The Cheerful Depletion of the $600

There’s nothing like going to Boston and spending the night by the ocean to deplete funds, I can tell you.  I will also confess to drinking numerous cups of coffee and trying every kind of food in Boston as I squished around through the puddles: falafel, Italian pastries, asparagus salad and baked crab, and a chocolate cupcake. Currently my balance says $355.04, and I have two more nights to go.  But I’ve never had so much fun spending money.

About Connecticut, all I have to say is that I don’t know why no one told me it is the most beautiful state in the Union.  Even their travel plazas look like sun rooms.  I started off the day (after exiting the city of New York, successful traffic this time) with a $2.29 cup of coffee from the travel plaza and $2.29/gallon gas in my tank.

I then stopped in Stratford, Connecticut for a $1.50 cup of exceptionally cute coffee with breakfast, and a quick peek at the ocean.

The only thing I have to say about it’s capital, Hartford, is that apparently my mom and her sisters must have designed it. Looking at the pleasantly varied heights of the sky scrapers and the dome capitol building, I can almost hear them talking. “Move that dome over just a little and put the blue dome out front.   Switch that pointy skyscraper to the other side. There, much better.”  Hartford’s skyline is just perfect, so if it wasn’t my mom and aunts, it must have been someone just as artistic.

I forgot to check where Yale University is, and then I was flying through Connecticut when I saw that it was coming up.  I sacrificed driving through Rhode Island for it, and pulled in to investigate. And really, I don’t know when I’ve seen anything as beautiful as the Yale Campus. And guess what they have that I have? A dogwood tree, just like the one outside my porch.

Going to Boston is a little like going to your grandparents. There’s elegance and propriety and excellence and age and beautiful flowers and every imaginable kind of food pressed upon you.  You feel like you should be more quiet than usual, around all the bronze statues of famous people and the beautiful brick buildings and the sculptures and beds of tulips. Yet, like a grandparent, Boston also loves children and the ducklings of “Make Way for the Ducklings” have become an icon of the city.  Even they have been immortalized in bronze.

I had heard that Bostonians are rude, but that wasn’t my experience. Maybe it’s because the first person I met in Boston was a girl just my age who grew up on the same gravel road I did.  She welcomed me to the restaurant where she’s worked for ten years, made sure I got the best care, and refused to let me pay for my asparagus salad, baked crabs, Diet Coke, coffee, and two delightfully tiny lemon cookies.  She gave me tips for seeing the city, helped find a garage for my car, and suggested I take the train to see Harvard because it was across the river.

I bought a $2.09 cup of coffee at a Capital One cafe, which I had heard was the latest rage, and got some cash from my electronic pocket with my Capital One card. By then it was raining so I had to set my coffee on a gravestone to re-arrange my map and umbrella.

By the time I walked around the historic trail and took in the beautiful park and boarded the subway to Harvard University, just to see it, my shoes were positively soaked.  But I don’t think I’ve had such an interesting day in years. As I was trying to switch from the red line to the green line on the way back, a man walked up.

“Need help?”

I suppose I looked tattered and worn by then, with my sopping shoes.

“I’m trying to go here,” I said, pointing to the map.

“Kenmore?” he said, without the “r”.  “Go down the stairs, then up, and take any train except E.  No E.”

So that was my experience of the rude people in Boston.

I was exhausted but as I drove into Maine, I began to thank God for helping me find a place for the night, since I was listening to an audio book that encouraged praising God ahead of time. It was freezing, but I parked by an inn I had seen in the coupon books my friend Jeanie recommended, and the man agreed to give me a room for that price.

I had seen and heard the ocean in the dark, and (I thought) I asked him if there was a room with an ocean view, knowing it would cost more, and he said no, but it’s a nice room.  I took my luggage up the steps (no elevator) and down the tiny hall and opened the door with the real key.  The room was small and I settled my things and then saw there was another door, which I peeked out of.  Puzzled, I peered through the darkness from the balcony to what looked very much like the ocean.  I then went to the small window in my room, and looked out it, and without doubt, it was the ocean.
This morning, when I woke up from my exhausted slumber, I woke up to the sound of the waves rolling on to the shore.  I looked out my window and what a view!  Everything I was hoping to see in Maine was right outside my window. I’ve never awakened to the sound of ocean waves before. What a delightful gift from God, and what a trick to have the clerk tell me it wasn’t a room with an ocean view.