I canceled the trip we were going to take this month to Wyoming to meet a couple of friends I met on Myspace. I turned down the Grand Tetons, white water rafting and Old Faithful, and the cool things we could have seen along the way. I had overnight arrangements at Myspace friends’ houses along the route. I’m an idiot for not going.
I changed the plan because, quite frankly, the drive. I don’t know if I’m up for it mentally, physically or “vehically”. Mentally, I don’t know if I have the stamina. Physically, my body would turn to stone if I had to sit for the three, more likely four days it took to get there. And the minivan is running on a questionable rebuilt transmission and a 10,000 miles overdue timing belt change. I could mind-over-matter the mental and physical excuses. It’s the questionable vehicle I don’t think I would be able to handle.
One July 4th family reunion/camping trip I decided to take my husband’s Toyota pick up truck with the cap, and call the bed of the truck our tent. If it rained we were not going to get wet and we didn’t have to set up a bunch of tarps. It rained. We were dry. Dry and deaf. When rain comes down in torrents on a metal roof IT IS VERY, VERY LOUD. I hadn’t thought of that.
Skye tried to talk me out of taking the truck. He tried to convince me to take the Accord. He used excuses such as “the truck isn’t reliable”. But I thought he was just being overprotective. Plus, I was pregnant with Vincent. A pregnant woman’s mind is non-negotiable.
July 4th came on a Sunday that year. We only reserved the campsites until the morning of July 4th since everyone had to go to work the next day. That left little James and pregnant me driving ten hours in record high heat in the worst traffic ever in an unreliable truck. It didn’t have AC, and James was covered in a rash. Just across the Pennsylvania border the truck started slowing down and picking up and slowing down and picking up, and I couldn’t maintain speed with the July 4th traffic.
It got so bad I drove on the shoulder through most of Pennsylvania. The heat wave was too much for quite a few people, judging by the unusually high number of broken down cars on the shoulder. I kept my eyes peeled for broken down cars so I had plenty of time to merge into traffic that I could not keep up with. It was a disaster. James was crying because of his heat rash. My heart was racing because I thought we were going to die. I knew I should pull off but I was in a trance. An I-will-make-this-work determined pregnant lady trance.
Finally, as I’m on the Ohio side of Pennsylvania, I pull off the highway and find a hotel that fortunately is across the street from a service station. I feel like crying, out of sheer relief to be off the highway and still alive but I am trying to play it cool because I don’t want to alarm James. This was back when I was determined to be the perfect mother if it killed me. We opened the door to our hotel room and as I’m jiggling the key into the lock James noticed that I was crying. He said, “Are you okay, Mommy?”
“Yes, honey. I’m fine. That lady at the hotel counter was just so nice. She told me where we can get the truck fixed. Isn’t that great? We are so lucky!”
I threw open the door and said: “Let’s jump on the beds!”
I cranked the AC and we jumped on the beds until we were exhausted. I pulled the camping stove out of the truck, some veggie burgers out of the cooler and made dinner. The next morning Skye showed up and took the truck to the service station, came back with parts for a new fuel filter and, in the shade of a tree outside our hotel room door, he fixed the minivan with the tools he brought.
I don’t think he would be able to bail me out if the timing belt broke on the minivan halfway into Nebraska. We will take that trip. But next time we’ll plan it when Superman can get two weeks off and come with us.
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