Femme Tour Trials
6 Women traveling together, who would've thought? I have to admit that I was really worried about six females together in close proximity and getting along enough to survive it for 48 hours. By the end of our trip I was pleasantly surprised.
Carmen came in the night before and after working all day and then traveling in the afternoon, she was up for anything. She even went grocery shopping with me with no questions asked and sat down while my young one interrogated the strange woman that was about to stay in her room.
The rest of the Femmes joined us the next day, right on time. It was a VERY energetic bunch as we were joined by our male guest author, Victor MGlothin. He had been dubbed, "Man Child" by the store manager. Victor was very gracious and seemed to understand that us women, we were the ones running the show.
And the things we talked about in the car. I can't write them here, you see, we all agreed that what was discussed in the car remained in the car, but we learned a lot of things about one another.
We shared.
It was a good thing. Remove men from the equation and pass a few dried pineapple snacks and everyone became very forthcoming. And the fact that I refused to stop to let anyone go to the bathroom or even eat helped. They were my prisoners. We talked and crossed our legs to take our minds off the need to relieve ourselves and our hunger.
The thing that will stick with me most though was the gratefulness of the soldiers that we talked to, even the ones who had just returned from Iraq the day before. They were out there the past few months laying their lives on the line for us, and they were so surprised and glad that we would visit them and sign our names to books that they paid for. The time in the car was a small sacrifice. The only bullets flying at my head were friendly jests from friends.
