Ahead of Schedule

We are not expecting this moment quite yet.

We have joked about it as we shivered out of our garage at dawn Tuesday.

“It’s inevitable,” Marlo said.

 I agreed. “Most likely in Chinandega in about three weeks.”

Behind us in our minivan were two suitcases and two carry-ons for each of us, stuffed with meager wardrobes and 137 copies of On Mended Wings.

Maxed-out luggage and “mule” service are familiar territory for us because Nicaragua postal service is not reliable. (On a 2008 trip, our church’s service-and-learning team transported $16,000 in audio visual equipment in our allotted luggage.)

Wednesday, Marlo and I made our first hotel stop in Lexington, Kentucky. Our hotel heater was under-powered. We shivered through a game of gin, robbed the adjacent bed of its blankets, and finally warmed up at 2 a.m.

The next day, West Virginia was 20 degrees and windy. We asked a visitor-center hostess “Is this weather typical for a West Virginia January?”

She grimaced and nodded.

During our Raleigh visit, our son called a repairman. His heat pump was running non-stop, and not keeping up.

We sighed as we read Iowans’ Facebook posts about wearing shorts and hanging laundry in stocking feet.

This morning we are skirting the Atlantic Coast south toward Miami on US 95.

We stop at a Wendy’s near Jacksonville for soup and salad.  I gather plastic ware, straws, and napkins and then choose a sunny south window. Marlo follows with the food tray.

He chows chili, I munch salad—and then it happens.

His upper lip starts to sweat, then his forehead.

He looks at me and—way ahead of scheduled—utters the inevitable sentence.

“You know,” he says.  “I am really too hot.”