Recollections of summer trips: A wish list
- Mike Dewey: Life Lines
- June 22, 2024
- 644
It was more a wish list than a set of demands; nonetheless, like most hopes in life, reality had a way of making it seem selfish.
I suppose it could be chalked up to typical adolescent me-firstism, the sort of temporary oldest-child developmental stage that produced a number of unappealing character traits, the sort of arrogant behavior that led my mother to call me “wretched flea.”
She got the name from a book she had read in her childhood and, once it had surfaced from the depths of her memory, it stuck.
I don’t remember the precise transgression that triggered her animosity, but that’s only because they were legion. It might have been the time that Mom, needing to go to the grocery store to pick up something for supper, left the three of us alone one afternoon.
“I’ll be right back,” she said, looking me in the eye. “Be good.”
Naturally, I took that as a challenge and immediately instructed my siblings to pick hiding spots – under a bed, in a closet, whatever they liked – and stay there, quietly, until Mom walked in the door.
Well, I’m sure you’ve already imagined what happened next.
Frantic, panicked and running from room to room calling our names, getting more worried each time she came up empty, Mom was in a state I’d never seen before – in a word, she was terrified.
Eventually, I emerged from the basement and called a halt to the whole thing, bringing my sister and brother back safe and sound, and when Mom washed my mouth out with soap – Ivory, I believe it was – she didn’t know whether to be relieved or furious.
We had a rather complicated relationship, you could say, but in the final analysis, we shared enough common ground to get along fine.
Once, she was driving me to baseball practice and we passed a tumble-down motel on the edge of town with a sign that read:
Air Conditioned
Carpeted Phones
We got the biggest kick out of those four non-punctuated words, sharing quips about what one might look like and how it worked.
Speaking of hotels and their amenities, that brings us back to the wish list I mentioned at the outset of this essay. In our family, summer vacations were something both highly anticipated and furtively dreaded, owing to the vast array of unknowns and unavoidable missteps that could be counted on to create kinks.
My father planned those trips with the precision of military operations, working on those itineraries all winter up in his den, secreted in his special space, the FM radio tuned to the classical music station, his mind working to create the perfect blend of fun and history, always seeking the balance that was his trademark.
“Everything in moderation” was his mantra and it served him well.
Thus, for every trip to Fenway Park, there’d be a day spent at the Ralph Waldo Emerson home. An afternoon game at Wrigley Field would be followed by side trips to the Adler Planetarium and the Shedd Aquarium. A journey to the top of the Gateway Arch would be abutted by a ballgame at Busch Stadium. This was how he did it.
Of course, he was dealing with major American cities, places he’d never driven before, in the height of the tourist season, in a station wagon with his worried wife – “This looks like a bad neighborhood … kids, roll up the windows” – and three preternaturally curious children, all of whom were getting hungry.
I honestly do not know how he did it, summer after summer, covering thousands of miles, doing every bit of the driving himself, dealing with detours and construction zones, crazy traffic patterns and countless missed exits, all the while exhibiting not the least trace of irritation, anxiety or anything other than placid equanimity.
And then, that moment of arrival at that night’s destination, a Holiday Inn or the occasional Sheraton, a chance for all of us to exhale and trundle into the elevator, heading for our cozy room.
This is where I deployed my wish list. To me, the finest hotels featured the following four luxuries: air conditioning, a pop machine, a color TV and a swimming pool. In the beginning, I’d also included room service, but that was impractical for a family of five, so we’d venture into the unknown, seeking sustenance.
Air conditioning was unknown to us as was color television, even as friends and family relations boasted both. We had never known that kind of comfort, not in the house, the school or the church.
And name-brand beverages? Forget it. No Mountain Dew, Cherokee Red or Orange Crush for us, not when a packet of Kool-Aid or a can of frozen lemonade concentrate cost mere pennies.
As far as swimming pools, the college had an indoor facility which we could use in the fall and winter, and there was also a municipal one in the park, a place where we spent many, many summer days.
When all four came up, it was like hitting the vacation jackpot.
I look back on those family trips now with a mixture of gratitude and nostalgia, knowing how lucky I am to have those memories.
Even a wretched flea knows the proper way to say, “Thank you.”
Mike Dewey can be reached at Carolinamiked@aol.com or at 1317 Troy Road, Ashland, OH 44805. He invites you to find him on Facebook, where every missed exit leads to a nice place to stay.