Rambles from the "ville

Last night was Jake's last cross-country meet. He decided last spring to give it a try and spent the summer running to get in shape for it. He's not the fastest person but put in decent enough times to be proud of - last night's was 22:10, for 5K. It was one of the hilliest courses but the weather was beautiful - finally a day in the low 80s.

It had been 6 years and slightly less than a month since I had been at that school to see a race run. Alix did cross-country all the way through middle school and there was a meet there on September 13th, 2001. I can remember it like it was yesterday. That same brilliant blue sky as the 11th's. The sky was completely clear, not a cloud, not a contrail, not a plane. This school, South Dearborn, sits right below one of the flight paths into the Cincinnati airport. That day, long ago, there were no planes flying anywhere in the US. They were all grounded. Kent was in NYC, hoping to get out soon. And everywhere flags flew in defiance to the hurt that had come our way two days before.

Eventually Kent got out of NYC. In fact he was the captain on the first Delta jet to leave the city. We have pictures he took from the cockpit as they flew out. It took several more days for him to get home. When they landed in Atlanta their jet which was suppose to come back to CVG went somewhere else and they had to wait for another one. He was a really welcome sight to see when he finally got out of his truck.

Last night our teams did real well. It was a sectional so there were 12 schools there. The Varsity boys came in first, the Varsity girls came in 2nd and the JV boys came in first. (The JVs won't go on to regionals so Jake is done.)