Our sweet cabin on the lake in Tahoe City was an oasis of peace and quiet for the two nights we stayed there. Even though warnings of bears were as prevalent as the giant pinecones that fell from the Jeffry pines that towered above us, we didn’t see a single bear (much to my relief). We didn’t take any direct hits from pinecones either.
Our big excitement came when we discovered this fellow trying to break into our car. Just kidding. He was the lovely fellow AAA sent to unlock our car after someone (to be named much later) locked the keys in the car.
The very best part of our time at Tahoe was a chance encounter that began with a conversation about the water in the lake. We stood by a small dam with a sign that explained that while 63 streams flow into Lake Tahoe, only one, the Truckee River, flows out. The lake is 1,644 feet at it’s deepest – almost a third of a mile. As a sign alongside the dam pointed out, all this makes for some very slow transfer of water through the lake: There is still some water in the lake that flowed into it around the time of Marco Polo. I turned to a fellow standing next to me reading the same sign and said, "That amazing. But do you really believe that?" That’s actually Tahoe-speak for “Nice pie.”
And that’s how we met Bob Robinson from Louisiana.
When we told Bob our cross-country adventure was taking us through Louisiana he reached into his pocket and pulled out a gold medallion. “Come to Shreveport,” he said, putting the medallion into my hand.
On one side was a picture of Bob, and on the other, one of his wife JoAnne. It seems that Bob and Jo Anne are King and Queen of their very own Krewe in Shreveport's Mardi Gras celebrations. (Krewes are the individual clubs that sponsor parades and parties during Mardi Gras. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krewe.) “If you can’t make it to Shreveport, you should definitely not miss Jackson, Mississippi," he advised. We immediately began to make plans to make that happen.
Meanwhile, we gave Bob the web site address of this blog and have been rewarded with his wonderful responses, including the one he sent after we posted the blog entitled Courage. that he said we could share with others:
Dear Lora,
Well said. As a conservative, I find it hard to believe there are those who define my positions on politics, business, faith and love as repugnant. As a healthcare professional, I cannot believe that the people we elected to represent us in Congress can't seem to agree on a system that satisfies both sides of the isle. Wait a minute, not that satisfies both sides of the isle, but one that satisfies the American people. When politics became a business rather than an avocation, we the people lost. Keeping your job should be based on coming to agreement, not disagreement.
Your comments about being friendly are also well stated. I remember the first time my wife and I went to Paris, everyone warned us that Parisians were very haughty and unfriendly. Since neither of us spoke French well, we learned a phrase in French that said basically, we did not speak French - did they speak English. Everyone we used the phrase on laughed and said their English was much better than our French. We had one of the most delightful times meeting new people, being invited to their homes and touring all over Paris.
Bob's comments and other comments from friends on both sides of the aisle seem to suggest that the deep divisions between the two sides are in large part caused by many of the political leaders on each side playing to their base by demonizing the other side and refusing to compromise, and by the financial corruption of the system that they rely on to keep their positions of power.
Our impressions of the people we've met on this trip seem to complement this view. Admittedly, the number of our encounters is not particularly large, probably not more than three or four per day, and we try to stay away from politics, religion and "culture war" flash points like abortion, gay rights and gun rights. Nevertheless, even though many of the strangers with whom we have had conversations were certainly from the "other side," and they and we hold some beliefs that the other may consider repugnant and morally wrong, we never thought that these adjectives applied to any of the strangers we met as individuals; each seemed to be a decent and reasonable person. And every one of them gave the appearance of thinking the same of us.
