Topic: Vacation

Topic: Vacation

One of my late mother’s many gifts was her ability to make the mundane seem special.  My dad was a college English professor and she was trudging through law school with three kids under the age of ten.  I know now that she didn’t like being in the house by herself at night.  Back then when my dad had to teach a Wednesday night class she would declare that we would have a “Dad’s Not Here” party.  We got to stay up late and watch the Sonny and Cher show.  She’d make popcorn-on the stove-this was the early seventies so we hadn’t heard of microwave popcorn, or even microwaves.  She’d buy a one quart glass bottle of Coke that we’d split three ways between mom, my brother Chris, and me.  My baby brother Marty was too little at the time to appreciate what a rare treat it was for us to have soda.

Mom would “move” the leftovers in an innovative way.  She’d tell us to sit in the dining room and then she’d appear with an apron tied around her waist as she welcomed us to “Dee’s Café.” 

“Good evening, miss.  May I offer you a cocktail to start with?  We have milk, water, and apple juice.”

Then she’d list the chef’s selections for us and would jot down our “order” on a little notepad.  We loved it. 

She even made the task of cleaning my room seem exciting.  Mom’s angle was that we would pretend we worked for the Red Cross.  My room was the site of a terrible tornado and we had to get everything cleaned up and ready so “the people” could come back home.  I bought into her vision and cleaned with unusual gusto for an eight year old. 

Once a month she and dad would sit at the dining room table to balance their checkbook and pay their bills old school style.  They handwrote checks and stuffed them into envelopes.  They took their paper bank statement and reconciled it to their check ledger-stuff my kids no nothing about.  There were no ATMS, debit cards, or electronic banking. When I asked what they were doing mom said they were playing a game called “Oh Shit” and that only grownups could play it.  All I knew was that if my mom did it, I wanted to play too. 

But probably her greatest feat was making us feel like a trip to Peebles, Ohio and on up to Toledo, Ohio was a luxury vacation.  She started by talking up the big vacation weeks ahead of time.  She made a countdown calendar on the kitchen fridge.  I proudly told the neighborhood kids that I wouldn’t be available for the next few days.  I was going on vacation.  I never went to the beach or a resort as a kid.  I still haven’t been to Disneyland or Disney World.  I didn’t ride on a plane until I was in my thirties.  I was in my forties when I went on my first cruise, and it was just this year at age 53 that I finally traveled outside of the U.S.  Our big vacation involved all three of us kids and my parents traveling in a station wagon to the Indian burial mound in Peebles.  Then we drove up to Toledo and stayed two nights in Howard Johnson hotel, all of us in one big room.  We dined at the L&K Family restaurant and went to the Toledo Zoo and the Toledo Museum of Art.  I remember it as one of my favorite vacations. 

What made it great, what made so many of my childhood memories great was my mom’s enthusiasm.  No matter what crap was thrown in mom’s path she managed to make it into a party, a game, or an adventure.  Now that I’m older I realize money was tight for my parents during those days.  By a lot of people’s standards we weren’t well off.  But when I think back on my childhood, I remember feeling unbelievably rich.