I am pretty sure I just had the longest day of my life… or at least one of them. I woke up so happy… so excited… why??? Because we get to go and pick up brent… well… I left the house around 10 thinking that it would take about an hour and that maybe he would even call me while on my way to say he was able to be picked up…. That we would go and have the best day… go to the beach… out to lunch and just enjoy the day…
… it did not happen quite like that…
at first… when I had already arrived in Oceanside and had not heard from him I drove around downtown… nothing really caught my eye… so we didn’t stop there.. instead I decided to drive about five miles back the direction I had just come from to a swap meet… it sounded like fun… like a small adventure that would keep jones and I busy until he called… and it was… I loved being there… I did not expect what it was… it was almost a little mexico… I loved that I was able to speak spanish with many of the people there… it reminded me of the mexican market that we would go to whenever people came to visit in guaymas… but without the weird smells and the meat market part… yuck… I was very happy that part was left out of this swap meet… jones played with some toys that were for sale… but I was never convinced enough to buy any… we found some yummy fruit… one woman was so nice and gave jones and I samples… we both loved it and bought some to take with us... then… a woman was selling books for a dollar… I found “the secret life of bees” which I just watched the movie and was so excited to find, so that I can now read it… such a good/sad/true story… so, that was fun, but the swap meet wasn’t very big and didn’t occupy us for too long…
next… I decided to drive around, see what else we could find… and realized that we were hungry… I thought it would be fun to go to mcdondas playground… so we found a mcdonalds.. but sad thing was… no playground… I don’t think jones cared… he had just as much fun eating chicken nuggets, laughing at himself “dipping” them in ketsup, and smearing it all over the window that we sat by… so sorry mcdonalds... so sorry
after our hunger was satisfied, I remembered that we passed a thrift store… and thought it would be fun to see if we could find anything… so we went, but unfortunately by this point it was getting close to nap time for jones… so the thrift store hunt didn’t last very long… we looked a few children’s books for jones, did not have any luck on finding a good garment bag… (I want one like this for temple visits)… and so we left… empty handed…
then… I thought maybe if we start driving to camp Pendleton, brent will call… well before I knew it, I was in camp Pendleton… accidently passed the “border guard” without stopping and was freaking out because I had no idea where I was supposed to go, where I was, or where I should not even be… this is when I became very frustrated… stopped at another mcdonalds for a bathroom break… and did not know what to do next… by this time it was 2:13 pm… I had been “hanging out” since 11 am… I was getting tired… so I decided that I would just start driving… the base is huge and I don’t even know how much of it I drove… not much at all… but somehow I ended up leaving the base and was back at my thrift store about an hour after my freak out at mcdonalds #2… so 3:15ish… I parked I the parking lot and just waited… don’t even ask me how I got so lucky to have a wonderful child like jones that was so happy while all this was going on… I have no idea… we just chilled in the car and watched baby einstien… I was getting more frustrated for a few reasons… I had already booked a hotel room for us… and it turned out to be in san diego… priceline… that is all need to say… awesome deal, but they pick the location and they are nonrefundable…. So I had to decide… was I going to just forget about it and go back to my aunts… 38 miles away… or go to the hotel myself…. 46 miles away… I didn’t know what to do… I told myself that I would give it another hour…
so… 4:05 came and I decided to start driving… I was going to go the hotel… my stuborness would not let me pay for something unless I was going to enjoy it at least partially! So I began to drive and literally right when I had to decide for sure I5 north or I5 south, brent texted me and told me that he was free…
Almost… I will leave the story at that… because it is already really really long… but I want to describe my feelings… I honestly felt like he, brent, was a figment of my imagination… that he did not exist… a perfect person that I was just not being allowed to see nor talk with… I hated these excrutiating moments
august 22nd 2009 (written in the car while waiting on base to finally pick brent up for his off base leave)
