Evening came and I pulled out of the campground around 8:pm. It really amazes me now that if only I had just stayed the night I would have eventually fallen asleep and actually got some rest, instead I was working on an ever-increasing sleep deficit. I was just a kid and I wanted more, I wanted to see more and although my focus was more on the trip itself at this point, deep down inside, I knew that I was going to see my father within a few days and that had this great invisible pull on me.
He had left in September of 1980, now nearly four years ago. We had periodic phone calls once every few months and this generally left me trying to extract more meaning from words by replaying these conversations back in my head over and over again. I do remember though, there was nothing like the feeling of being around him.
When I think about the different times I had with him I always had to span years of visits. It has been a choppy timeline. The idea of having him in my everyday life was so foreign because, with a small exception of 3 months at the end of 1974, I did not have him in my everyday life since the spring of 1973. Even then, he worked two jobs and I barely saw him. From 73 through 74, he would take my sisters Brooke and Amy and me from 1 PM till 7 PM on Sundays. We always did things that required no money at all for the most part. He would take us to post-fishing derby bonfires where entire families cooked fish on long sticks and played summer games outside. He took us to fish hatcheries and we talked all day. There was a motor cross set up at New Departure Hyatt, a giant factory in Bristol Connecticut that my Grandfather and my cousin worked at. It featured a parking lot so big that you could probably land a commuter jet there.
My Dad brought a social light everywhere he went. You could have the most boring people assembled, trying to socialize using awkward small talk, but have my Father in the picture, and that visit became so warm and exciting, creating a memory to never be forgotten. This was an anomaly with him because, inside he was somewhat tortured. He drank to be more social, and that worked. The flip side was it could go too far. I recall one of those visits on Sunday, he stayed at our house outside socializing and had too much. My Mom and a friend drove him and his twenty-dollar 64 Chevelle home. A little while later, I saw the Chevelle coming back down Lillian Road, but with the police right behind him. I think it was experiences like being 8 years old and watching your Dad being cuffed and taken away that forced you to let no chaos stumble you, at least on the outside. You want to know why the world can burn around me, with meteors falling from the sky and I act like it’s an everyday occurrence? It was forged right there on Lillian Road in 1974, for the sake of me and especially the sake of my father’s image in my mind.
My 18-year-old limited palate and I found a McDonald’s that had a girl with the same accent as my friend Denise at Toys R Us where I had worked this past year. This was a time in my existence when I could still over notice everything out loud. Later in life, everything, no matter how insignificant will get noticed and used to navigate stealthily in a dangerous world.
From Mcdonalds, I stopped at a Phillips 66 filling station. I was filling the Dodge when this young guy ran outside and commented on my Lone Star Beer shirt. It was a t-shirt Dad had mailed to me back in 1981 for the 8th Annual Port Aransas Barroom Bicycle Race. This was a race on bicycles in which enrollees would pedal from one bar (and there are so many) on the island to the next, stop, down a plastic cup of beer, and then pedal onto the next one. If this did not provide a profile of where I decided to start my life as an adult, nothing else does!
The guy said “I love Texas! I”M going there soon!” and he went on and on. That boy just loved Texas and in a way, he made me look forward even more to what lie ahead for me. The truth was that this was no ordinary journey. On a normal journey, you return to where you came from. But this time was to begin an all-new life at the other end. And even better, I was taking the trip in stride on the way there. My enthusiastic new friend, he was headed to Lackland to start his career with the Air Force.
On the highway again, I began to see the signs for Columbus. I began to debate whether or not I should go through Columbus or bypass it as I had with the city of Cleveland. Once again I chose the easy way by bypassing the city. I scorned myself. All of America’s great cities and I bypass them. I told myself, no more. The next one I drive right into. Next would be Indianapolis.
Ohio was very nice. And excitement grew as I headed for the next midwestern state. I was happy now to be able to cover all this new ground. The sunset on the western Ohio terrain was a mirror reflection of the one that I had watched rise on the northeastern terrain this morning. Darkness and the highway. Route I-70 West. Now I was moving definitely west. “Till you learn to laugh you’ll never come to any parties at my house…And if go on like this the only house you’re gonna visit is the nuthouse. Oh! You’re such a misery, why don’t you learn to laugh….” Ray Davies of the Kinks shouted from my tape deck.
I drove across the Indiana border and then continued till I hit Indianapolis. This time I did not turn the steering wheel either way. Straight on this time. Indianapolis at 1:am looked pristine, modern and clean, and beautiful I loved it! And I left Indianapolis feeling very good. Headed this time for the great gateway to the west, St. Louis, Missouri. But first I had to go through Illinois. Not too hard.
The lack of sleep was wearing hard on me. Fortunately, I had the good sense to stop around 3 AM in Greenup Illinois, and get a motel room. I cannot remember if they told me that this meant that I only had till 11 AM in the room due to the weird arrival time, but that was what I was going by. I was so exhausted since my last real sleep had been in Alfred NY nearly 2 days ago. I never thought to ask for a wake-up call.