Toronto is a Bad Idea

Visiting Toronto itself might be a good idea, but booking a flight in and out of Toronto when flying to Europe and living seven hours away, is not the wisest move.
Tuesday morning, on my day off, I drove with Grace and her boyfriend to Toronto.They were going to catch a plane and they saved about $500 each on the flight leaving from Toronto instead of here in Columbus. So that's a $1000 savings, probably worth it for them.
The drive to Toronto is nice enough, north through Ohio, along Lake Erie through northern Pennyslvania before a sharp left turn at Buffalo, New York. Then we crossed the border into Canada.
The Canadian border guard was a little sterner than I expected as he questioned Grace and Jack about their flights and how long they would be in Canada. Are there Americans trying to sneak into Canada? I mean, there might be now that Trump is threatening. And I can promise that they plan to keep us out, judging by this guard.
He made Grace answer since she sat in the front passenger seat, but she had already taken two anxiety pills since she's afraid of flying, so her answers might have been a bit slurred. He shushed Jack who sat in the back seat. After he assured himself that I planned to leave the country the same day (no, I'm going to sneak and spend the night at a Canadian strip mall), he let us pass.
That's when my driving nightmare increased. Maybe it was the directions that Jack's phone gave us. We traveled a myriad of roads where I had to exit and then exit again and then stay to the left at the V. The roads had names like QEW rather than I-90.
Plus, Canada is on the metric system, and the speedometer only told me how fast I traveled in miles, so I drove much more slowly than I might have in the U.S.
And all of it looked so much like the United States, an awful lot like Buffalo. Industrial and strip malls. I think I passed three outlet malls in my ninety minute foray into the country.
I didn't make it into Toronto proper, which I'm sure is a lovely city. Plus, I saw no moose or polar bears or even Mounties, things that make Canada enjoyable.
I dropped Grace and Jack at the airport. Luckily, no one yelled at me while I dropped them off, and then I got back on the highway to head south.
The gas gauge edged toward zero. It got to the bottom section where it turned red. Then half of that section disappeared. I stayed in the right lane, hoping each time that I'd see a tell-tale sign of a gas station or an exit sign that indicated I could find something other than diesel.
I finally pulled off an exit where there was road construction that sent me through a Walmart parking lot, past a Home Depot and into a Tim Horton's that had gas pumps.
I nearly cried when I finally got to the U.S. border. A laissez-faire border guard asked me how long I'd been in Canada and if I'd bought anything. I told him I stopped at Tim Horton's. He let me go.

You can't tell it, but the lake looked really pretty here as I pulled into America.
And I drove the rest of the way as the sun set over Ohio, getting home around 9 p.m.
Meanwhile, Grace and Jack got on a plane, and only a few hours after I arrived home, they landed in Dublin.

At least I don't have to pick them up from Toronto.

23-Hour Drive

Grace's classes start on Monday, so we needed to get her back to school. The boys both had sporting events on Friday. I decided to drive Grace on Saturday and Sunday. Ten and a half hours each way. The dorms opened again on Saturday. As she texted friends and checked Facebook, she feared she would be the only one back on Saturday.
"Will you stay with me if no one else is back?" she asked.
"Sure," I said, already dreading a night in a dorm room.
We left about 7:30 on a bitterly cold morning. The temperature at home read zero; as we cruised north of Columbus, it dropped to -7 but the sun rose blindingly over the snow-covered fields.
Usually, Grace and I talk a lot in the car. She slept instead this time. She'd been home, mostly forming an indentation on the couch for five weeks. She got home on Dec. 17 and she came down with a cold on Dec. 18. She hardly left the couch.
Two trips to the doctor finally revealed that she had whooping cough, which probably explains why she wasn't able to shake the "cold" and why getting up to exercise or taking a walk around the block didn't help kick the cold.
So we had five weeks to talk. We went shopping on Thursday, avoiding the house while the water was turned off and sewer work completed.
Even though we didn't talk, I could reach over and touch her. We held hands for a lot of the way.
We arrived at the school at 5:30, and after a brief panic where Grace couldn't find her student id which gets her into the dorm, we carried about six loads of things into the dorm room. And there was her roommate Colleen limping around because she sprained an ankle. How? She likes to jump off her front porch into the snow. Her dad had dug up the yard and deposited rocks in the yard, which he hadn't told her before she jumped. Thus, the sprained ankle.
Everyone screamed to be reunited. Hugs. Late Christmas gifts. Nick has dreadlocks. Big Mike lifted girls off the ground in backbreaking bear hugs. All the exciting news. Kim had whooping cough too.
I helped Grace unpack some then sat and watched. I'd planned to take a nap in her dorm before heading back southwest to Columbus. I thought I'd drive and get a hotel some place in New York.
I started driving at 7:30 p.m., twelve hours after we had left that morning. The snow splattered the windshield and the nights seem especially black on the two-lane road in upstate New York. The snow and dark made it hard to see, and I felt really nervous when I passed an Amish carriage with a lantern swinging on the back. The lantern gave off faint light through the falling snow.
The snow made the trip slower. I travelled at 40 miles per hour on much of the highway. I stopped for coffee. Then more coffee as the hours ticked off. At one point, somewhere between Syracuse and Buffalo, I pulled into a thruway rest area and laid the seat down. I covered myself with a quilt and tried to sleep. Nope. I might as well get some coffee and keep going.
Whenever I got tired, I'd stop for coffee, the cold air kicking my eyes wide awake before I scrambled back to the car to drive some more.
I'd hoped to wait to fill up with gas again once I got to Ohio. Gas in New York hovered around $3.35 while in Ohio we were paying $3.08. With the snow pelting the roads and the snow plows lumbering along, I kept filling up whenever I stopped, in case I got caught in a snow traffic jam.
Earl texted me again around 2 a.m.
Still driving I told him, when I called.
At 4:50 a.m., I stopped at a rest stop in Ohio, about 70 miles north of Columbus and rested for 20 minutes. Then I drove the rest of the way home. I arrived at 6:30 a.m., 23 hours after I left. The car is coated with dirty snow and salt. The inside of the car is littered with blankets and sleeping bags and bottles of water.
I put on my plaid, flannel pjs and climbed into bed just as the sun began to rise, reflecting again off the bright snow.

Snow Dreams

I lay in bed in the dark on Wednesday morning when Earl kissed me goodbye and drove into the frigid morning air. He returned at 3:15 a.m. Thursday morning to find me back in bed. He had driven for nearly 21 hours to Grace's college to fetch her home for Christmas.
Grace hugged me and scooped up the cats. The younger cat just looked confused. He doesn't have a very long memory and can't recall that another person lives in this house.

"That's too long of a drive for one day," I murmured as Earl climbed in bed.
"I know. I can still see snow flying at the windshield," he said.
We had searched the weather forecast, trying to find a day when the snow would be minimal. The entire week was supposed to be full of snow. The road to Grace's college follows the Great Lakes, which is always dumping "lake effect" snow on the highways and cities nearby. In Syracuse, they already had 42 inches of snow last week.
"Almost a white out in Syracuse but at least we're to Syracuse," was the message I received Wednesday evening at 7:05.
My entire day was a series of text message updates from Earl as he traveled there then Grace as they traveled home.
"In Pa." came the message at 9:40 a.m.
"NY" arrived next at 10:21 a.m.
"Roads clear but NY has plows parked and running in the medians," Earl texted at one point. He was impressed with the way they handle snow.
Grace's texts talked about a boy then about the drive.
I suggested they stop and get a hotel.
"Dad says it's not going to happen. We both feel fine. You've got a nighttime newspaper editor and a college student who has spent the last week and a half preparing for finals by staying up late and cramming. We're gonna be fine."
And they were fine, just tired, and, obviously, still in bed this morning as the boys stumble off to school.