Day Three St. Louis to Springfield, OK

  I must introduce you to Helen and George. They are the friends of my parents (and now me!) who put us up for the night. And put up with us for the night! They are fun and lovely. And they were kind enough to store my camping equipment for me for the rest of the trip once I came to my senses and realized that there is no way I will be camping in the desert in 100 degree heat. So the probability of bear attacks just went down about 47 percent. I might still taunt or otherwise upset a bear, but it won't be from inside a tent.

  Mom and I said a tearful goodbye. Well, not tearful, but it was a little sad. So mom did a dance in the driveway to cheer me up. I'm going to miss that little grasping-impaired lady!

  Even though it was my first day solo, that didn't stop me from going off route almost immediately. But I had to to get to the LAURA INGALLS WILDER HOME!! And you know I was not going to miss that!

I got to see Laura's travel desk – complete with fake (I assume) $100 bill peeking out of it!

I got to see Pa's fiddle, too.

Which was a little breathtaking. 

Not Lincoln's desk breathtaking, but pretty cool.

 

I did not take a picture of Laura's writing desk in her house because I wasn't allowed to take photos in the house. But during the tour, I was the first person to go into her little writing area. So despite the admonition from the tour guide not to touch anything, I discreetly touched the desk as I walked by. Because I wasn't NOT going to touch the desk.* The woman behind me hissed, "I saw that! I should report you!" and then proceeded to BLATANTLY touch the desk. And then we both giggled, because rules are for other people.

*And yes, if I had six foot long arms I would have touched Lincoln's desk too! I know these are artifacts, but I touched the underside of the writing surface of Laura's desk. Like I was hiding my gum there. (Before you even ask, I did NOT hide my gum there.) I would have touched Lincoln's gum spot too. Not the shiny top where people can see. I can see that this justification is getting out of hand. I'll just stop here. 

I drove up the road a little ways to visit the stone house that Rose Wilder Lane bought for her parents. 

It is just beautiful! And I learned that it was a Sears Roebuck house, which I found fascinating. It has always been a dream of mine to go into a Sears Roebuck house and now I have! See kids, dreams can come true!

I also visited the Wilders' graves. There was a little girl there who was leaving as I got there. She reminded me of me at age 10. She was obviously on a family vacation and her little brothers had had just about enough of this cemetery crap and her lovely, patient parents didn't want to rush her, but they needed to get going.  Right before she left she took a letter out of her pocket and weighed it down with a rock and put it on the base of the gravestone. (You can almost see it between the orange flower and whatever the hell that green thing is on the left.) Once she left, I so desperately wanted to read the letter to see what she wanted to say to Laura. But I didn't. It is enough to know that there are still little girls out there who are so in love with books that they leave letters for dead writers. 

And now, my lunch. Isn't it pretty? I made it from healthy foods from my cooler!

So unlike me.

 This is the hatch of my car. It is practically a gourmet restaurant on wheels.

  Speaking of food... I ate at Steak and Shake for dinner. It was good, but I don't get the fuss. Maybe there is no fuss. Maybe I have been imagining the fuss.But it looked cool, anyway.

After I ate, I was looking for someplace nice to just go and read my book for awhile. There was a young mom waiting for her fella to get back to the car with dinner and she had twins who looked about 3 and a baby definitely under two in the back seat. 

I asked her if she knew anyplace pretty to go and sit. 

She looked at me funny, so I went on. "You know how when you are driving in the afternoon and all the kids fall asleep in their car seats at the same time? Where would you go to enjoy that for a few minutes?"

She broke into a huge smile and gave me directions to a pretty park with a fountain. 

We chatted about kids for a few minutes and I went on my way.

I am glad I made a rule that I have to talk to a stranger a day on this trip!

And finally, here is the Airbnb where I stayed the night. It was the top floor of an adorable bungalow in Springfield. I was a little nervous because I had never stayed in an Airbnb before. But my friend Danielle is a host and she is wonderful! (Come to Beverly and stay at Danielle's) So I just pretended that I was going to stay with Danielle and it worked out fine. You can check out some other photos on their page. But those ones don't have the added bonus of me taking the picture reflected in the mirror. 

And you thought you'd get out of this blog post selfie-free! HA!