Monday - August 1, 2011 -  We were off. The hangovers were only a slight annoyance on the beautiful Monday morning in Milton, DE. Amidst competing sets of directions, which oddly enough had us going on all the same roads, in all the same directions, we made our way to our first destination: scrapple & egg breakfast sandwiches. And although I love scrapple, I opted for the less adventurous ham & egg. The traffic was light but I knew we would be tested in just a few hours after crossing the Chesapeake Bay Bridge into Annapolis, then into the crucible of the DC beltway at lunchtime.

All in all I would say Dave and Jim did commendable jobs of driving in the maddening traffic, although I will say my knuckles were white for most of the trip into and around DC. After lunch I took over for Dave and was glad to finally get behind the wheel of Rupert.  Yes, we named our Honda Pilot "Rupert."   Hopping on to Route 66 (not the famous, but still useful) we eventually met up with Route 81, which was going to be our home for a few hundred miles over the next two days. For any of you who have traveled along Rt 81 you will remember what a busy trucking route that is. The day was our longest so far, and the opposite of the cake-walk that we had leaving Philly the day before and hopping down to Milton. When we finally pulled in to Roanoke, VA that evening we were all pretty frazzled. Our original plan was to make it to Wytheville, VA, but needed to break for reasons I'm about to explain. The rental truck, although being a honking beast, didn't quite have the get up and go to handle the hills of southern Virginia. Jim had struggled with it for many miles on the ups and downs. Not being able to climb a hill above 45 mph was nerve-wracking. Dave and I had been speeding along at 70 most of the trip and hadn't known Jim's predicament. Consulting with each other over the phone we decided to cut the day short and stop outside Roanoke, which we felt was a good enough distance for the day.

Dinner, drinks, and a swim (for me), and we all seemed to be 'settled' for the night. We did, however, have a brain-twisting session of 'how do we avoid all these hills tomorrow!?'  That's easier said than done, especially considering where we are. The straightest shot for us had the route continuing down 81 to Chattanooga, TN, then on to Tuscaloosa, MS. Another day of fighting with hilly ups and downs wasn't in the cards for Jim though, and we agonized over adding a few more hours to our overall trip by diverting instead to Atlanta, then on to New Orleans from there. In the end it all worked out, and we settled on the Atlanta – NOLA route. I'm glad we did.

Sunday - July 31, 2011 -  It's been a tense couple of days, but we are finally on the road... to a new home, and a new life.

That's not to say we are leaving the 'life' we had behind us, but rather, a new something that neither of us know's what exactly is in store.

In talking with many of you over the past few months this is something that most people envy.  But let me caution all of you:  it's not something to be taken lightly.  

We left the comfortable apartment on 9th Street today with a sense of relief.  That relief was born of a very stressful year long process of "YAY, we're moving."  Well, that sense of excitement creeps up on you and turns into a foreboding sense of dread very quickly when things start going wrong.  We've had our share of hurdles, roadblocks and pitfalls in the past six months, but now we are finally on the move.  And I can't thank our close friends enough for all the support, encouragement, and strength they have given us.

I have to give special thanks to our friends Will Maus, Dave Malen, Matt Lauts & Tim Pepper, who all helped in the loading and packing of the truck... and without whose help I'm sure we would have been at least two days behind schedule. 

Tonight we are at Bruce & Kate's in lower, slower Delaware, tomorrow it's on to Tuscaloosa, MS.  

Good food and good wine are always in abundance at Brakewynde; tonight we got to see not only B&K, but their friends  Rob & Angela and their kids Jasper & Cora.  

Hopefully we won't kill each other in the car tomorrow (who, US?  Really?)  And  that doesn't even begin to address the amount of patience our friend Jim Coffin has for us both on this trip.  We owe him an eternal debt of gratitude for helping us on this adventure (Jim is driving our truck from Philly to NOLA).  Jim, it's only the first day, but you have already proven invaluable to us in all this.  

More to come.

 It was a simple plan:  get married.

A lot of people do it.  Most of our friends have done it.  Some of my siblings have done it multiple times.  It's a 'cornerstone' of our society, something so simple yet vitally important to so many.  Well, perhaps it's not all that simple.  And it's definitely not that simple when you are us.  Having to wait until it was actually LEGAL to do so kind of put a damper on the act for many, many years.

So in the spring of this year when California began allowing same sex marriages we thought, 'Hmmmmm.'  (Massachusetts had allowed for marriages to that point, but you had to be a resident of the state to do so.  That has recently changed.)

The threat of it all being overturned this November still hangs over our heads but at least for now we're 'equal not separate.'

But WAIT!  There's more!