There’s a statement I’d never though I’d make. But it’s true — when I went back home a few weeks ago to see my parents off on their RV journey (I’ve twittered and podcasted about this, so you’ve probably heard: my retired parents sold our house in St. Louis and bought an RV to travel the country), I started up a blogspot blog for them, and much to my amazement, my mom has been pretty faithfully posting news about their travels to it. I feel a little bad — I stacked the deck early on so they’d have some comments, but I have no idea what traffic has been like since then. Blogs, as you know if you’ve ever actually started one, begin much more like a locomotive than a Lamborghini: it takes a while for them to get up to speed, if they ever really do. But I’ve talked to my mom and she says she enjoys it. I know she’s had a writing bug for a long time (I used to find snippets of fiction around the house near our typewriter when I was a kid), so maybe the act of chronicling their trip will bring that out in her.

Plus, we get to read about all the fun stuff they’re doing — they’ve already wandered a good fourth of the United States and met all kinds of people on the way. They have always had the itch to travel, though. When I was a kid, I probably traveled more than all of my classmates put together, but while they were vacationing in resorts and flying off to New York, I was riding the blue highways in my parents’ van with my family. We took trips (these are all separate trips, taken on a spring break or during a summer week) to Maine, California, Colorado, Washington State, Washington, DC, Florida, Florida, Texas, Mexico, South Dakota, Nevada, and anywhere else on the map my Dad thought it might be interesting to see. When I got a little older (say 16 or 17), our trips started petering out — all of us kids started having social lives and schedules, and it was not quite as easy to get us all in a van and go (not that it ever was). But now, ten or so years later, my parents find themselves back on the road, this time to stay.

Every time I tell someone about it, they have a kind of shocked non-response (“Really?!”) and then fall into a sort of “your parents are crazy” mode (“Well I’m sure they’re enjoying it!”). They don’t really have to tell me — my parents are crazy (especially my Dad), and that’s why we love them so much. But then they ask what we, my brother and sister and I, think. Are we OK with not really having a home to go home to? Are we fine with our parents showing up on our doorstep with a giant RV whenever they feel like it, or our parents inviting us out to someplace we’ve never been for a Christmas or Thanksgiving dinner?

I know I speak for myself, and Daniel, and Melissa, when I say: of course we’re fine with it. Our parents have done nothing but support us for the largest part of our lives. When we were down, out, lost and/or broke, they were there to help. They’re our parents. And this is their dream — for years, they’ve talked about doing just this, and now, after all of the planning and scheming, they’ve done it. How can we not support them completely?

And I’m happy that I get to read about it on the blog. If you haven’t a second, head over there, and, since they’re new to blogging, give them a nice welcome.