lydamorehouse: (renji has hair)
[personal profile] lydamorehouse
 ...waiting on my car.

Tor did not seem super-confident that he could get to my car right away, so I don't know how long I'm actually going to chose to hang out here. I don't actually need much done on my car.  The a/c stopped working and probably needs a "refresh" or whatever, and then, since I figured the car was in, might as well do the oil change (it's due).  I wouldn't have had Dave's bother with the oil change, except that on Saturday morning my family is packing up and heading off to Valparaiso, Indiana, the armpit of the universe.  

Maybe that last bit is an exaggeration of sorts.  Possibly Valparaiso is only the wart on the nose of the universe or the unruly bit of chin hair of the universe, but it's definitely not my favorite place.  I wouldn't go at all, except that's where the mother-in-law lives.  

What's weird about Valparaiso is that it should be a more interesting town than it is. It's only about an hour from Chicago, Illinois, and is a university town. You know what's wrong with it?  The ONLY bookstore in town is a Barnes & Noble, which seems unreal for a college town. Where's the university's bookstore? (We haven't found it, though I suspect it's somewhere on campus and mostly sells IU paraphernalia and textbooks. Where's the local comic book shop?  Where are the cool  college hangouts? Libraries??  A DECENT COFFEESHOP??? (I did, at least, stumble across that several years ago. It's a queer-friendly place called "Blackbird." I'm sure I wrote about it because I instantly felt at home there because there were people with visible tattoos and piercings and haircuts that looked like mine.)  

To be fair, Valparaiso has a very cute downtown area. There are a few kitschy stores around the capitol building that are sort of fun to window shop in, if you like window shopping.  Last year we spent some time exploring, which was pleasant enough. But, you know, once you've been there, you've DONE that.  They also have a lovely arboretum... which we see EVERY VISIT.

There's one, tiny public library. Tiny.

I think the other  thing that's wrong with Valparaiso is that it's 89.9% white*. This is especially noticeable because to get to Valpo, you have to drive through Gary, Indiana, which is 84.9% African-American*... so it's not like there aren't black people living in Indiana. Grandma just chose to live in the whitest enclave of Indiana (Valpo is whiter than Gary is black.).  

But, the MiL is in her nineties.  She still lives on her own in a big house, and, even though she's Shawn's stepmom (Shawn's dad remarried when Shawn was in college), Margaret the only grandma that Mason knows on Shawn's side of the family.  I'm not sure that any of Shawn's brothers have stayed in touch with Margaret.  Margaret is also Mark's mother. Mark was Shawn's stepbrother--you may remember me writing about his death last year; he left behind a partner, Joe.  We don't always get along with Margaret. She has a tendency to get her news from Fox, if you know what I mean.  But, we make a yearly trip, because: family.

I just wish she lived in a more interesting town.



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*Actual 2010 US Census data, from Wikipedia.
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