Road Trip to Virginia (Kansas to Kentucky)

There is really not much to say about this portion of the trip. Once you get past Denver (which really isn’t that interesting anyway, just a big sprawling city) not much changes for the next 650miles. I was joking with my dad that if only we could just fold the map a bit, you know… delete a few middle states… jump from Denver to St. Louis, but we did have a pretty good stake in Kansas. From Moab, UT we drove to Hays, KS spent the night and then drove to just outside of Kentucky. The scenery progressively got prettier, but there were no longer the tall pines, redwoods, and rough wilderness that I have grown to love.

This is about it...for miles and miles

It was good to see Jim is doing well for himself

While driving the flatlands my dad and I read a book out loud to each other as we took turns driving. The book was Called When Crickets Cry by Charles Martin. Along with majestic views and good conversation, reading this book has been a major highlight of my trip.

The story is written from the perspective of a young man who has dedicated his life to understanding the human heart. Although the book has sections in which it is heavy on the medical terminology: (“Felt crepitus, suggesting subcutaneous emphysema, suspicious of partial pneumothroax left side.”) It has also been heavy on the healing of the heart.

I believe that this quote and a bit of explanation sums up the tone of the book: “We are all shipwrecked. All castaways… Once day, we all wake on the beach, our heads caked with sand, sea foam stinging our eyes, fiddler crabs picking at our noses, and the taste of salt caked on our lips… And, like it or not, it is there that we realize we are all in need of Friday to come rescue us off this island, because we don’t speak the language and we can’t read the messages in the bottle.” p. 240

For those of you that have not read Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, Friday is a character that has a life changing impact on the life of shipwrecked Crusoe. When Crickets Cry takes the reader through the highs and lows of a man’s search for the healed heart. It is a fascinating book regarding the procedures behind open-heart surgery, as well as health friendships, I would whole-heartedly recommend it.

Oh and it also contains great quotes from writers such as Shakespeare, John Donne, William Blake, Saint Augustine, Isak Dinesen, and others.

It was a good book and a page-turner (and not just because we were driving through the dullest part of the country)