Happy Father's Day

It's been over 2 years since I've seen my dad. And that was only during a 4 hour layover in Phoenix. I've not spent Christmas with my parental units since the year 2000, in Yuma. That was fun. That's Yuma in the photo. Me, mom and dad. I'm hoping to get to see Ma & Pa this summer up in Washington.

The older I get the more I realize how lucky I had it in the parental unit department. Most of what is good about my nature I got from my dad. I've never seen my dad get mad or lose his temper. I learned my style of driving from watching my dad. I am unflappable when driving. No matter where I'm driving, even notorious places, like Los Angeles, I'm always totally relaxed.

I never knew, when I was a kid, that not every family got to go on fun vacations. Usually the day school got out we'd take off on vacation. This is where I learned to like a long road trip. Me and my, at the time, 3 siblings, would beg to go to Disneyland, we wanted to see California really bad. When I was a 7th grader we took a week long trip to Oregon and Idaho. We were told if we behaved the next year we'd go to Yellowstone.

We behaved, so the next year we got to go to Yellowstone. We were told if we behaved on the Yellowstone trip the next year we'd go to California and Disneyland. We behaved.

So, when I was 13 we took our first trip to California. This remains the funnest trip I ever remember. Like I said, my dad is unflappable. We were barely 20 miles into our trip to California when something broke on the trailer. It was the trailer hitch. It'd cracked. The safety chain saved the trailer. Dad took apart the hitch. We drove into Everett. Dad found a welder to fix the break. We drove back to the trailer, dad put the hitch back together and we were back on our way. My mom and dad made this type thing totally non-stressful, like it was just part of the adventure.

In the LA zone we stayed at San Clemente State Park. Us kids were so antsy to get to the beach. We all had our little duties to do when we set up camp. We got those done quickly and found our way to the beach. We'd only been in the cold Pacific of the Washington coast. We'd not experienced warm salt water before. Or body surfing.

Disneyland was the best thing I ever remember doing as a kid.

We crammed in so much into our time in the LA zone, Beverly Hills, Hollywood, Knotts Berry Farm. My dad only had 9 days off work. When it came time to head back north, mom and dad could tell us kids were sad. We made it as far as Ventura and pulled into a rest area. Mom and dad figured out they had enough money to take us to Universal Studios. And so we stayed in the LA zone one more day.

We had so much fun that we went to CA again the next year. I did not know it at the time, but that was to be my last family vacation. This is getting to me thinking back on this. That year my dad worked an extra job to save up enough so that he could take an extra week off. That year we did Tijuana and San Diego.

On our second trip to LA, our station wagon had a mechanical problem while we were in Hollywood to watch the Lawrence Welk Show get taped. We also watched The Dating Game. We were stuck in Hollywood for about 6 hours getting the car fixed. It was so much fun. My 2 older siblings and me took off exploring.

A mere 8 years later I was once more stuck in Hollywood, in the middle of the night. The clutch had gone out on my 65 Mustang after getting out of Paramount Studios about midnight after watching a taping of LaVerne and Shirley. We pushed the car to a Chevron station. And slept in the car til it opened. They were able to fix it.

My baby sister was born when I was 17, 3 years after my last family vacation. She never got to experience what it was like to be stuck in a car for thousands of miles with 3 siblings. And mom and dad.

The trips to California when I was 13 and 14 so imprinted happy memories on me that starting when I was about 20, for years, I'd go down there every year. The last time was Christmas of 1994. I remember once staying at San Clemente State Park, sometime in the 1980s, sitting on a picnic table, looking out at the Pacific and remembering back to when I was there when I was 13, with mom and dad and my brother and sisters. It made me feel sad. And alone. Sort of how I'm feeling right now.