On the road to Gotham

Well, we made it back from our trip last night and I failed to keep updating as we went along. I’ll pick up the story where I left off.

We celebrated the 4^th of July by driving to the Monroeville Mall to see fireworks in the parking lot. If it sounds strange, it kind of was. It was a great idea because there is a lot of open space, plenty of parking, and lots of ways to leave after the show is over. Still it was a weird spot to watch fireworks. I am used to a big open field or a baseball stadium. Ultimately, it was probably the most appropriate way to celebrate the birth of our nation—a nation now inextricably wedded to mass consumerism. I watched fireworks come up between Don Pablo’s Mexican restaurant and K-Mart surrounded by cars in a parking lot for a big mall. The only thing lacking was fireworks with corporate logos to remind us that our great capitalistic experiment was founded on liberty and justice for all corporate persons. After our national rite of intensification, we returned to Irwin where the kids shot off their own fireworks.

Somehow that felt closer to what I think we are all about, but that is just me. When I was a kid the 4^th of July started when my dad got up early, lit off a pack of firecrackers, and blasted John Phillips Sousa The Stars and Stripes Forever. We grilled various meats, had a family target practice with our gun collection, and ended the night with our own fireworks. I can remember as a kid my dad even shooting a muzzle loader he had as part of the celebration. The 4^th of July always was really a celebration of our country’s founding ideals. Would you expect anything less from my dad who, during most of my childhood, expected a popular revolution to happen (we actually had packs hanging near our door for a while, ready for the revolution)? We are both still waiting for it.

After celebrating another year of corporate freedom, the next day we all loaded into the minivan and went to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh. It is a great museum with lots of cool dinosaurs, gems and minerals, and a nice Ancient Egypt display. I was a little disappointed to discover that I really wasn’t that interested in the Egyptian stuff…yawn. What really got my attention was the architecture hall where they had casts of all sorts of architectural bits from the Ancient World. I now understand why someone would get all caught up in cathedrals, gates, and statues in Europe. That was cool stuff and old. And I think I deal with old, cool stuff? The art museum was right next door and had a nice exhibit on Impressionists. They may be passé to most, but the Impressionists are by far my favorites.

I left the Carnegie comforted to know that great private museums can still thrive (in this age where people don’t want to spend money to support the arts and cultural centers) even if those great private museums were funded on the backs of exploited workers during the early days of industrial growth—thank you Mr. Carnegie.

We left our friends and Irwin the next day and traveled to central PA to visit my wife’s family. They live near towns with great names like Gallitzin and Nanty Glo. I’ve driven by those towns a hundred times and wondered how they got their names. Thanks to the wonders of the internet, now I know. Gallitzin was named after Prince Demetrius Augustine Gallitzin. Deme was a Russian aristocrat cradled in the arms of Catherine the Great who, after traveling as part of his education, rebelled against his family (and their Russian Orthodox Church) by coming to America and becoming a Catholic priest. He founded the nearby town of Loretto and was quite a popular guy. He was called the Apostle of the Alleghenies and has been under investigation for canonization since 2005. Honestly, that story is better than I could have made up. How about that moniker? Someday I want to be known as something…or at least have a bridge named after me.

Nanty Glo has a different story. Its original name was Glendale until the postmaster (not sure how he got to do this) changed the name in 1901. Actually his wife gets credit for coming up with the name, which is from a Welsh phrase (nan ty glo) meaning ravine or brook of coal. Apparently there is a town in Wales of the same name and it is not clear whether the name refers to that Welsh town or to the creek that bisects the PA town. That creek is named Blacklick Creek because in its banks you can see seams of coal. Either way, Nanty Glo is fun to say. Someday I’ll send out post cards from Nanty Glo.

It was a hit-and-run on the family. We blew into town, ate at the finest restaurant in Ebensburg, and spent the night at my sister-in-law’s house. The kids got to play with their beloved cousin and we all got to meet Bernard the giant tabby cat. That cat had a head the size of a grapefruit, really. He took a liking to my sandals and spent a lot of time laying on them, hugging them, and mauling them with his back feet. He is also under suspicion for chewing up an IPhone charger cord. I give Bernard the benefit of the doubt.

 
The next day we drove the rest of the way across PA to Quakertown to see my brother and his family. My kids have not seen his daughters for about 6 or 7 years so both sets of kids were excited. I haven’t seen them in that long either and it was fun to see how they had changed from the little kids who called me Uncle Cranky to adults. It was another hit-and-run visit. We stayed a few hours and then spent the night at the Quakertown Hampton Inn. We only stay at Hampton Inns because some in our traveling party refuse to stay anywhere else. And of course they had a pool so after our free hot breakfast the next morning, the kids and I went to the pool. My kids cannot pass within half a mile of a pool without wanting to go swimming. It is not possible to stay at a hotel with a pool and not spend at least an hour swimming in it. Fortunately for me the hotel had free WiFi, the Tour de France is currently running, and I had installed the NBC Tour app on my daughter’s Ipad. I watched the bike race, sweated like a pig (did you know that pigs don’t actually sweat? They wallow.), and timed my kids as they competed against one another in swimming a length of the pool. After a quick stop at Dunkin Donuts (which are everywhere up there), where we ate at least two of everything on the menu, we headed on the next leg of our trip—on to Gotham.