Lets start with Joni. I think I loved her thirty seconds after she walked in the door. She’s spunky and adorable and older than I ever would have guessed just by looking at her (I will not give her age away as that would be rude). Hilarious is the best word I can come up with to describe her. We started talking about the craziness of our relations (yet again something I will not delve into as it is super complicated) and at one point she laughed and said “You need to pause this story until Jeanne gets here!” So Mom went and showered and got ready to go and Jeanne and Whitney (Joni’s youngest daughter) got here and we all left.
Jeanne is an architect (yay!). She does mostly commercial work, but designed the house she lives in which is in Golden, CO (about five minutes from Lakewood where her mother lives). She has two boys, Jacob who just turned 21 and is going to Colorado School of Mines, and Conner who just graduated from high school. Jeanne was our driver today in her sleek Volvo SUV. She is cool. And I am not just saying that because she is kin that does architecture.
Whitney is a goof but very cute. She and her mom seem to have a relationship similar to me and Mom’s. She spent the day with us and was our driver this evening when we went in search of Hannah (her older sister) at Buffalo Rose, a biker (as in leather not spandex) bar in downtown Golden where she is a waitress. She only had a Shirley Temple, with no ice of course, but still was a little rummy. Joni explained, that’s just what Whitney is like. She is a great little tour guide. On the way to Golden she drove us past her middle school and the Coors brewery and a few other random places. On the way back to Aunt Lou’s house she drove us past her high school, then said she had something really important to show us: her parking spot at school. Then she drove us past Jeanne’s house (unbeknownst to the occupants) and then took us past Aunt Lou’s and showed us her grade school. A very entertaining young person to be sure.
Aunt Lou reminds me of Grandma Emma, as I have already mentioned. She is the kind of grandma type that dotes on you, which is nice, but was very weird this morning as I have not really experienced that in almost 12 years (since Emma passed away). I got used to it though. As Joni says, Aunt Lou is a little “Spacey” but that makes her her, and we wouldn’t want her to be any other way. She has been absurdly wonderful, letting us sleep here for a couple of nights and organizing a little outing as well as a BBQ this evening as a mini family reunion (so we could meet Jeanne’s boys and husband Tom).
So! We all gathered (well Joni, Jeanne, and Whitney came over) and we all piled in Jeanne’s car and headed of to Estes Park. I had no idea what Estes Park might be, but I figured if they said we would enjoy it, we would enjoy it. It took us 45 minutes or so to get there, but it was a beautiful day so the drive wasn’t bad. Plus with six of us in the car there are more topics of conversation than just when it’s Mom and me. I mean, we know each other, have our whole lives. We didn’t know these people existed until 20 years ago, so we have some caching up and clearing up of confusion to do.
We went to the Stanley Hotel first when we got to Estes Park. For all you Stephen King fans out there, that is where the book The Shining takes place slash what inspired him to write it. Contrary to popular thought, King was not residing in the hotel when he wrote the book. He was actually living in Boulder, CO which is about 20-30 minutes East of Estes Park. Another interesting fact is that Stanley Kubrich’s classic film with Jack Nicholson filmed exterior shots at Timberline Lodge on Mt. Hood (in Oregon), not in the Stanley Hotel. So, Stephen King helped produce a TV Mini-series that was actually filmed up at the Stanley Hotel. We did not happen upon any ghostly activity while we were there, but then again we weren’t anywhere near any of the so called haunted rooms (rooms 217, 401, 407 and a few others). Well, we were by the ballroom but the piano sat on the far side of the room rather quietly so the ghost of Mrs. Stanley seemed to not want to play at that moment.
After the hotel, we were all rather hungry. We went down to the main part of town, which is a lot like Seaside with all the shops and things but without the Ocean two blocks away (Colorado being a landlocked state and all). We had lunch at Ed’s Cantina, which wasn’t classic Mexican food, but had a slight twist on it, though it was pretty close. More like what you would make in your own kitchen, not like what authentic Mexican places serve. Their guac was awesome though.
Then we went shopping. All I had bought at the hotel for souvenirs were four post cards and a shot glass. We stopped in a few nice jewelry stores and Mom got a necklace. I toyed with the idea of buying a really pretty cross, since the one I currently wear makes my chest break out in a rash, but decided against it when the clerk didn’t know what the necklace was made out of. Bummer, it was super simple and pretty. We were searching for a t-shirt for Dad, so we went into this little store with a ton of Colorado touristy clothes, and though we did not find anything for the old man, I ended up with a bright blue sweatshirt that says Colorado in big letters across the chest, and “Estes Park” smaller underneath it. It’s cute! Not that I will need it a lot on this trip with the crazy thing in the sky that someone may have told me once was called the sun…
We came back to Aunt Lou’s after our shopping venture, and prepped for dinner (which was BBQed steaks and chicken breasts courtesy of Aunt Lou and the boys). Jacob and Connor and Whitney goofed around in the back yard while Joni, Jeanne, Mom, Aunt Lou, Tom and I sat on the patio and discussed the rest of Mom’s crazy family. After the food and discourse Jeanne and family decided it was time to call it a night and departed with hugs and flashes from Mom’s camera.
Then we decided to go find Hannah, Joni’s 18 year old daughter at work. She wasn’t there when we got there. Neither was anyone else but the bar tender and a waitress or two. We asked the bartended if he could call Hannah and tell her that he needed her to come back to work because all of a sudden it was slammed. That didn’t work. So Joni called her and told he that she was to get there within five minutes or have car privileges removed, she showed after that. We all hung out for 15 minutes or so, but Hannah wanted to get out of the bar that she had spent most of the past two days working in, so we split up and went home. Whitney dropped us at Aunt Lou’s and here I sit typing to you about our day.
It was a good girl bonding day. I think I will have to come back here sometime and hang out with these people some more. They’re wonderful!!
Sean
License Plates Seen
Kansas
Illinois
Indiana
Kentucky
Louisiana
Michigan
South Dakota
Playlist
No playlist today, as there was too much talking for music to be heard.
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