New Jersey

Well this is a State Linda and I have only been in a few times

We mostly drive out of this state after visiting New York City

It seems we always buy gas at the first rest stop and look back at the City Skyscrapers

We have however, driven to Atlantic City and walked on the boardwalk and

Actually visited Trump's Casino

I remember the Boardwalk as busy with a lot of people and the ocean of course

We did not win anything in the casino but did not gamble very much, maybe $20

The drive into the casino was through an old town with run down appearing houses

The first time I remember New Jersey was going to Fort Dix to

Welcome Linda's family back from Europe

We had small children at the time and we went to eat before going back to Michigan

We also got a speeding ticket just outside of Fort Dix

We have driven I-80 into New York and I-78 out of New York

We have also driven I-295 south to Newark

We once drove to Philadelphia from Havre de Grace, Maryland

Through Delaware and New Jersey

Where we bought Linda a small black and white TV as I was entering OCS

It was night and the traffic was heavy and

The streets crowded but did not matter as we were very young

This is another of those drives with what seems to be endless

Tall apartment buildings, tenements if you will

You see them and wonder what all the people who live there do

But don't remember ever stopping to find out

I seem to remember at least in part on the way to Fort Dix, green farming country

The poverty near Atlantic City was strikingly obvious also

This isn't a state that would be high on our personal list to revisit but

It also isn't all that low either

If there is such a thing for us, and I wonder if there is, well blasé would be the impression

Hum drum, so so, nothing special or even not special

I know this isn't especially fair but it is how I remember New Jersey

John