You Can Go Home Again

I "go home" two or three times every year, back east where I grew up, to see my Dad, my sister and her family, and a small number of friends whom I still keep in some sort of touch with. This time we brought a car load - with Linda and me, the son, and the daughter and son in law, as well as their (thankfully) small dog, Lilly, a pug who is short on most mental skills but who possesses that "strangely cute" appearance that can win people over.

Two sets of pictures from the trip: First, from an hour spent walking up the main drag in downtown Ellicott City, Maryland. This town proves that in an age of dying shopping malls and vacant big boxes, the 1800's business model for retail sales can work here and there. Of course, Ellicott City has carved out an antique-y, arts-n-crafts, sorta upscale, funky, quasi-Appalachian niche that seems to serve it well.

Every time we go through there, which is a lot as it is between my Dad's and my sister's, the place is jumping. Even late at night.

One thing that is intriguing to this midwestern, flatlander transplat is the topography of the place. The road reaches up through a low point and the buildings fronting the road tend to have hills rising behind them. In some, you can walk in the front on the first floor, and out the back on the third floor. It lends a lot of character to the place. Hostorically, Ellicott City is the terminus of the first passenger train, out of Baltimore. And the site of the old National Road that is now Route 40 when you can still find it.

Second group of photos - Lilly got to meet her, um, I have no idea what her relation would be - her owner is Bella's owner's niece. Anyway, it was puggle meets pug (and Boston...and, through a glass door, ferret being ferret-sat).

We all got home safely and, while sad that the visit is over, it's always kind of nice that after I got to go visit "back home", we got to return to the home we have made back in the flatlands of northwest Ohio.