1991

Mom and Dad Visit

Mom and Dad on our deck overlooking Lake Audubon

In July Mom and Dad visited. They had left Florida on June 20th in their motor home and had spent ten days traveling the Blue Ridge Parkway stopping along the way at various state parks and campgrounds. Spending time and traveling in the mountains in the summer to escape the heat of Florida was one of their favorite vacations. I have many fond memories of family summer vacations in the mountains.  After ten days in the mountains, they left the parkway in Virginia heading east to the Bull Run Park campground in Northern Virginia, only a few miles from our home in Reston. 

Me, Mom and Dad in front of their motor home

After checking into the campground midday on Monday, Mom and Dad had dinner in their motor home and settled in for the night.  I took Tuesday off and drove out to see them arriving around eleven in the morning where they showed me their camper and then we drove to a nearby Pizza Hut where we had lunch. After lunch we visited the nearby Manassas National Battlefield Park where two Civil War battles were fought at Bull Run.  I’m not much of a Civil War buff and had not been to the Manassas Park before, so I found it quite interesting to learn more about the battles fought there.  We first stopped at the visitor’s center where there is a large map of the battles which we examined. Dad also seemed to be somewhat interested, after all he was in World War II, his father in World War I, and his grandfather in the Civil War, yeah, that would be my great grandfather.  Mom, on the other hand, feigned interest and patiently waited until Dad and I had seen enough.  Upon leaving the visitors center we took a short walk to The Stone House which was used as a Confederate hospital during the battles.  We left the park and arrived at our house midafternoon. Mom and Dad were quite impressed with the place and the view overlooking Lake Audubon.  Living in Florida where all the houses are Ranch style on one level, Mom didn’t like all the going up and down the stairs of our three-level townhouse.

I was a bit apprehensive about how Julie and Mom would get along.  Julie had a number of years ago told me she didn’t think Mom accepted her or liked her and at first, I tried not to accept it but in time I had to acknowledge it was true.  Mom never thought Julie was “good enough” for me, she always wanted me to marry a nice Christian girl from the church, and Julie with a daughter just didn’t fit that mold.  Since then, Julie seldom accompanied me to family events. Tonight and I had planned to make dinner, I would grill salmon while Julie would make asparagus and a carrot casserole and a toss salad. While Julie and I prepared dinner, Mom and Dad talked to Anne who was home from college for the summer. Anne accepted Mom and Dad well enough, a third set of grandparents after her mother’s and father’s.  Mom wrote about Anne in her journal, “Anne was there and we got to talk to her. She just finished her 2nd year of college. She’ll be 20 her next birthday in December. Very nice young lady.”  Anne was another one of those awkward things for Mom that she just didn’t handle very well, a step-granddaughter who she hardly knew at all. I just let be what it would be, Anne was old enough to have whatever level, or not, of relationship with my mother she so chooses, and Mom, well I wasn’t going to change how she felt.   

After dinner we all went for a walk on one of the many paved pathways that run throughout Reston. From our front door we took the path leading down to the east end of Lake Audubon where the dam is, allowing us to look back across the lake. From there we continued across the dam, over a ridge on the opposite side where the path led downwards to a creek in a ravine which the path then ran parallel to for some distance. This was one of Julie’s favorite paths to run on, a quiet place in nature, along side a stream, large sheltering trees overhead shading the path making it a few degrees cooler on a summer day.  We continued a short distance downstream to the overlook at the beaver pond.  Quite picturesque, a beaver dam at one end, a beaver home mound in the middle of the pond, beaver chewed tree stumps around the edge, then to make it more perfect, we see the beavers, to larger ones and one smaller following them.  With the evening setting we headed back to the house, crossing the Lake Audubon dam just as sun was setting alighting the sky across the far end of the lake in brilliant hues of red, yellow and gold.  Yes, Reston is a beautiful place to live.

We returned back to the house and Anne excused herself and went to her room.  Mom, Dad, Julie and I sat in the living room and talked until nine o’clock when Julie said goodnight and went to bed. Mom, Dad and I continued talking for another hour, it was good to see them and catch up on what they had been doing, which apparently was quite a lot since they retired. I got Mom and Dad set up in the guestroom and I retired to bed.

The following morning I took Mom and Dad to the nearby Safeway store where they bought some groceries while Julie went out jogging. After shopping we picked up Julie and we then drove Mom and Dad back to the campground and was back home before noon.   On Thursday I left work early and drove out to see Mom and Dad getting there around just before five missing worst of the rush hour traffic.  We sat around in their motor home and talked while Mom made dinner. After dinner we talked until around eight when, after goodbyes and lots of hugs, I left.

On the drive home I reflected about the visit and felt good about it.  Life was good, it was nice to share how we lived with Mom and Dad… and it went pretty well with Julie and Mom. 

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