I think I am finally ready to talk about it.  I have given myself 4 days to mull it over and now I think perhaps I can tell the story without crying…or screaming…or throwing up.

I am talking about the recent  trip to Philadelphia.  It didn’t go exactly as planned.  There are some things I can’t talk about.  Primarily because my daughter is now living at home and she reads my blog.  Other things are just too painful, but these are the things that happened that fall within the pre-ordained limits of my blogging ability.  It started on the Thursday before we were supposed to be leaving. We were planning to drive to Flippin to pick up my brother-in-law’s Tahoe to drive on the trip.  My Audi TT just wouldn’t hold 3 people and my daughter had decided to take a friend with her.   Her car (which would hold 3 people) didn’t have a trailer hitch and even if it had we didn’t think it would pull a trailer cross-country.  In order to leave earlier, I had gone straight from bed to the shower.  This meant I didn’t have my coffee when my husband told me that the Tahoe was a no-go.  It seems that the transmission had gone out on it.  Now while I was grateful that it had happened before we left, this meant we were without a vehicle the day before we were supposed to leave.  We checked to see if we could put a trailer hitch on my mom’s car and we could have for about $250.  We checked on rental vehicles and they were reasonable daily rates, but unfortunately the mileage was going to kill us.  Enterprise had an unlimited mileage deal, but it was only good for the four surrounding states.  I was perfectly willing to lie about where we were headed, but the honest (sometimes too honest) man I married blurted on “Philadelphia” without even batting an eye.  You could almost hear the “cha-ching” of the cash register.

As if all of this wasn’t enough my daughter was having a panic attack, and while usually I can calm her down…there was no calming this time.   Every solution I came up with was wrong, and so finally I just took my now throbbing head to bed.  Sometime during my nap she knocked on the door to tell me that a friend of hers was willing to let us use his Tahoe.  I didn’t even have to think about it.  “Super!  Call him and say yes and thanks!”  With my head still throbbing I got up to pack.  I told the girls that we needed to leave by noon.  I really didn’t want to drive into Indianapolis just in time to check out and hit the road again.  I didn’t really  believe we would be out of town by noon, but I was hoping for some where around two.  It was nearly five o’clock in the evening before we left.  The truck and my daughter were both at the house by noon.  I was pleased, until we went to pick up the trailer and realized the air conditioner didn’t work.  I stopped at a place next door to the U-haul rental place and asked them to check the air conditioning.  Two hours and $100 later we had temporary A/C.  When I arrived home, my daughter informed me that she couldn’t find her friend.  She had called with no answer and she had gone by her house and she was at a total loss.  Finally, she arrived at five with little explanation other than that she had fallen asleep at her boyfriend’s house because she had partied a little too hard the night before.  Needless to say she slept all the way to Effingham, Illinois because that is as far as we could get that night.  About two hours away from Effingham the passenger’s front seat broke.  This caused some irritation on my daughter’s part so I decided that I would have it looked at the next day. Then a sudden storm began to shake the trailer like you wouldn’t believe so I called my hubby to see what the weather was like.  If we traveled on, we would be in the eye of the storm for the enxt two hours.  That settled it…we were spending the night in Effingham.  The next day we were up by noon because that was when check out was.  We went to the local Wal-Mart to see if they could fix the seat.  They couldn’t, but they knew who could.  Off we went…with panic ensuing.  The panic was due largely to the fact that the fellow at the repair shop couldn’t fix the seat without taking it out.  The fix would take at least two hours.  The tension level increased greatly.  I was in a pickle.  I didn’t want to listen to any more complaining about the seat, but I also didn’t want to hear any more angst about arriving in Philly too late.  We fixed the seat.  Two hours and $40 later we were on the road again.

It rained off and on all day long.  I drove almost all of the way into Philadelphia, but after we stopped for dinner my daughter took the wheel.  About an hour into her turn the windshield wipers stopped.  As long as the rain was light it was fine…the rain wasn’t light a lot.  I made the mistake of asking her if she had turned them on and was scalded by her acidic tone.  It looked like the wipers were going to need fixing too.  Yea!  We rolled in to Philadelphia at about 7:30 a.m.  I went to bed and the girl’s went into the city.  Two days later I saw them again.  It was the best part of the trip.  Two days in a hotel room alone!  At the end of the second day we went in to the city to get cheese steaks.  While I enjoy visiting different places, I also enjoy air conditioning.  Almost all of the buildings in Philadelphia have no air conditioning, which if you remember from the start of this blog is so important to me that I had it put in a stranger’s car just so I didn’t have to drive sweaty.  The girls left after eating to go to a concert.  I went back to the hotel.  I told them to be sure to be back because we had to leave by noon the next day.   The zombie creatures I awoke the next morning slightly resembled the girls I had brought with me, so I put them in the truck and we took off. 

On our way home we began to notice a sound.  I had hoped it was the chains from the trailer dragging the road, but it sounded more like a fan belt with an intent to break.  I clinched my butt cheeks and kept driving.  Then the rain started again…but miracle of miracles the wipers worked.  I suspected operator error before, but dared not mention it.  And if my daughter reads this…I only suspected it.  I have no evidence and I will never mention it again.  We just kept driving.  On the second day, night actually, I surrendered the wheel again.  I made it through St. Louis and told my daughter that home was pretty much a straight shot.  The Garmin was set for home.  There should be no problems.  I awoke an hour and a half later in Aurora, MO.  Aurora is not on the straight shot I mentioned before, again I suspected operator error but this time I spoke the words.  Have you ever heard the phrase handed your head on a platter?  Well, looking much like John the Baptist in a Caravaggio painting I slunk back in the back seat and shut my mouth.  At about 5 a.m. on Friday we arrived home.

While on this trip my daughter mentioned that it might be for the best if we didn’t travel together.  She’s wise this daughter of mine.  Although I suspect at some point we will, next time we will take a buffer.  Not a friend.  Someone who is the voice of reason…thus agreeing with me (most of the time).  I have never felt so old and unappreciated as I did on this trip.  I saw my daughter and her friend looking at me in the same way I know I have looked at my parents and I felt ashamed.  I have vowed to try and do better.  I only hope I live long enough to see my future grand daughter look at my daughter that way.

 

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