It was the road to nowhere and every where.
The last place I would officially move. (or at least one of them)
It was also the hottest road in recent memory. A caravan of one car full of 3 cats, 1 guinea pig (yea, he’s still kickin’’), one 8, soon to be nine year old boy and a very, very ready to land little lady, one GMC pickup chock full of two grand parents, one old cat, (my Monet), and a truck full of me, my dogs and 100 plus temperatures for six fun filled days of Subway Sandwiches, bad roadside attractions as well as legendary stops. Wall Drug, Badlands, Mt. Rushmore and of course Exit 364-A. (Thank god for that one, for it had a gas station which allowed my forward progress. I ran into more instances than not that proved to me that god was watching my every move. It was almost uncanny. There are few soul searching experiences that clarify your life like 6 days on the road with nothing but blazing heat, your thoughts and two slobbering dogs to keep you company.
With thoughts of family, new adventures yet to come, and the hot, and I’m not kidding hot air rushing past my 2-55 air conditioning system. (2 windows rolled down 55 mph), of course I could only reach those blistering speeds on a 6% downgrade with a stiff tailwind). We made numerous stops along the way. Within the first two hours of the trip, I had to disperse the cats amongst the cooler cars. The dogs, for better or worse were stuck with me and my Diet Pepsi exploding machine. We traversed the tougher mountain passes, opting for the farmlands of Idaho instead. I personally counted every potato and green onion along the way. You may not believe that possible, but F-you. I did, or at the very least, it felt like I did. It was a LONG trip up until then and we were only into the second day. YIKES.
On one shade break, we got out in some town, stretched our legs and relaxed, well, 4 of us did, the other, an 8 year old, ran off to peek through the fence of the public pool at the local 8 year talent and soon found his shoeless self in the middle of a sandburr lot that would neither permit his passage the rest of the way to fence, or back to the cool grass. He called for me, his pops to come save the day.
Tragically, I was far too busy soakin’ up the shade to be bothered with a screaming 8 year old and he suffered for a good couple of minutes before my "lovely" wife “persuaded” me to go get him. Upon reaching him, I realized that I was a complete ass. And my “lovely” wife was right to brow beat me. The poor kid was not going anywhere without either some excruciating pain, or a helping hand, so I carried the little monkey out of the thorn patch while a cute lifeguard squirted the hot ‘ground’ beneath us with cold water. “Um, hey honey, how about us”? The walking wounded? Nope, no water for us. The gate slammed and that was that, load up the dogs and hit the road with sore itching feet, egg boiling heat and a feeling that the lifeguard had something better to do, which really hurt...
We lit out for what I like to call the “Next Stop”. Might not sound like all that much to you sitting in your LazyBoy, chillin’ like a villain, but for me, the next stop was a place full of magic, surprise and at the very least, a cold Mt. Dew and pisser. My expectations had dipped to a new low while the temperature hit a new high.
When we finally, and I really mean finally, reached Prairie, I was beyond ready to stop. That however would have to wait. Wait until I had the chance to unload the trailer at my 2nd parents house, then haul the rest of the shit to storage. I may have been a bit crabbly at this point in the “adventure”. I remember getting to my storage facility and literally throwing chairs as deeply into the massive chasm as I could see. I think I may have acted like an ass, but that’s between you and me. From there, we set out to find the jobs that would sustain our existence in the Midwest. Little did I know that my trip to the barber on the 2nd day in town would stand as my first and ‘game winning’ interview. Sure, it took some hardball selling, a lot of self doubt with some interviews across the sate mixed in to finally reel ‘em in, but reel ‘em in I did and now I work for a great start up in town that I truly believe will take off like wildfire. I was very happy to be gainfully employed again. We soon bought a house by Dylan’s school. Since then, we’ve been working steadily on the house and the unpacking. Jim, (Kim’s pops) has helped immensely, the only way I have thought to repay his work, time and effort is to join his bowling team and help them go from a contender to 2nd place. (2nd to last that is) That sucks! You might say, or specifically, YOU SUCK!, But look where they would have been without me...thats right, on their couches experiencing ass spread as their dreams of 2nd to last place faded into oblivion.
YOUR WELCOME!
Meanwhile, two weeks before Christmas, Dylan takes the “All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth” song to heart and cracks his bike and his two front and (of course) permanent teeth in half in a harrowing maneuver that all those with a penis have tried.
That is the jump from the higher place to the lower without going over the handle bars and smashing your face on the street. Some of us pull it off... and some of our bike forks snap at the critical moment and send us hurtling toward the pavement face first without the luxury of breaking said hurtle with our hands. This was the case with Dylan. On the upside, he looks like he just won the Stanley Cup by himself!
He goes in for reconstructive dentistry on Monday.
If that’s as bad as it gets here, I’ll take it.
Peace and Merry Christmas to you all.
