Million Little Pieces

It all started with a mouse.

A dead smelly mouse.

That's what prompted us to tear apart our walk-in closet.

The good news is that we found the offending deceased mouse and disposed of it.

Now that has lead to a deep cleaning of said smelly closet.

Upon this sidetracked adventure I decided to open my trunk.

It was a high school graduation present.

It's mostly full of my childhood things that were special to me.

There's a few other odd and end things that have made their way in there too.

I came across a small paper bag full of post cards.

Most of them were ones that I bought over the years.

A few of them, however, were from my dad and step mom.

Six post cards that lead to my heart melting into a million pieces.

My dad and Marilyn drove tandem for a while and they loved it.

I remembered getting these cards in the mail.

And the tears just flowed...

(Actually, the tears started on Thanksgiving and finding these sent me over the edge.

That's OK it's a good cry. I know it's temporary.)

Typically Papa and Marilyn were on the road for several weeks at a time.

Crisscrossing this great country of ours.

That thought wasn't lost on them.

They knew they were seeing many things most people don't get to see.

They loved seeing the different parts of the county.

Royals Stadium.

My dad was a Royals and Chiefs fan.

As a youth he spent many summers in Kansas City with his aunt.

He and I often commiserated on who had the worst team in baseball: Cubs or Royals.

Many years it was a toss up.

It was quite ironic that the Royals won the World Series the year he was killed.

Then the Cubs won the following year.

They loved sharing where they were.

Their job took them all over the place.

Six postcards. Six states.

Montana, Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas, Kansas, California.

Post cards.. before the days of email and cell phones.

They told of the weather. One even mentions 7 tornadoes!

They told what they were hauling (I almost always asked).

They hauled everything you can imagine.

One load was candy and another load was 3,500 sweet heart cups.

They hauled everything from ultra fancy toilets to stuffed animals to filter parts to food.

It was always fun to find out what they were hauling.