room...
We spent Thursday day with them in Plainview before heading down to Lubbock with my cousin Jennifer and her son Ethan in order to eat dinner with Frank, where we spent the night. We had a slow Friday morning, making great friends with Ethan before hitting the road once more with a long haul through Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama before we hit Florida and made our way down to Bradenton where Nate's Grandma Bitting lives. I'm writing on pirated internet from their dining room table this afternoon. We stopped in Tampa last night and showed up at their door early enough to go to church with them this morning.
In the midst of all our travel and busyness.. we've come to a sense of where we want to be next. After listening to us tell our story, Nate's uncle Martin Tom paused and then said, "So you're going to Chicago." At first we tried to protest, that is not what we had meant to say--but then listened to ourselves and realized that essentially, it was.
Coming closer to home, exploring the opportunities afforded by a larger city, learning something we haven't managed to yet.. these are our hopes as we approach Chicago. In the weeks ahead we'll be gathering our belongings and hovering in Indiana while we look for work up by the lake in Illinois. Wednesday you'll find us back in Charlottesville, trying to say our good byes to something I'd rather wasn't ending, yet am not comfortable with staying the same. Perhaps "so long" is better than good bye...
1 comment:
Chicago! Fantastic. For this year anyway. Next year we would prefer you being in VA since we are 99% sure we'll be in DC for a couple years (or more). We'll look forward to catching up when you're around and free. And we'll have to have a rendezvous or two in the Windy City.
Love,
Bethany
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