I don’t know if I will ever get used to putting Belle on a plane and walking away without her.

I’d better, though; she was born with a packed suitcase beside her bassinet and an airline ticket clutched in her hand. So to speak.

From the time she was a tiny child, she has loved to travel. Even when she was really small, she would say that it was fine with her if she never had to unpack her suitcase. She loves to drive, and she loves to fly, and she loves to try new things.

When she was a child, we had no money to travel. She’s making up for lost time, now that she’s an adult.

(She thinks she’s an adult; personally, I find that pretty hilarious to contemplate. ) (No, I don’t.)

She majored in Classical Studies (D’ya want fries with that?) and celebrated her 21st birthday in Italy, on an archaelogical dig. She speaks idly of three-hour layovers in Belgium; of walking the streets of Rome, alone, after midnight, looking for a motel; of taking trains all over central and southern Italy doing the tourist thing. . . .

Several times a year she drives up to Ann Arbor to visit one of her best friends, a woman she met on the Italian dig. They are co-authoring their second novel.

You oughta see her keen pictures. She’s got one of a street sign saying:

Pantheon —>
McDonald’s <--- . . . on the same signpost. I guess if you’re hungry enough, McDonald’s is up there on the same level as the Pantheon. When she gets back, I’ll ask her to email that picture to me. And then I will try to figure out how to post a picture on a blog. I’ve tried many times and failed just as many times. I am not very technologically knowledgeable. I can get it to post on the template, but not on the actual blog. If I ever get my own computer back, I think I will download a blogger picture program. I’ll screw it up, but I will give it a try. But I digress. . . . Belle’s in California for the next few days, near San Francisco. We drove her up to the airport Friday night, stayed with her an hour or so, and walked away leaving her there alone in an international airport full of strangers, some possibly with candy. She called me when she got to California. Your kids are never so old that they don’t need to call you when they get there. Wherever ‘there’ might be. Especially when you’ve abandoned them in a big city airport at 3 a.m. with a lot of strangers. She’ll have fun. Wherever she is, she always has fun. That’s my girl. It won’t keep me from worrying, but that’s just because I’m her Mommy, and worrying is one of our skills. I keep mine well-honed.