An Overseas Odyssey . . .

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If you've been following these pages recently, you will have gathered that I've just returned home to France after a three week odyssey, travelling in the land of my birth. And quite a long strange trip it was. The camera almost never stopped clicking. Over 4500 photographs came home with me. It is going to take quite some time to sift through them to see if one or two are worth sharing here. When one has been away from a country for going on twenty years, many sights which might have seemed commonplace and not worth a second glance had one never left, now seem fraught with messages and meaning, and worth contemplating.
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I'm not going to comment on the political situation there, other than to say that the little I saw and heard left me feeling bewildered, perplexed, and a little dismayed. Signs of patriotism abound everywhere. Yet what they really signify is less clear. It would seem that some Americans are not as American as others. Some speak of true Americans, leaving one to wonder about what the others are.
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But enough of that. For all its contradictions and extremes, I still found much to appreciate there. The photos that follow are just a tiny taste, hopefully to help whet your appetite for more to come. Enjoy . . .
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This flag flying barn was seen on a back road somewhere in Pennsylvania . . .
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PS Just added this to Tricia's Old Barns theme, as it seemed to be a good fit...
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On a back street in a gritty coal country city in Pennsylvania, another flag painted on a wall . . .
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I was literally overwhelmed by all the dream cars, dream trucks, dream houses I came across. Decay and deterioration seem to be rampant. A feast for a ravenous rust glutton like me. This red Chevrolet left for dead on a side street was a lovely example.

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The reflection in its window is what justifies including this post in James Reflection Weekend series. The houses reflected in the window were abandoned . . .
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Not only houses and trucks, but entire factories had been left to slowly disintegrate. This eleven story high coal breaker was a marvellous site. I spent a couple of hours inside exploring the labyrinth of machinery and passages, remnants of another age, when coal was plentiful here. Before the mines played out. More on this site soon. And I found it thanks to Tom B. who is passionate about such places, as his excellent website attests.
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Dream houses were in abundance. I was like a kid in a candy store . . . Hardly knew where to look.
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This one is ready to move into . . .
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And for one special reader, I had said I hadn't seen any salt or pepper shakers in any of my pictures, until I noticed this pair peeking out between the sugar dispenser and the vase in a small town diner . . .
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The flight back over the ocean was peaceful, just clouds to gaze at as the sun disappeared on the horizon fading away behind us. Wished the flight could have gone on and on.
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While pondering cloudscapes, I returned to one of those eternal questions found painted on a rusting surface at the abandoned coal breaker site . . . food for thought indeed . . .
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