End of Summer Musing
As the summer speeds to a close and Labor Day 2024 is upon us, I realize that my blog has been sadly neglected these last couple of months. I’ve been super-busy with various activities, and will try to summarize some highlights here. Timing seems right as I have a few weeks where I am not going anywhere. Sort of the calm before the next storm, so to speak.
Last Activity in June
My son Conrad turned 29 on June 29, a once in a lifetime experience! Maria, Conrad and I celebrated by going to a comedy jam, where we learned that local comedy clubs don’t really have much going for them unless there is a well-known, seasoned, headliner in town, which was not the case on this particular night. To beef up the birthday experience after those so-so performances, we went to a nearby restaurant where we could sit outside and enjoy the beautiful summer evening. It was lovely and delicious, and we followed that up by heading downstairs to the basement grunge bar under the restaurant (which was just cranking up at around 10pm that Saturday night). There we were treated to a very loud (especially so in a small, contained space) rock band who weren’t actually that bad but would have been much more enjoyable had they been performing in an outdoor venue. We enjoyed it as best we could and stayed long enough for me to catch the eye of a man, who dragged me onto the dance floor for one of the numbers (yes, I went voluntarily and actually enjoyed cutting loose for a few minutes! - and yes, I had been drinking a bit by that point…). That was then followed by the man’s lady friend accusing me of being a home-wrecker (honestly, I had no idea she was even there, as we had just arrived). Conrad and I switched places at our table so that I didn’t have to be sitting near him and I pretty much gave him the cold shoulder until he gave up trying to talk to me. What a jerk! Conrad and Maria thought the whole spectacle hilarious, and much funnier than the earlier efforts by the performers at the comedy club.
This experience taught me that if and when I’m ever ready to enter the dating world again (make no mistake, this is not something I spend time thinking about, ever), I will not begin my quest by hanging out in grunge bars hoping to be picked up. I did not need any reminders of some of my most embarrassing and regretful moments in college, and so I am making a pact with myself, from this point forward, not to do anything that might once again bring those memories to the surface…
July Move-Out
Maria arrived from Peru in mid-June, and Conrad got the keys to their rental house in Ypsilanti on July 3 (a Wednesday). There was an insane flurry of activity as we all tried to move enough stuff into their new place so that they could entertain and host some good friends who came to Michigan that weekend for a wedding. Conrad’s college friend Manny arrived with his parents and sister and stayed at the Ypsi house for 3 nights. Between July 3 and the family’s arrival two days later, we managed to get enough beds set up (complete with bedding and towels), dishes and kitchenware out of boxes and put away, table and chairs moved in, and even some rugs on the floor to provide a homey feel. Plus food in the refrigerator and a coffee maker! When Manny’s family showed up in their truck, Conrad enlisted them to pick up a large, heavy leather couch and overstuffed chair that they had purchased from a friend, which completed the move in activities for the week. Even with all the rush of working, moving, setting up, and preparing for the visit, once Manny and his family arrived everyone had a great time. Easy guests and great friends! I enjoyed seeing the family again after first meeting them at Conrad’s college graduation in 2017. But what a whirlwind of preparation! We had no awareness that the July 4 holiday was even happening!
July Reunion
Just a few days after Manny and his family went back to Chicago, Conrad, Maria and I went to Marthasville, Missouri to gather with my husband Jay’s side of the family. We don’t see them often, and had been looking forward to the trip for months. Conrad and Maria flew to St. Louis, and I drove my camper with my brand-new bike fastened to a rack on the back. Jay’s Aunt Toosie was our host for the next three and a half days. At 92, she has lost none of her spirit and drive and had planned several memorable activities - a dinner cruise down the Missouri River, a trip into St. Louis to see The Little Mermaid performed live at the Muny (a long-standing outdoor venue that Toosie remembered from her childhood), and a trip into historic St. Charles where she grew up and where we visited the cemeteries of Conrad’s great grandparents. I had visited those same graves when I stopped to see Toosie on the way back from my 1938 Project trip last fall, and was glad that Conrad was along this time.
The rest of the time we spent together catching up, playing games, and generally hanging out in the same spaces. It was another instance of not having seen some of these people for quite a few years, but then diving right in as if no time had passed at all. The time together was made even more special by the presence of “newer” family members who joined our reunion and fit right into all the activities as if they had been related for many years. To Maria (my future daughter-in-law), Theo (married to Daniella, daughter of Norm who is Jay’s 1st cousin), the “Greeks” (Theo’s parents and sister who were on their first trip to the U.S. from their native Greece and who couldn’t have been more gracious about jumping into whatever we were doing despite their limited English), and Roz and Tony (Marvin’s mother and grandson - Marvin is married to Aliza who is Toosie’s daughter): all of you added spice and humor and love to our gathering and I’m so glad you are part of our family and could share the experience with us! Those relatives who were not able to make it were busy with summer volleyball tournaments and welcoming the newest member of the family into the world, baby Kenneth Jay Stock.
Getting To and From Missouri
This category deserves its own heading because, when it comes to my competence in the van camping life, I’m learning that it’s best not to assume anything (although I seem to need to relearn that message pretty much every time I take the camper out - you’d think I’d know by now and take necessary precautions).
The trip out to Missouri was reasonably uneventful, with the exception of the discovery that my bike had not been strapped down adequately, resulting in a near dragging event in Indiana when I swerved to make a sharp turn onto a small road (that I almost drove by) during my search for the Indiana Dunes National Park on the shores of Lake Michigan. While driving I could see my bike handlebar through the rear view mirror, so when I looked up after I made the turn and didn’t see it, my heart skipped a beat. Fortunately, I was not going fast and was in a place where I could pull off quickly. The bike was still attached but was lying parallel to the road, the rack arm that was supposed to hold it having lost its grip. One characteristic about Dodge Promaster cargo vans is that they have big engines and chassis built for heavy, inanimate cargo, with a limited shock absorber system. This means that Nellie Bly does a lot of shaking, rattling, and rolling when she goes over any sort of rough terrain, uneven pavement, or the occasional bump in the road. My new (cheapish) bike rack attached to my hitch did not feel compelled to do its job under such challenging circumstances, and simply decided to let go.
I was able to get everything back in place and strapped down more securely without having damaged the bike, which I was grateful for. Both the bike rack and Nellie had given me another chance to prove that I knew what I was doing when it came to protecting and transporting the bike. Although she wobbled a bit, the bike stayed visible in my rear view mirror for the remainder of the trip out to Marthasville. I had arranged to spend a night in Springfield, the capitol of Illinois on the way. I was so glad I did! I biked all over the downtown area and up to visit the tomb of Abraham Lincoln. The next morning I found a charming coffee shop and then visited the Lincoln museum before continuing on to St. Louis. Lots of history in that city!
After the wonderful family visit I had planned to drive a bit further west to visit Hannibal, Missouri, boyhood home of Mark Twain, before heading back to Michigan. Instead, I stayed in the Marthasville and St. Louis area on our last day, long enough to say goodbye to folks and to see Conrad and Maria off at the airport that afternoon. I then headed toward Joliet, Illinois, which lies in the shadow of Chicago, and where I had a hotel reservation for the night. Although I don’t relish driving at night, it seemed an easy jaunt from St. Louis and very doable, given that the hotel was just off the highway and only 3 hours away.
On this particular segment of my trip two things happened that I hadn’t planned on, which prevented me from making it to Joliet:
On the bridge crossing the Mississippi River from Missouri to Illinois, in rush hour traffic, as I was in the far left lane, on very rough pavement full of ruts and potholes, going maybe 60 mph, I lost sight of my bike in the rearview mirror again. In the split second that my new reality jumped into my consciousness, a car passed me with everyone in it trying to get my attention and pointing to the back of my van. Worst possible scenario!!! I had to cross three lanes of traffic to get to a shoulder where I could stop without another vehicle crashing into me, and by the time I did, my poor bike’s handlebar had dragged and scraped its way across the roadway in its valiant effort to hold onto the van and not drop off completely.
Yes, the bike was still attached, but the right side handlebar that has the gears as well as a handbrake, had been badly damaged. My new bike!!! Potentially ruined!! I didn’t have time for a close inspection of how bad it was, and simply propped it back up as best I could, fastening it to my defective rack as tightly as I could, knowing that the rack’s arm that was supposed to hold it in place had totally abdicated its responsibility. That darned rack had only ONE JOB - holding the bike in place behind my van. Grrrr…!!! For the remainder of my trip home, I stopped every few miles to make sure nothing was amiss as I watched the bike wobble about in my rear view mirror when I went around corners and over bumps. In a fit of defiance, the rack arm failed me one more time, but I was on a street going slowly and was able to stop right away to fix the problem. I tried to stay off highways for most of the rest of the way home and when I did venture onto one I stayed in the far right lane (yes, I know, I should have been doing that all along…). Utilizing few interstates meant that the trip back to Ann Arbor took twice as long as it would have if I hadn’t been fighting with the bike rack the whole way.
This story ends on a good note, thank goodness. The actual damage to the handlebar was relatively minimal given what could have happened if the entire bike had disengaged from the van and tumbled into the busy roadway in front of oncoming traffic. I was able to figure out what parts I needed, ordered them directly from the manufacturer, then delivered both bike and parts to the local authorized Aventon dealer to put it all back together. It once again works beautifully and you can’t even tell when looking at it that I almost destroyed it. If you happen to squeeze the end of the handlebar grip, however, you may notice that there is about an inch of space at the end of the rubber handlebar grip that is kind of squishy because that’s where the old grip and metal handlebar was shredded off as it slid across the roadway. Other than that, no remaining signs of my mishap.
But that’s not all that happened on that fateful day…
As you can imagine, after the harrowing episode over the Mississippi, I was way behind my original schedule for reaching the hotel. But once I got out of St. Louis and into Illinois, I was cruising toward Chicago headed due north on Highway 55, which is long and straight and flat. I decided I was alert, feeling good, and could make my destination by 10pm, even with the periodic stops to check the status of my bike. As darkness descended onto my horizon, I began to notice far up ahead what I thought was heat lightening. Since the intense heat and sun, with its cloudless sky, had been stifling the entire weekend, I didn’t find that surprising and didn’t give it much thought.
Unbeknownst to me, however, an epic storm was pushing east, covering a large swath of the Midwest, and the northbound highway I was on was directly in its path. A massive wind and rainstorm of Biblical proportions (no, I am not exaggerating) suddenly and with very little warning blew through between 8 and 9pm.
The wind and rain buffeted my little high top Promaster and threatened to blow her over. I slowed way down to under 20mph and when I saw the big semi tractor trailers pulling to the side of the road and stopping, I figured I had better do the same. The wind was blowing the rain sideways in front of my van and she shook and trembled trying to stay upright against the strong gales. It was pitch dark and I was in the flatlands of rural Illinois. I had no idea how far the next exit was, and I was still more than an hour away from my reserved hotel room. After stopping I shone a light out the window to make sure that if I did blow over I wouldn’t tumble into a ditch or down a steep ravine. Thankfully, as best as I could determine, I was surrounded by flat farmland. At that point I had to decide what was my safest place for waiting it out inside the van. I decided that I would stay put in the driver’s seat with my seatbelt on, figuring that if I did blow over I would likely survive, and there were other vehicles and trucks on the side of the road nearby who would see me toppled and (I believed) would come to help me.
Once I got myself stopped and situated, I checked my weather app (yes, I probably should have done this before starting the trip earlier in the day - I know that now…) and saw that a severe storm and tornado warning had been issued. Yikes! Not only that but apparently multiple tornadoes and flooding were happening all around me, which I would find out about the next morning. Some of the tornados in and near Chicago that night made the national news. Sitting there in the middle of rural Illinois, alone on the side of the roadway, not knowing whether my van would hold up against the force of an actual tornado (the fact that the wall of purple and red on the weather radar had not even reached me yet was rather sobering), I decided that someone besides me should know about my predicament. So I called Conrad. He was justifiably worried about me once he saw the radar images of the storm bearing down on me (from my perspective it felt like I was already in the middle of it - not so, apparently). He did some checking and discovered that a big exit with lots of hotels, truck stops and restaurants was just up the road not very far. He recommended that I head there as soon as I felt safe to do so.
After waiting on the side of the road watching the rain blowing sideways in front of me and clenching the steering wheel as tightly as I could for what seemed like hours and hours (but was probably only about 30-45 minutes), I decided I was not going to blow over (whew!) and that the storm was abating. I could see other vehicles starting to move and I cautiously inched my way forward and happened onto a rest stop about a mile up the road. I pulled in and thought that might be a place I could hunker down for the night but decided against it when I read that Illinois doesn't allow drivers to stay at rest stops for more than three hours. Despite the low risk of that rule being enforced given the rough weather I was in the middle of, I still didn't want to take the chance that I might be rousted at 2 in the morning after the storm had moved on, so I took a deep breath and pressed carefully and slowly on. As predicted by Conrad, the next exit had a bunch of stuff and a nice clerk at a Hampton Inn gave me permission to use their parking lot until morning. My nice cushy hotel room booked in Joliet remained empty that night, but that was more than an hour away and I decided I was done driving for the day. I was very grateful that I had the option of taking refuge in a storm in my cozy camper.
My day of horrors was not quite finished, however. As I began settling myself in for the night, I discovered that my two back windows had been open during my entire stormy ordeal, inviting the wind to blow the heavy rain right in on top of my bed. My sheet and comforter and mattress were all soaked, but I found a corner dry enough to curl up on and didn’t even care at that point. In the morning I spread things out to dry on my way home.
The rest of the drive home was relatively uneventful compared to the day before, except that I was forced off the highway and onto several small roads and detours due to the previous night’s flooding and storm damage. I passed through several towns that had clearly suffered high winds, with large trees and branches strewn around. I could tell exactly where the path of the tornado had been.
The video below gives you a little taste of my harrowing experience.
Yes, I was happy to be home for a few days after that to regroup before my next trip.
Music Fest!
To cap off the month of July, my camping buddy Kim and I headed to southern Ohio for the Nelsonville Music Fest. This was our second time around at this festival, the first one being practically drowned out by all the rain two years ago, with the highlight being my brand new van getting towed out of the mud twice - once on the way in and once on the way out. This time the weather was beautiful and we were able to fully experience the music to our heart’s content. It was hot, but we scored a picnic spot in the woods near the stages where we could hang a hammock and stash our chairs. Whenever we got too hot in the sun we retreated to that cooler spot.
August Visit to the Northeast
I was barely home from the festival before I got back into the camper and headed east to join a family gathering with my siblings and other relatives. I was home just long enough to get a new, sturdier rack to replace the ill-fated one that tried to destroy my bike. The newly repaired bike fit snugly and tightly right where it was supposed to, and stayed there through all my driving exploits to New England and back. What a relief!!
Both the trip out and the trip back were, for the most part, enjoyable drives. On the way east, I spent a night in Cuyahoga Falls, stealth camping in the far corner of an upscale hotel’s parking lot after having dinner with one of my favorite relatives. I usually try to meet up with Emily whenever I pass through the Cleveland area, and she is always gracious in making time for us to get together.
In the morning I took a little extra time and drove through the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, a gem of a park nestled in the middle of the greater Cleveland metropolitan area. On the way to the visitor center my GPS had located a wonderful-looking little coffee shop in a small town right on the Cuyahoga River close to one of the many park trailheads. There was a parking lot at the end of a narrow drive that was located behind the cafe and along the river. I blithely turned in, assuming there would be a parking space waiting for me. I pride myself on being able to get in and out of “regular” sized parking spots in most lots, but as I drove through the narrow alley to get to the small lot behind the building, I realized that there were no available spaces, save for one at the very end of the narrow passage between the other cars. The parking lot consisted of two rows of cars parked on either side of a narrow driveway, and what I thought was a parking space at the end turned out to be a small turnaround area so that cars would not have to back out the same way they drove in. Of course, I didn’t know all this when I turned into the alley and made my way carefully and slowly to the far end of the lot. Sadly for me, once I had made the turn off the street and into the driveway I was committed. A sign clearly marked the space I had my eye on as a turnaround only space, with an accompanying warning against trying to park there. The fact that the lot was full of small-looking cars and no trucks or vans should have been an obvious tipoff.
I stopped at the end, looked around, and surveyed my situation. Behind me, I could see two other cars waiting in the alley that were intent on entering the lot as soon as I did whatever I was going to do. I tried to do a three point turn several times, but there just wasn’t enough room to maneuver without crashing into the steep embankment on one side or sliding into the river on the other, and eventually I resigned myself to backing out the same way I came in. The waiting cars had to also back out and move to the side to make room for me to pass by. It was not a pleasant experience to back the van down that alley, narrowly missing all the parked cars on either side of me as I crept slowly and cautiously backward. The drivers who were waiting their turn to venture into the lot gave me a thumbs up as I backed my way past them. Woohoo! Made it! (but won’t be attempting a similar maneuver anytime in the near future…)
Suffice it to say I did not get coffee at that shop, as there were no other viable parking spots to be had anywhere nearby. So after ditching the coffee plan I drove the rest of the way through the national park and managed to hike to some beautiful waterfalls without adversely impacting my travel schedule for the day. I ended the afternoon in Dunkirk/Fredonia, where my mother’s family lived and where my aunt and first cousin still do (Emily’s father and grandmother). I spent the night with them after a nice dinner at one of their favorite Italian places and then hit the road early the next morning headed for my sister’s house in Ashfield, Massachusetts. When checking my bike (yet again) I did notice that I had managed to bend a portion of my brand new bike rack as I was trying to turn around in that tiny parking lot the day before. The good news is that the rack is still functional if a bit unsightly, so I decided not to let yet another reminder of my van management incompetence ruin any part of this trip. Keep moving forward I say (literally and figuratively)!
Bridal Shower
With all of Maria’s relatives and friends in Peru, there was no one in her immediate circle here who could throw a bridal shower for her. At some point fairly late in the game it dawned on me that someone needed to rectify that situation. After getting home from the Cape and doing a quick check-in with Maria, I scurried around and six days later we had a very nice, congenial, fun gathering at my house. Of course, we had to have a game, as is the requirement for such events in the United States (is that a tradition anywhere else?).
The whole event was a huge success (if I do say so myself) and I am eternally grateful to Amanda, Judy and Melissa, who helped at the last minute with the party decorations (and also Conrad and Maria, who I commandeered to blow up the 60 balloons the night before), Liz who MC’d the “shoe game,” assisted by Thea, who also helped clean up and tear it all down at the end. Everyone had a great time, and the brownies and cherry crisp made by my friend Margaret were especially delicious. There was very little food left at the end of any kind, always a good sign that people enjoyed themselves.
Next Steps
The next two months promise to be jam packed. Three weeks from today, on the first day of fall, 2024, my son Conrad and his beautiful fiance Maria, will be joined in marriage. So much to do between now and then! None of us feel ready, but all of us are excited for what we hope will be a very memorable and fun experience for all who are able to be there with us. I’d be lying if I said I was approaching the day calmly and sedately. My emotions have been all over the place all summer. Not surprisingly, I am feeling the profound loss of Jay (2018) as well as my parents (2015 and 2020), who will not be by my side to witness and share this sacred event. On the other hand, I’m elated that Conrad and Maria found each other, and have enjoyed getting to know Maria this summer and observing how much in love the two of them are. I know it will be a wonderful celebration, if a somewhat poignant one for me. I will be surrounded by love and support, and know that my friends and family will make sure I get through the day in one piece as Conrad and Maria begin their future together.
After the wedding I do have some travel coming up, and it isn’t all camping. You’ll have to stay tuned to the blog to find out what’s next for me as we move into the colder season towards the end of year holidays. So if you aren’t subscribed, consider doing so and you will get my direct notification when the next article is published.
Until then, stay healthy and keep your loved ones close.
