Dawn did some calculating and shook her head. “She’s probably in her 30s. Teaching at college, earning her masters and Ph.D., that takes time. Plus four years of college before that.”

“Well, sure,” I said, “if you’re a slacker.”

“What, did you finish college in three years?”

Actually, it had taken me five years. And summer school. But that was beside the point. I had taken longer ’cause I wanted to learn more. At least, that’s how I remember it.

Skirting the issue of my beer-addled college experience, I led Dawn inside to begin my wine-addled adult experience. There was an event room where we could have eaten our picnic lunch with wine, but we had already eaten our sandwiches on the side of the road. Rats! Instead, we settled behind the bar in the tasting room and prepared to sip 16 of their award-winning wines. Dawn and I are not wine connoisseurs, but we both enjoyed the wide variety of reds and whites.

A reporter from the Virginia Farm Bureau was on hand filming a segment for Down Home Virginia. She zoomed in for a close-up on Mitzi while she poured a glass of wine for me. At that moment, Mitzi’s son, Noah, tugged at his mother’s pant leg and said, “Mommy, I need to go poo poo.” It was all caught on tape, but I have a feeling the Farm Bureau will use something else for their segment.

“Hey,” Mitzi said, “I told you earlier this was a family operation. You don’t get much more ‘family’ than that!”

The next leg of my journey picked up where I had left off, in Ashland. I walked 7.5 miles with Tom Hipple up the road. Although the endpoint of our walk, Doswell, is home to Kings Dominion, we didn’t stop to play and ride. We simply logged our miles. Thanks, Tom. You’re a good sport. Maybe next time we can stop and play somewhere.

From Doswell, I walked up to Carmel Church, this time accompanied by Dawn West (not the “other Dawn”). Unlike Tom, Dawn won’t let me walk anywhere without stopping to play, so we popped in for a visit at Mount Olympus Farm.

We chatted for a while with the farm owners, Ken and Mary West, a couple of transplants from West Virginia. The main crops on the 40-acre farm are strawberries and tomatoes, but they also have perennials and other plants in their greenhouse and will grow anything that strikes their fancy. “We like to do the unusual,” Mary said, “whether it be the produce or the plants. Most of our customers know that if they want something odd, they can come to us.”