The Daily Junket

There are a couple of definitions for “Junket”.

One is a dish of flavored curds of milk. The other is an extravagant trip or celebration. I like this juxtaposition of thoughts. Obviously, both are referring to different things, but isn’t that part of a complete perspective of life? Sometimes there is a little sour milk and sometimes there is a little fun? They can’t be separated. We’ve all heard the phrase that when going on a trip, “getting there is half the fun.” I suggest that there is no difference between the “getting there” and the arrival. It’s all part of the trip.

Recently, Tate had a tennis match in a town about 45 miles away from our home. The whole family attended and afterwards everyone was hungry. A hungry family can become a grumpy family in a nano-second. Sour milk. So, Molli suggested a place from a recent read in the travel section of the newspaper. Another 20 miles later, we found ourselves at an old general store from the Civil War era. The Camp Verde General Store (http://www.campverdegeneralstore.com) kept us occupied for a couple of hours, plus provided a great lunch. I loved the old post office boxes still in the front section of the store.

From there we unexpectedly headed to Comfort, Texas and meandered through a few vintage stores, where I picked up an old Brownie Target Six-16 camera and some colored glass. We even met Dave Ballard, a shop owner in Comfort, who was a team member on the Apollo space missions.

All along the way, I was snapping photos and posting them on my Instagram page. I eventually got a comment from a friend asking if we were on some kind of field trip. My reply was, “It’s turned into one.” And that’s the way it should be. A constant field trip. One that is full of adventure, history, and things we value. In particular, the time spent together.

I didn’t give the full definition of junket at the beginning of this post. I left out an adjective. This word is how I would define my family’s day of unexpected junketing.

Sweet.