The First Leg

There is no more relaxing way to start your vacation than piloting a gigantic RV down the Interstate, your loving husband in the co-pilot seat screaming, “You are going to kill us!”

I’d held off driving the beast as long as possible. When I finally did take over the wheel it seemed I was cursed. Each time, I’d start on a pristine empty highway. Within miles, herds of cars and trucks would appear over the horizon, quickly overtaking me, mocking me with their swift nimble ways. The semis shook me as they passed, the cars just made me wish I could speed like that.

Worse than the traffic, though was the road construction. Offering new obstacles and narrowed roads, each new orange sign rattled my nerves. It was while we were sailing over one of the “under construction” narrow bridges that Bill shrieked as I held my breath and tensed my knuckles.  We made it without a scratch but when Bill demanded the wheel, I didn’t object.

We pulled into the next available truck stop and determined, since we were stopped, we might as well fuel up. We knew the drill – no swiping a card at the pump in these stations. Instead you go in and pre-authorize.

I strode confidently into the station and handed the clerk my credit card. Now, let me preface this next bit by saying that I am very careful with my money. I pay my bills on time. Heck, I still balance my checkbook every month. I’ve never had a credit card declined.

So, when the clerk told me my card had been declined, I didn’t know what to do other than stare in horror for a second or two. The line of professional drivers was growing behind me, though, so I knew I had to come up with a better plan. I flipped out another card and handed that over.

When the clerk told me that one was declined, too, I felt the wind of a sigh from the six-foot, three hundred pound driver standing behind me.  The clerk gave me a skeptical look which I avoided by glancing at a text that had just arrived on my phone. As I read it, I breathed in relief. Fraud protection. My credit card companies obviously couldn’t fathom me at a truck stop in the middle of Kansas buying boatloads of diesel any more than I could.

After I assured them, via text, that I was doing the unfathomable, I handed my card back to the clerk.

 “Please try it again.”

He gave the tall dude behind me a look of, most assuredly,  shared annoyance but swiped it through the machine anyway. It went through, just as I knew it would. I hitched my purse over my shoulder and threaded my way back through the crowd.

I found Bill out at the pumps deep in conversation with one of the professional drivers. I heard snippets of conversation about the best place to buy diesel and the merits of various types of truck stops. When Bill said, “If my wife’s driving, you’d better stay out of the way,” the guy winked at me and said, “Don’t worry, I’ll stay out of your way, too.”

The clock was ticking so we didn’t stay long to chat. We’d shipped our daughter off to her grandparents several days earlier and allocated two days to drive from Colorado to South Carolina to pick her up. Colorado to South Carolina is a lotta hours if you are driving down the Interstate in a car at 80 miles per hour. It’s way more if you are going, optimistically, sixty-five in an RV.

The first night we limped into Columbia, Missouri around 11:30, spent an hour catching up with my brother and his wife and then crashed in our home away from home on their driveway.

Around 4:30 in the morning, my bed started to move. 

“He can drive if he wants,” I thought. “I’m sleeping.”

It quickly became clear while they called this beast a land yacht, though. I was tossed around like a rowboat in a choppy ocean. I rolled from side to side and at one point my body even left the bed. So, after less than an hour, I reluctantly got up.

Fueled by caffeine and snacks, we made it four hours before our three hours of sleep the night before caught up with us. We pulled into a truck stop and, lulled to sleep by the hum of the semis next to us, slept for a couple of hours before once again hitting the road.

Around noon, I realized it was hopeless. “We aren’t going to make it tonight. Maybe we should find a place we can spend the night.”

“We’ll make it,” Bill said, his eyes resolutely on the road. “You drive for awhile while I sleep.”

“Right.”

I drove awhile, but refused to let him sleep. I wasn’t nearly that comfortable driving and stuff like road construction and towns and such kept getting in my way. Somehow I ended up driving through downtown Nashville and later through the twisty hills of North Carolina. 

“Let’s just call your parents and tell them we aren’t going to get there tonight.”

“We’ll get there,” he said, as if saying it would make it true.

So we kept driving and finally, finally, finally – around 1:30 in the morning – we pulled onto his parents’ road. His Dad met us to show us where to park.

Before Bill jumped out to say hello, he slung the walkie-talkie at me. “Listen to me,” he said. “I’ll tell you what to do. Just do it fast before Dad comes up with a different idea.”

I reluctantly climbed into the driver’s seat and started pulling into our space. Bill stood behind the RV watching the roof of the barn to make sure I didn’t hit it. His Dad stood in front watching everything else.

We were close. I could hardly keep my eyes open and could only think of my waiting bed.

“Go forward,” Bill commanded into the walkie-talkie.

I didn’t move. His Dad stood in front of me saying something else.

“Go forward,” Bill said, more urgently this time.

I sighed but still didn’t move.

“Dammit, go forward,” he screamed.

I picked up the walkie-talkie. “If I do, I’ll run over your father,” I said.

Bill came around to the front and got it sorted out. “If he saw you coming at him, he’d have got out of the way,” he grumbled as I pulled to a stop.

As I turned off the key, I realized we’d made it. Leg one completed successfully with no one killed or even hurt.

Still, I couldn’t help myself when Bill said, “See, I told you we’d make it tonight.”

“That was yesterday,” I said. “It is after midnight.”