It took me most of the day to get back home to Portland. I was up at 3 a.m MST, looped the parking lot of the Residence Inn in Phoenix darkness to get in my minimum one-mile run, made the 4 a.m. shuttle, and caught a 6 a.m flight. The temperature difference between taking off and landing dropped in half, as I was greeted with icy streets from an inch of snow. My wife was waiting for a ride to work, as her smaller car does not have the traction to get up the hills of our neighborhood, while our excited pups got to ride along. I reflected on another week of travel where I drank too much and ran too little, afraid to step on the scales. 

Traffic was light on President’s Day and there was no treasure hunt for mail. It was a holiday for many people, but just another day of retirement for me. I took the time to buy and prepare a pound of pork belly between shuttle runs to my wife’s office. I also thought it appropriate to watch Ken Burns’ Thomas Jefferson documentary (See Post #430) in honor of the occasion. It will also give me some background on the Broadway show Hamilton that we will see after we return from our Mediterranean cruise next month. I was glad to see that he lived a long life, but it was filled with too much tragedy and controversy in company with his fame. The biggest take away from this documentary is that both Jefferson and President John Adams died within hours of each other on the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence – July 4, 1826.

I returned from this adventure with a couple of tickets stubs, a schedule magnet, a plastic souvenir cup, a few extra pounds, and a thousand memories to add to my various collections. Over the past two weeks, we’ve gone to seven new restaurants together, met up with ten old friends, visited the Desert Museum in Tucson, toured the Philabaum glass glass blowing studio, and I went to an Oregon State vs. Cal Poly college baseball game at the Texas Rangers/Kansas City Royals spring facility in a sunny Phoenix with a Sigma Chi fraternity brother. However, just like last year when we made a similar trip to Arizona, we were accused of bringing the rain with us.

I get to stay home this week, before our red-eye flight this weekend and after suffering through two fundraisers. We will be “Back Home in Indiana” for the second time already this year, hoping that my wife’s mother remains in good health and we can avoid another hospital stay. This time, I’m also hoping to take a short drive down to Shelbyville and look for further evidence about my “second family.” I still haven’t got a reply from the certified letter that was sent nearly a month ago, but there should be photos of the Banister family in the high school annuals in that decade from 1941-1951. (See Post #392). To establish a firm genetic connection, I mailed back my Ancestry.com DNA saliva test today, hoping to compare results to a first cousin who maintains the Banister family tree on that site. (See Post #422). More of my Indiana roots may be uncovered as I continue to dig deeper into the mystery of my adoption.