Kaitlin and Emily do Virginia: 8 March 2009.

So I had been wanting to visit my friend Emily, who goes to Liberty University in Virginia, for a couple of years now. We were talking over Christmas break, and when we discovered that our respective spring breaks coincided perfectly and that I had never been east of western New York, we decided to make a road trip out of it.

I flew out of San Diego early Saturday morning and Emily brought me home to her grandma's house just outside of Richmond. It used to be a schoolhouse, and so it was creaky and wood-floored and adorable.

Emily and I went to church with her aunt and cousin Sunday morning, then drove out to a nearby lake and walked along it that afternoon.

There were lots of beautiful houses along the way.

It was warm and sunny, apparently the warmest day they'd had since the fall.

I was delighted to rediscover that Canada geese exist. I was delighted to rediscover that a lot of things exist—deciduous trees, mallards, chickadees, blue jays, moss, naturally occurring bodies of water. I couldn't believe how much I had forgotten after nine years in southern California.

Emily told me to get as close as possible to them as I could, but they started hissing at me, so I gave up.

Her grandma made us dinner, and Emily and I snuggled in the delightful layers of soft sheets in the bed in the guest room and fell asleep with happy thoughts of adventures to come.