Stories From the Road (10 years later)...

Our next insane story comes from the wonderful time we had while driving from Chicago to the town of Rapid City, South Dakota - in one night! That's right folks, 1,008 miles in one night! We left early in the afternoon, and started out after seeing my cousin Stephen and his wonderful wife. We stopped by and got to go into Wrigley Field, (that is a story unto itself!), and then headed out for the road. Now when we first decided to do this trip, we had decided that we would only take back roads, and avoid the major routes, but realized that if we tried doing that in the Middle of NoWhere USA, we would be screwed big time waiting for some help to arrive. So, reluctantly, we decided to drive on the major roads. So in this insane amount of driving we did this one evening, we took major roads. I-55 to I-80, to I-35, to I-90. it was insane, but really fun. Then we hit the border for South Dakota, and found the thickest fog I have ever seen in my life. Literally, we couldn't see 10 feet in front of the truck. I wound us slowing down to about 25 MPH, hazard lights on and all, hugging the guideline on the side of the road just to make sure I was still going straight. Then we got passed by a tractor trailer. Who was doing 85. In fog that could actually be described as "Pea Soup". So I did the most logical thing I could do... follow at a safe distance, and set the cruise control and ride his wake. That is how I know he was doing 86. I was doing it right behind him. I was at a safe distance, I could see his lights clearly, and was merely looking at the ground for the stains of the animals he may have destroyed along the way. I found that to be true about most of the midwest states, especially the ones that had loose speed limit rules. We finally got into Rapid City around 4AM, and slept in the entrance to the Badlands in the truck. We got up early, right at sunrise, and drove the rest of the way to Mount Rushmore. We got there about an hour after sunrise, so instead of the typical white color of the monument, we have amazing pictures of it with a yellow color to it. The sky was was the perfect sky, no clouds at all, and the color of it was so perfectly blue, that when I had some of the pictures blown up, they couldn't replicate the color at all. I finally had my father in law enlarge it a few years later, when the wife and I had just started dating, and he did it perfectly. Anyway, we had a great time there, and were simply awed by the amazingness of the fact that we were actually there, in South Dakota, looking at Mount Rushmore. After a few hours there, we decided to explore some more. We heard about a statue we had never heard about before, called the Crazy Horse. Everyone knows who the Indian is, but how many people knew there is a monument being built to him that already makes Rushmore seem tiny? The carving of George Washington on Mount Rushmore is 65 feet high, from the bottom to the top of Washington's head. Well, the head of Crazy Horse alone is 95 feet high. When finished, it will be the largest sculpture ever made in human history. What is amazing is that the sculpture is being carved out of the side of a mountain. When all is said and done, it will be over 600 feet high. Now when you see it in person, it is simply amazing. Neither of us had heard of it before, and we both keep tabs on it over the internet. So after the drive of insanity, we got to see two of our country's marvelous wonders. There are other wonders we saw on the trip too. But those are for a later date...

The meaning of life...

I know the past few posts have had funny moments, and I love sharing the stories of my road trip, but I have to put that on hold for this post. The guy I went on the road trip with, Chris, has been my best friend for almost 20 years. We have had our ups and downs, but through it all, we are ALWAYS there for each other. He was my friend support when my Grandparents started dying off, and I was his when his Grandparents started doing the same. But now I have to step up yet again, for reasons we all fear, and never want to have to go through... his mom is extremely ill. She has cancer, which for the moment she seems to have beaten. But the fight against the cancer has left her in a very beaten up shell of her former self. Her mind is still there, but her body is losing the fight. The fact that her mind is still there is a miracle in itself, as she had a stroke about two weeks ago, but recovered completely from it. I have known her forever, and to see her this way is scary. I have some funny memories of being at her house, spending time with her and Chris, spending time with their family, her cringing at the stories of our road trip, and all the times I have ever been with her or his family. But walking into that room, I am embarrassed to admit I didn't recognize her at all. But I made sure that she didn't know it. I went in and gave her a kiss, and made sure that she knew i was there to be a rock for her, just like I would expect Chris to do for my mom if she was in the same situation. It took her family a second to recognize me, but when they did, they were thrilled I was there. We never addressed the issue of why she was there, we never admitted that she was close to dying. We never admitted that this might be the last time I get to see her. Instead, we talked about my kids. We talked about the fact that she remembered Jackson's name during her stroke recovery, clear as a bell. I shared some stories of the boys growing up. I showed off some pictures of the boys, which they all adored (of course... lol). We all shared stories of Chris and my trip. We were all amazed that it was 10 years ago that we took the trip. But overall, it was the simple fact that we got her mind off the pain and problems, even just for a few minutes. This difference was the best thing I could do for her. I got a text from Chris later in the day thanking me for making his mom smile. In all the pain and issues she had that day, she also had a smile. And that smile made her day that much better! I was glad to make the bad things go away for even just a brief moment, and I knew she would enjoy the time I was there. If only it was visiting her at her house instead of a hospital... I can only imagine how hard it is on Chris. He saw his mom, his rock of support for his whole life so far, right after she had suffered a stroke. He saw the fear in her eyes as she was unable to talk or move her body like she wanted to. He was in the house with the Medic crew right behind him. He was there when she was unable to do anything. That image, of her panicked look, the fear in her eyes, still haunts him, even though she has recovered completely. I can only imagine how scared he must have been. But he is being strong for her, and won't let her see him cry. his girlfriend is amazing during all this, giving him the supportive shoulder he needs when he isn't near his mom. She is his shoulder to cry on. Thank God for her being there. I would be scared if he didn't have her through all this. Now it is my turn to try to help him as best I can. Hope I do it well...

Stories From the Road (10 years later) - Syracuse

I am gonna skip around on our trip here to tell you about the night we stayed in Syracuse with my cousins Stan and Jimmy. Now, they were my great aunt's kids, and a little bit older than us, but it turned out we had a great night. The day started off on a good note, arriving about 2 hours before the Syracuse football game against BYU. My cousins already had their tickets, but had none to spare. They Suggested we go buy some scalped tickets along the way. (I know, illegal, but we did get quite adept at finding great tickets for good prices that were being scalped!) So we walked to the Carrier Dome, and along the way (only 30 mins from kick off) and bought our tickets at a ridiculously low cost. The guy just wanted to dump the tickets, and didn't really care how much he got for them at this point. Well, it turns out , we got tickets that were a whole lot better than my cousins tickets, and for a hell of a lot cheaper! SO we sat through most of the game, until the third quarter. BYU was getting blown out (at this point they were down by like 25 points or something) so I called one of my cousins and we all agreed to go to a bar that was along the walk back to his house. Well, we had a few drinks at the game, had quite a bit more at the bar. We both had a lot of drinks in us, since neither of us were driving. Turns out it made for an interesting night. So we all walked into the bar, and we all started drinking. Well, Chris decides he wants to play some pool, and finds this amazing gorgeous blond who wants to challenge him to a few games. So they play a game, (she REALLY sucked at pool btw) and he kicks her ass while attempting to lose on purpose to her. So since she lost, she heads down the the end of the table to rack the balls. Of course the shirt she has on is VERY low cut, and Chris being a lot tipsy, comments on "Such a Gorgeous Rack)! Well, unbeknown-st to us, she was there with her boyfriend, who she had ditched to play pool with Chris about 30 mins ago. We found this out when he finally found her, and told her to quit the game and come with him right then. Chris decided to tell him to screw off, and threw a few colorful words at him, telling him that she would be done when he was "done playing with her". Both my cousins looked right away at me, and we all thought there was gonna be some fists flying. We all put down our beers, and got ready for the first punch to be thrown by this guy. I knew Chris would never throw first, no matter how drunk he was. We had both been raised the same way. Never start a fight, but don't hesitate to finish one if someone is dumb enough to start one with us. So We sat and waited , but the guy turned bright red and fled the room. So we all toasted him being a total pansy, and drank more. The woman decided to stay with us, and had a few beers with Chris while they played a few more games. About an hour after he first came in to yell at his girlfriend, the guy came back. This time he was more commanding, yelling at her to 'Knock this shit off and let's go!" So Chris again told him to put up or shut up. "C'mon Ralph Mouth... put your money where your mouth is. $100 dollars says I kick your ass in this game and I am down 3 balls right now! You beat me, and she and I are done playing tonight." This time my cousins and I all put down our beers and stood up bracing for the inevitable punch that this guy was gonna throw... that never came. He left the room flustered again, and we wound up closing out the bar while Chris played pool with woman until about 1AM. So when they sent us on our way, we went back to Jimmy's house. Stan and I were pretty much toasted at this point, and were drinking water and soda at this point, but Jimmy and Chris decided they were gonna drink a bottle of Jose' Cuervo. But they had no lemons, and no salt either. So they did straight shots of Jose' until about 4AM, when they killed the bottle. Stan had gone to bed at this point, and I went out to the car to get our stuff to bring inside. While I was outside, Jimmy decided he had enough and had gone to bed. Chris didn't know that. So he shows up outside, at 4AM mind you, with the last two shots in his hands, yelling "WHERE'S JIMMY??? WHERE'S MY JIMMY?? HE NEEDS TO FINISH THIS JOSE' WITH ME!!" I finally convince him to shut up, laughing my ass off, and that it was ok if he had the last two shots. He polished them off, and I helped him find his room. I was pretty much sobered up at this point, but I knew Chris was super slammed, and I wanted to make sure he went to bed. So I sat on the floor next to his bed until he fell asleep.

The next morning I woke up about 9AM, and was the first one up. I started getting breakfast ready, when Stan and Jimmy came down from their rooms. Chris didn't wake up until around noon. He looked like shit, was bright red in the face, and didn't feel so great. He had gotten sick during the night, but he was still in bad shape. We suggested he drink some water to help himself some. He did, but threw that up too! He decided to go back to bed, and woke up the second time after 8PM. Two football games later he woke back up! We all razzed him incessantly that night, and had a great time laughing at the memory of him yelling for Jimmy at 4AM. Ironically, I still to this day tease him about it, and he has stories that he teases me about too! I will share them another day, as this was a VERY long post!