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03/17/2006
Travel blog
Note: This post was typed on my Palm Tungsten C on 3/9/06, but was trapped inside the device by an errant password and my aversion to re-typing.
Seventeen years ago last Thursday, I sat, sweaty palms and dry mouth, just a few feet from where I sit now. Across the table sat the lovely, gracious and talented woman who would one day become my wife. I think she was as nervous as I. As I recall, we both had sandwiches. It was our first date.
I'm in the finest dining establishment in beautiful, historic downtown Mount Vernon, OH. In a few minutes, I'll finish my Ham Stacker and vegetable beef soup and stroll the sidewalks of memory lane. I'll pass the accounting firm where Wonderful Wife worked when we married, the menswear shop where we rented the tuxes for the wedding, the jeweler where we bought our rings (someday I'll upgrade that diamond dust), the bank where we first opened a joint account, the florist where we bought the flowers for the wedding.
It's later now. My tour of downtown revealed that the menswear shop is now Sips, a coffee shop with a kickin' espresso. The jeweler is still there, as are the accounting firm and the bank. Many of the other shops have converted into antique stores. The theater is closed down, replaced by a multi-plex on the outskirts of town, right next to my hotel, in fact.
I stopped in Sips, in part to inquire as to the past history and confirm my suspicion that it once sold men's clothing, in part to get a cup of something warm (hence the afforementioned kickin' espresso). One of the things I like about Mt. Vernon is that every restaurant, every coffee shop can be a meeting place for the town's leadership. On a simliar trip years ago, I enjoyed my scrambled eggs and bacon while eavesdropping on some of the town's elders at the large table nearby. This night, there was a group of church leaders discussing outreach strategy.
People complain about Mount Vernon's remoteness. For me, that's part of the charm. Give me a stable, insular society any day.
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