Russ in Vancouver with the Pasics, Andy & Jas in New Zealand, Ryan in Boulder and me near New Orleans…  As Thanksgiving approached, I was absolutely, positively determined not to feel sorry for myself. I chose to do this trip, after all, and I chose to do it in the fall.  I never thought I’d still be away at Thanksgiving, but my dawdling made this so.

Many people in this country would be happy to enjoy a peanut butter sandwich in a warm motel room. I was determined to be one of them.

But not thrilled about it.

So I called Mary Beth, my friend in Seattle who manages PR for Emeritus Senior Living. I remembered that they have senior communities in 45 states. Might there be one within a couple hundred miles that needed some holiday photos?

There was. On Thanksgiving day, dressed in my One Nice Outfit, I walked into the Emeritus at Ridgefield Pointe, just outside Jackson, Mississippi.  Within 10 minutes, I met Ann, Bill, Jennifer and Caroline.  Within a few more, they were having an extra plate added to their T-day table for me.

Bill, a retired psychiatrist, has been at Emeritus for a year and has blossomed there. Ann, his wife, lives nearby. Jennifer, their daughter, is a former nurse. She and Caroline, their granddaughter, live in Birmingham, Alabama. All four were delightful company as we shared tidbits of our lives over turkey and stuffing.

My favorite tidbit: Caroline, 11, wants to be a vet, and delivered her first litter of kittens at age 5. Bella took to her immediately, as did most of the Emeritus residents we visited.

Later, I set out to explore downtown Jackson as the sun started to set. The completely deserted streets were so easy to navigate. But also a little eerie, so I only got out of the car once to catch the sunset.

Later, I connected with my family in the four time zones. Away from them, I did feel lonely, but also overwhelmingly grateful for the many blessings in my life.

Including the family who had so graciously shared their Thanksgiving with me.

If you ever get the chance, visit the Rosa Parks Museum in Montgomery, Alabama. I would have named it the “Montgomery Bus Boycott Museum,” but that’s me.

It’s one of those things you remember – vaguely, maybe – from your U.S. history class.  It started Dec. 1, 1955 with Rosa Parks refusing to get up and give her seat to a white man, and ended 13 months later with the Supreme Court ruling that segregation on public buses was unconstitutional.

But those 13 months in between were pretty…insane.  And to the credit of the museum – and the city of Montgomery – the story is told without flinching.

Here’s one of the details I can’t seem to shake:  Among other insults and threats, hecklers threw urine on the peaceful boycotters.

Think about that for a second. (Even though you’d rather not.)  Before you can throw urine on someone, you have to a.) collect it and b.) transport it to the target site.  Who does that?

Not far from the Rosa Parks museum is the old greyhound station.  In 1960, the Supreme Court outlawed segregation on interstate buses as well, but in many places, the ruling was ignored.  The Freedom Riders set out to change that.

What I hadn’t known was that when they arrived in Birmingham, Alabama, the violence was so intense, the protest was halted.  A group of kids – 19, 20 & 21—took it upon themselves (against the admonishments of President Kennedy) to continue the protest.  They got on a greyhound in Birmingham, and were met with brutality in Montgomery. The police were called, and showed up oh, about an hour, after violence broke out. ­­Kennedy sent in the national guard and national attention was finally riveted on the protest.

Montgomery is a lovely city, stately without pretention. I appreciate it being right out there with the darker chapters in its past.  I like the park down by the river. The uber-clean streets. The sign on Martin Luther King’s church that says no self-tours on Sundays, but you’re welcome to come and worship with us.

I’m sure I would fade into a puddle of misery during the hot and humid summers, but on a blue-sky November day, it was the perfect place for me.

Before I left Seattle, everyone asked how long I would be gone.  Needing a stock answer, I made one up: Between 3 weeks and 3 months. (Not thinking, really, that I would actually be gone three months, though that’s what it’s turning out to be.)

As I headed East, everyone I met wanted to know my ultimate destination. Needing a stock answer, I made one up: Savannah, Georgia.

And when I got to Savannah, I was satisfied. I had done it. Travel many miles, met many people, had some pretty dang interesting experiences.  I was not so much ready to go home as I was to be home.  Beam me up, Scotty!

But Scotty apparently was not listening, and the continent that I so happily crossed now has to be… recrossed. I had known this all along, of course. But it really sunk in in Savannah and I felt a wee bit melancholy.  Maybe that’s why the only photos I took there were of a cemetery in the middle of the historic district.

As cemeteries go, it’s an good one. Lots of soldiers from the revolutionary war buried there.  Plenty of statesmen. Victims of the Great Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1820.

Not a lot of folks from the Civil War. (Or, as they call it here, the War Between the States.)  I think it might have been full by then, with a city rapidly growing up around it. This is itself was a bit of a relief.  I think I have seen enough civil war battlefields, statues, memorials, sites and epitaphs to last me for quite a while.

Tobacco is no longer a major crop in Kentucky.  You still see lots of the old black drying barns standing empty.  I was lucky to find a few still in use.

Charleston is a magical city, even in the rain. The big “pictures” I  took with my mind and heart.  A few little details, I took with my cell phone camera.

I’m pulling together sets of photos from my travels so far.  Here’s one from Wallace, Idaho.

In geographically random order, here are a few more of the folks I’ve met along the way….

When Anthony was a kid, his uncle woke him up every morning by playing a stack of Delta Blues albums.  Every morning, the blues.

He hated it.

But somewhere along the line, the music entered his soul and became a part of him. The last 7 years, he’s worked here at the Delta Blues museum in Clarksdale, Mississippi. His favorite musician?  Now, that’s a tough one. But when pressed, he picks Muddy Waters, who grew up on a plantation just outside of town.

There’s an old telegram on the wall of the museum, wishing Muddy Waters a happy birthday. “Without you, we wouldn’t be who we are today,” it says.  And it’s signed Mick, Keith, Bill and Charlie. (i.e., for the younger set, the Rolling Stones.)

I told Anthony that my parents woke us many a Saturday morning with Johnny Cash.

He shuddered a bit and replied:  “No disrespect, ma’am, but I’m so sorry.”

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On this site, in 1897, nothing happened.

When I read this sign on the Holiday Motel Lodge in Lander, Wyoming, I knew it was my kind of place. I’d been camping for quite a while and was ready for electric lights and a hot shower.

                            Betty                                                                                                      Barb

Comfortable, inexpensive, and a little quirky, the motel draws an eclectic clientele. Like me, I guess – and  the four 70-something gentlemen who were traveling to see the Four Corners in four separate vintage cars.

I planned to ask for a group shot of the men and their cars – the ’55 Chevy being the only one I recognized. But they were up and gone very early. And I wasn’t.

“The world comes to my door,” Barb said. She and her husband have run the motel for 15 years, taking over from his parents, who had it for 18.

Betty is on the cleaning crew. She lives out of town, on seven acres down a dirt road. She tried to retire at 70, but it just didn’t take.  Maybe next year.

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When I passed the rough-hewn structure deep in the Arkansas Ozarks, John was sitting in his porch rocking chair and adjusting his well-worn hat. I had no choice, really. I had to stop.

John and Annalie ­­­­­own a craft shop, chocked full of items they make themselves. Stunning hand-made quilts. Dozens of woven baskets. Intricately carved walking sticks.

For 34 years, John has been carefully picking which white oaks to harvest, shaving the thin strips and weaving intricate baskets. He wove a few around my fingers to show me how it’s done. Then he got out an old bucket, turned it over, and showed me how he weaves the base of a basket around it.

I was a goner.  I paid $30 for two of his baskets. And $230 for cedar chest that I knew would cost hundreds more just about anywhere else. It would have fit in the Toyota if I didn’t have so much (necessary) stuff packed in there.  Finally, I decided to have them ship it.

Annalie added up the numbers up with a stub of a pencil on her much-used notebook.  She kept shaking her head slightly. In pity, I think, for one so daft.

‘You think I’m crazy to spend $60 to ship this, don’t you?” I finally asked her.

“Yes, I do,” she replied without hesitation.

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I’d spent nearly an hour photographing a couple dozen donkeys in a field near Yates Center, Kansas, when they all started to bray at once. It was one of those rare times when one can legitimately use the word cacophony.

I had been so engrossed in my new four-legged friends that I hadn’t noticed the pickup truck when it pulled up beside me.  It was feeding time, and Jack Turner and his son, Lane, had arrived with a load of hay.

Retired first from the military and then from years of coaching and teaching high school, Jack now raises, shows and sells miniature donkeys. He was, of course, a wealth of information on the topic.

Did you know, for example, that:

• Donkeys, jackasses, asses & burros are all the same animal?
• That donkeys range in size from miniatures (up to 36” at the withers) to mammoths (56” and over?)
• (Or, for that matter, that the withers indicate the high part of the back, between the shoulders?)
• That males are called  Jacks and females Jennets (though many people call them Jennys?)
• That people all over the country raise donkeys as a hobby or business?
• A mule is the product of a male donkey and a female horse?

I didn’t.

Jack offered to show me some baby miniature donkeys, and I followed the truck  back to Jack’s house to do so. Soon they asked if I wanted to see the most beautiful mule in the country.  Who could pass that up? So the trek continued to Lane’s place.

Halle Berry is a site to behold, from her regale bearing to her pure-white eyelashes.  When I asked why he named her Halle Berry, Lane was quick with his answer: “Because her father is black and her mother is white, and she is beautiful.”

I did not find this odd. After all, I’ve had a dairy cow named after me.  They said it was because of the big brown eyes, but I’ve never been completely convinced of that….

Hurricane Sandy and 12 inches of snow  have a way of changing one’s plans.

My friend, Janice, met me in Lexington, KY, for a week of traveling together.  But instead of heading east, we turned west through the rolling hills of Kentucky. They really do roll, by the way, but even squinting, I couldn’t quite make the bluegrass look blue.

We visited the Sisters of Loreto Motherhouse, the boyhood home of Abe Lincoln, a lovely equestrian center and, yesterday morning, the Jim Beam Bourbon distillery.

Did you know that:
* 95% of the bourbon in the U.S. is made in Kentucky?
* If it’s not made in the U.S., it’s not bourbon?
* If it’s not put into a new cast, it’s not bourbon?
* There are more bottles of bourbon in Kentucky than there are people?

Maybe you did, but I didn’t.  I don’t drink bourbon, but I just found the whole process fascinating.  And visually alluring…

So it was Jim Beam in the morning, and Churchill Downs in the afternoon. A good day.