This would be their basic everyday routine over the week-long cruise. Unfortunately, George was frustrated with his inability to sexually satisfy Molly or himself during their love-making sessions. As usual, Molly made sure not to show any disappointment, instead making sure that she demonstrated her love, happiness and respect for her husband.
She was becoming increasingly aware, however, that for her, the problem with their marriage was not the physical issue. Rather, it was the lack of anything more normal, more substantial – children, the satisfaction of cooking a wonderful meal or growing crops on the land. It was all too shiny, and, if she was honest, too easy.
After the cruise, George and Molly took a direct flight home to the Pittsburg Airport, arriving late Sunday afternoon. The trip back was tiring, so they didn't bother to completely unpack. Instead they drove to their favorite restaurant for a quick dinner, so that they could get to bed early to get as much rest as possible before going back to work on Monday morning. They easily slipped back into their work routines, and ate out most evenings over the next few weeks, with little other activity.
Molly still visited Aunt Dolores as often as she could, and George went with her when his work schedule allowed. They tried to encourage her recovery and cheer her up by planning to take her and Jesse on further trips. However, with each visit they noticed that her health was rapidly deteriorating, until two weeks after Easter, she passed away.
As summer approached they asked Jesse if he would like to go on the cruise, even though Aunt Dolores was gone, and perhaps to take Maureen along if she wanted to come with them; but he declined. Able to please themselves entirely, they decided to scrap the cruise in favour of a cross-country train trip to spend a week vacation in Yellowstone Park.
The total time it took for the train-trip to the park was approximately six days, with the highlight being the very spectacular scenery they enjoyed passing through Glacier National Park. The bus dropped them off at the famous Lake Yellowstone Hotel, where they had reservations for four nights. This venerable hotel, which was built in 1891, had very comfortable, spacious, rustic, rooms, which were beautifully decorated. Moreover, it had a huge, beautiful dining room and several cafes and bars. On the morning after their fourth night at the Lake Yellowstone Hotel, they transferred to the even more famous Old Faithful Inn, a sprawling hotel which was built in 1903 near to the Old Faithful geyser. The scenery was unbelievably spectacular, and they felt quite fortunate to have been able to visit this most spectacular and vast national park.
They arrived home full of stories and memories. Jesse drove them to one of his favorite restaurants which featured "down-home cookin’”, and both Jesse and Maureen were rapt as they listened to George and Molly describe their vacation, especially as neither of them had ever ridden on a train, let alone spent several nights on one.
‘It was wonderful,’ said Molly enthusiastically. ‘You should definitely try it.’
She saw Maureen cast a glance in her direction, then her sister said, ‘I need to freshen up. Molly, keep me company?’
In the bathroom, Maureen asked her sister, in a low, sympathetic voice: ‘What’s going on with you? Did you not enjoy your vacation?’
‘Of course I did!’ said Molly, stunned. ‘Did you not hear everything we were just saying? It was wonderful! You should definitely try it.’
‘There!’ cried Maureen triumphantly. ‘That’s about the fourth time you’ve said that, like you didn’t really think it was wonderful at all.’
Molly applied her lipstick, not quite sure what to say.
‘I think there are only so many wonderful adventures you can have in one lifetime, Maureen,’ she said with a sigh, ‘before they all become a little … empty.’
Maureen didn’t reply, but simply rubbed her sister’s back in great sympathy.
With a sinking heart, Molly noticed that it was exactly the same thing she had done to Maureen when Angus died.
As the couple struggled with their marriage, and began to noticeably drift apart, they looked for ways to recover the carefree happiness they had enjoyed during the first seven years together. They took pains to plan a very special honeymoon vacation for the start of their ninth year of marriage. Their decision was to take the romantic river cruise in Europe that they had been promising themselves for years, cruising to London on the Big U, catching a ferry across the English Channel to Amsterdam, taking an exciting train ride to Amsterdam and a Rhine River cruise back to Amsterdam; and then a ferry toward the white cliffs of Dover, back to London, where they boarded the Big U for the cruise back to New York.
Both George and Molly agreed that it was an amazing, enjoyable, and jam-packed vacation, highlighted by visiting parts of Europe that had been war-torn and ravaged - like Cologne Cathedral and the bridges along the Rhine.