It’s A Small World After All        (Saved from Summer 2012)

            Our last trip to Key West was to get some items we needed at a couple of stores, Franklins and Aldi’s.  The 46 miles there was a lot closer than over a 100 some miles to Miami to find some sort of modern civilization that offered the items we wanted.  We also went to the Museum to see Robert the Doll, but I digress.

We were leaving Aldi’s and Jim started yawning.  Everyone in the Keys is friendly and laid back.   A guy just going in the store saw Jim yawning and made a comment about the weather being so hot and that made people sleepy.  I mentioned that we were from Ohio and we were having trouble adjusting to the “hot’.   He asked where we were from and we told him a little town named Ada, Ohio between Lima and Findlay.  He asked Jim if he had ever heard of Bucyrus.  Well that started it, old home week.  Jim told him he was born there and they started trading information.  His name was Ron Rupe.  We learned that Jim had worked with his dad at the local lumber company during his summer employment and that Ron had graduating with Jim’s brothers.  He invited us to come back and give him a call and we could all go out to eat.  Of course we didn’t but meeting him was one reminder of what a small world it really is and it all started with a yawn and an offhand comment.

In that same vein, Jim went to get a few groceries the other day and was gone forever.  When he got home the usual question popped out of my mouth, “Where have you been?”

He told me had been in an accident and of course I freaked out.  Then he started telling his story. He had parked in the lot at Publix and an older gentleman walked around the truck and was looking at our license plate.  “Hancock County?”, he asked Jim.  Jim told him he was right. They started talking and in the midst of the conversation he told Jim that he was from Findlay and that he had graduated from Mt. Blanchard High School, which of course brought up another whole line of conversation when Jim told him of my family’s connection to Mt. Blanchard. He definitely knew Dean Cunningham and told Jim that after he left the bank, the bank just couldn’t be run right and it was bought out.  Sounds good but I am not sure that is the true story.  So once again, over a thousand miles from home, a chance encounter let us know just how small the world is.  We may never meet Ed Snyder again but for one brief moment he brought home close again.