YEAR THREE: Bland County, Virginia

It's been a hectic month, this one. We moved, I had multiple medical appointments with non-lethal bad news. I've been feeling crappy from all the immunizations and pills I'm taking. And then Tappuz bit my arm and it got infected.

Meanwhile, Joe has been preparing bar and bat mitzvahs, and trying to put our new house in order. While I dealt with the agent and the mortgage people, he did most of the packing, and now the unpacking.

Still, I'm behind on my goal of visiting a different county every month. I visited Blair County, Pennsylvania earlier this month, but that was scheduled for March. This week didn't seem a good time to go, especially since we are leaving next week for a few days with my sister Robin in Greenbelt, Maryland and our friends Ellen and Spencer in Virginia Beach.

Of course, it's never a good time to do anything, so I left yesterday for Bland County, Virginia. Wikipedia says it is the sixth least populated county in Virginia, but the man at the tourist center on I-77 says it is the second least populated.

Bland is located between two east-west mountain ranges (like the Santa Monicas) just south of the southern end of West Virginia. I-77 bisects the county. There are tunnels under the two mountains at the north and south end of the county. The tourist guy said Bland residents were able to vote on whether to blast through the mountains or tunnel, and they voted to tunnel. Good choice.

There are four historic places on the National Register in Bland County. Two are farms, one is an obsolete bridge and one a church. There are no traffic lights, one small grocery store, a Subway, a Dairy Queen with a truck stop-convenience store, and a gas station in downtown Bland with a convenience store and a few tables. They make sandwiches for lunch there. There is one motel. Both the motel and gas station have signs that say "American Owned and Operated."

Bland County is overwhelmingly white and Christian, conservative, overweight and elderly. The Bland County Messenger today (Wednesday, June 24th) complained in an editorial "In a climate of shifting genders, fluid ethnicities and the relentless redefinition of traditional norms, it seems that Americans are becoming increasingly confused about the nature of truth and the long-term consequences arising from a lack of clarity." I've been thinking about how to start an answer to that, but I may just drop it.

I don't mean to be negative about my trip. I've been overtired and managed to get some rest. The scenery and weather were beautiful with only a few drops of rain and some thunder and lightning Tuesday night.

I chatted up two different librarians, people who worked at the motel, and two people at different times at the Virginia Welcome Center. They were all helpful, kind and interesting.

The Appalachian Trail runs through the center of Bland County. I had trouble locating it. I was looking for signs, but it turns out there are none. The young man at the Welcome Center suggested a piece of the trail for me to hike and gave me a map to help find it. It turns out that "Hiker" is pejorative here for "smelly outsiders."

I met a young man named "J.C." from Plant City, Florida, on the trail this afternoon. He told me he is hiking the entire trail, and hopes to be in Maine by the end of September. There are pines, maples and other trees I don't recognize, and like the forests in Del Norte County, California, ferns and rhododendron.

I'll be home for dinner tomorrow (Thursday). Joe tells me the cat has been hiding. Meanwhile, there is still unpacking to be done, a bar mitzvah this weekend, a likely Supreme Court decision on same-gender marriage tomorrow or Friday, a turntable that needs to be fixed (in WestVirginiaspeak it "needs fixed") and we are leaving again Wednesday.

I have a new camera that arrived yesterday. The pics should be better next trip.