Cross Country Trip Field Notes: Day Two

This was the day for our trip to finally begin. After breakfast at the hotel, a short swim, and getting everyone ready and the car reloaded we commence our drive to Fayette.

Already in the trip I am grateful for several things: a DVD player and the new, $55 earphones that we just bought for this trip; the bag of bribes we purchased for the girls, including these ridiculous tiny rubber toys called Squinkies that Maggie discovered recently and just HAD to have; tons of snacks that we packed for the road.

Fayette is the location where the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was first organized in 1830 at the Peter Whitmer Farm. We visited with a very, sweet, attentive eight year old, who I was surprised knew the names of all three witnesses to the Book of Mormon on her own. Mia loved the tour, had long conversations with the missionary who was our guide, and commented on how strongly she could feel the spirit there. We also visited with a very grouchy, unhappy, tired five year old who spent most of the visit sulking, whining, and complaining that she was too tired to walk and an overactive two yer old who picked up pieces of china in the visitor center, sang happy birthday loudly, and was very unhappy when I would not let her try out all the beds.

While our tour was a little too long for the kids, the spirit was there. I was particularly struck about the very human side of the origins of the church, the extent to which those involved in what in my mind, with years of perspective on the events, were world-altering events could have had so little concept of all that was occurring. I thought about the faith required to sacrifice so much of your life, personal space, and family for such a fledgling cause. I loved hearing of Mary Whitmer who was exhausted by all the personal sacrifices that she and her family were making to provide a place for the prophet Joseph Smith to translate and hold meetings and live. She was the only woman to receive a personal, visual witness of the Book of Mormon, not given to her -- as it was to others -- to allow her to testify to the world and add to the veracity of Joseph's testimony, but instead as a mercy of the Lord to help sustain her in her work at this time.

Then, we drove to Palmyra via McDonalds in Canandaigua. I wanted to stop in Canandaigua and drive through the spots where Jeffrey and I spent our honeymoon, but there was not time, so we pressed on.

Somewhere during the portion of the trip, perhaps in finishing her double cheeseburger, Mia discover that she had a very loose, very sore tooth. This put a damper on the rest of the journey for her. We drove past Martin Harris' home and then visited the Grandin printing shop. Elsie was very over-tired and Mia's tooth bothered her so much, we did not finish the tour. Maggie was convinced we had been there before, but actually was just mistaking it for Franklin's print shop in Philadelphia.

We spent some time walking through the Sacred Grove. The best comment there came from Maggie. She told me, "Mom, you know how in my Kit Kitteridge movie when Kit is really happy she starts to cry, but she is not sad. And then, I sometimes feel like crying when I watch it. Well, that is how I feel now, really happy but like I am going to cry." It was a beautiful moment to walk along with her and help her identify that what she felt was the spirit telling her that the truth of what occurred there.

After visiting the Smith family log home and the Hill Cumorah (where the girls enjoyed watching a man reenacting Joseph Smith extracting the golden plates from under a large rock in preparation for the pageant) they all slept during our drive to Niagara Falls.

A few notes if you ever decide to make a similar journey: first, if you do not go during the pageant there are not crowds and you get nice, personal tours at the sites in Palmyra. If you go into Niagara Falls and want to cross to Canada there are three bridges -- check online on the way to see what the wait is to cross the border. Luckily we did this and took the less popular peace bridge which avoided the 1-2 hour wait to get in.

Niagara was beautiful but crowded since it was the weekend of US Independence day and Canada Day. I even googled it and I still am not quite sure what Canada Day really is about, but it meant that there were thousands of Indians and Pakistanis and Afghans at Niagara picnicking and walking about. Go figure.

After ice cream cones that were about four times too large for any of us, but apparently the smallest size served by the froyo place at Niagara, we determined that once safely back in the US we ought to feed the kids a real dinner. Olive Garden at 9:45 pm was not really what I had in mind, but it is a vacant, right? In the end we were driving again at after midnight, tired, and this time in a rain storm.

I was grateful to make it to Cleveland safely by 1:30 am and again collapse into bed.