Time Fries!

by Fay Jacobs

  Oh good, the guy behind me thinks honking for thirty seconds over Fairfax helps. Flipping him the bird is counterproductive; we’ll be joined at the bumper for the rest of the war.

  Now we’re inching past the Virginia Firearms Museum. Can I get a gun and shoot myself? Likewise, the Manassas Antique show is touted on a billboard. My late model car will be ready for it when I arrive there. Splat, splat, splat, big floppy raindrops plummet, wipers scratching the windshield like fingernails on a blackboard. Brake lights flash on and off like some code from aliens. Indeed, there is a close encounter of the fender kind one lane over. As we creep on, I picture Union soldiers with muskets, crawling on their bellies faster than this.

  Close to two hours later I arrive at my destination in a sweaty frazzle, only to discover my friend, supposedly home from the hospital, is actually stranded in her daughter’s overheating car at one of the Route 66 exits.

  “Jump in my car, we’ll go rescue them,” says her husband, “I’ll take the overheating car to a garage and you can drive her home in this one.”

  Back into battle? He’s got to be kidding.

  Sadly, no. We fight the second Battle of Bull Run, from Manassas back to Fairfax, literally crossing, once again, that winding waterway that ran red during the Civil War. We, meanwhile, see red as traffic still hasn’t lessened, taking us another 80 minutes to go 14 miles. I think I saw Stonewall Jackson in the Subaru next to me.

  We make it to Chantilly only to swap cars and passengers and reverse course. Even the War Between the States didn’t have a third Bull Run battle.

  It gets worse. Now I’m trapped in the back seat with a three and five year old who are behaving no better than most of the commuters imprisoned on Route 66. Among this confederacy of dunces, the kids throw shoes at mom and grandmom in the front seat, squeal, spit, hit each other and me, and I wonder if violence like this has broken out between those HOV drivers and their babbling strangers.

  An excruciating hour passes, but we finally arrive back at my friend’s home for the all-important two-hour visit. Her physical health is improved; my mental health, not so much. To avoid further angst, I choose not to get my kicks on Route 66 come morning but instead, head back to DC that night.

  Holy Jefferson Davis, now there’s road construction! If anything, the pace is even slower than the misnamed descriptor “rush hour” and more frustrating for its surprise.

  Blinding work lights and a parade of traffic cones accompany the misery of retracing my steps along these Civil War battlefields. Margaret Mitchell didn’t take this long to write Gone With The Wind.

  I find a place to stay en route and in the morning calculate my escape to coincide with abated traffic.

  Come the morning after, cruising at the speed limit, Bay Bridge bound in the rain, traffic suddenly halts near Annapolis. Too late to be the morning crush and too early for beach traffic, what the Robert E. Lee is this? Then, the rain becomes more of a thundering monsoon. Visibility drops to nothing, the bridge is enveloped in a hundred-year fog and fender benders ensue.

  This gives rise to Maryland’s take on brother against brother as uncivil war erupts. Drivers swerve on my left flank, cut each other off, jockey to get through Easy Pass and the bridge. Four freakin’ miles take over an hour. I should be shot for having had the Starbucks Double-Shot coffee. My bladder is screaming as I search the front and back seats for a potential open container should the need arise. I clench my teeth and everything else. Inching along, I must now cede my position to the battalion behind me as I skulk off road to find a potty. Relief and an Egg McMuffin later, I am back in the crawling caravan.

  Talk radio incites me. Music of the 80s makes me gag. Listening to the garbled AM radio announcement from the department of transportation is no help at all. I choose silence with the occasional honk and epithet.

  Twelve miles takes two and a half more hours. Auuggghhh!!!!

  By the time I get home to Delaware, the South could have risen again, So, too, my blood pressure. The trip back took five and a half hours before I was freed from my automobile. Yes, I emit a “Woo-Hoo!” as my (here it comes) emancipation proclamation.

  For my trip to Virginia I sat in excruciating traffic for a full dozen of the twenty-six hours I was gone. It didn’t take Abraham Lincoln that long to ride in a horse and buggy from Washington to Gettysburg to deliver his Address.

  Is Route One at its worst a piece of cake? You bet your sweet asphalt. This driver staying local is a more perfect union.

  July 2013

  DOWNSIZING

  Okay, first things first, we have to sell our house and its three quarters of an acre. The realtor said “You’ve got to unclutter this place and make it seem like a model home. All those bright colored walls have to go. The personal pictures, gone! Get rid of everything on the kitchen counter!”

  Okay, maybe the place did look a little like Spencer’s Gifts after a hurricane, but unclutter completely? We spent the first two weeks of June painting the walls beige. We got our recommended 10,000 steps a day in, much of it up and down ladders. Gone are the flashy colors and walls full of family photos and memorabilia. Missing are the Schnauzer statues and geegaws. All the walls are now Sherman Williams Latte. And trust me, you need a double shot latte just to stay out of a coma in here. And we installed fresh, neutral blah carpet to go with the neutral blah walls.

  And clean! You could do an appendectomy on the kitchen counter. And bland! It’s like living at the Days Inn, which wouldn’t be bad if we had room service. And of course, we’ve been afraid to put down a glass for fear of making a ring on the coffee table. Listing and showing a home is a special kind of hell.

  So we moved into the RV on the driveway. Seriously, it was our only choice.

  For one thing, every time the house was shown, we’d leave and shop for things for the new house. Four thousand dollars’ worth of appliances later, it had to stop. Secondly, it’s hard to actually live in a house on the market. We’d be eating lunch, a realtor would call, and unless we wanted the place to look like we fled one step ahead of the mob, it took a frantic effort to make the place pristine. Living in the RV was just easier.

  And “Let there be light!” Real estate etiquette says a home on the market should glow. Every time we exited it was like a bonfire, visible from the space station. You could have a Nats game in there. It was our own personal Motel 6. We’ll leave the light on for ya. Also, the electric bill.

  Blessedly, by the end of July, we had a contract on the old house and were up to our elbows spackling and painting the new one. We’d downsized by way of a yard sale, unloading Harry Potter CDs, Billy Joel and Beach Boys on vinyl, decades-old furniture (“The 80s called and they want your coffee table back”), the gently used lawn mower and carpet steamer, the queen bed that won’t fit in the new guest compartment and much more. A local thrift shop and the dump benefitted from leftovers.

  At deadline, as I sit typing in my office devoid of most books and all personality, we still own more assets than will squeeze into our new house. Another sale is pending. Books, posters and albums I held as essential two months ago, now scream “What were you thinking???” Self-help manuals like Fence and Deck Plans or Landscaping Solutions gotta go. Frankly, I think we chose the perfect landscaping solution. It’s somebody else’s problem.

  I am keeping the book 1000 Places to See Before You Die and Fodor’s Essential USA. As I write, we are about to leave for a vacation in the RV (our house on wheels), with plans to move into the new house (technically also a house with wheels, but one with a skirt around the perimeter) in early September.

  We have miles to go (both figuratively and literally) before we sleep in the new place. But I am already using the community pool and clubhouse exercise equipment. Both modes of downsizing are going full speed ahead. And I pray we will come through the move two clothing sizes lower with a home that looks less like Sordid Lives and more like a sophisticated boutique hotel suite. I shall keep you posted.

  In
the meantime, if you need a 1970s chrome coffee table, the 1982 version of Trivial Pursuit, a Ouija board, a copy of Khalil Gibran’s The Prophet, or Streisand on vinyl, you’re too late. Downsizing can be painful.

  August 2013

  NORTHERN EXPOSURE ’13

  Tuesday, July 30

  Off to Canada we go! Fought with and cursed the Rand McNally GPS all morning Monday until we stopped in Poughkeepsie to buy a Garmin.

  Bonnie, unwilling to give up on her special RV GPS kept it on while we learned to use the Garmin. I didn’t know whether I was hearing voices or it was just the competing GPS women. Finally I had to sit on one device to muffle the arguing and there are a lot of jokes I could make here about pulling directions out of my ass, but I will refrain.

  After about an hour of this insanity Bonnie hollered “For pity’s sake, don’t we have a map???” and I went to see if we had one of those antique travel thingies. My mate was not amused when I asked if she wanted the one on parchment or carbon paper.

  Drove through the Adirondacks and across the border into Canada, where this time they did not question the amount of liquor we were carrying for personal consumption. I guess they care less about boozehounds in Quebec Province than they did last summer in New Brunswick. Got to the campground by 7 p.m. and grilled steaks on the George Foreman, sipping a 1991 Châteauneuf-du-Pape. I love camping…

  This morning we drove to the old port and old city in Montreal. Walked and walked all over this vibrant, gorgeous city, then took a double decker Grey Line tour…this place is full of public art and bicycles, plus galleries, bistros, and shopping, shopping, shopping. We took photos of the stuff we might have bought if we weren’t moving to a tiny house.

  After sightseeing all day today, we’ve decided to go on a jet boat through the St. Lawrence River rapids tomorrow. We’ve heard it’s wet but not scary. Hope so. I generally avoid activities that advise you to bring along a change of clothes.

  Thursday, August 1

  No, we did not drown on the rapids. Just had no internet connection when we got back..

  The jet boat was fantastic—huge rapids at high speeds. Like a combination rollercoaster and sinus wash. Drenched and laughing all the way. That we were the oldest people on board both worried and pleased me.

  Later we visited Le Village, the gay part of town. “Look at those pink balls!” said Bonnie, something in her tone causing me to respond “Excuuuse me?”

  Rounding the corner we saw an avenue with strings of pink plastic balls strung high over the street for blocks and blocks on end. This was clearly the gaycation part of our trip, where we had a great lunch, people watched and loved that the window of the store across the street featured two buff male mannequins wearing only pink speedos. And this was an eyeglass store.

  Today we are off to the Museum des Beaux-Arts for a Chihuly glass exhibit.

  Saturday, August secondish

  Yesterday, in addition to the stunning museum exhibit in Vieux Quebec (Old city), we schlepped up and down miles of ramparts along the old fortified area, sipped Kir Royale at an outdoor café across from the magnificent Fairmont Le Château Frontenac (built by the Canadian railroad company in 1899) and dined on Quebec meat pies at Restaurant Aux Anciens Canadiens. By the time we got off the ramparts and seated for dinner, we felt like those anciens Canadians.

  Lumbering into the campground here in Quebec, we were assigned a site directly overlooking the St. Lawrence. Out the back window of the RV we have the lazily moving waterway, hawks flying and black squirrels leaping. To the side Fay and Bonnie tried to light a campfire. I should have listened more in Girl Scouts instead of scouting the other scouts. We finally got it done, but it required burning all the magazines we had on board. Thankfully, sparks flew before my mate started eyeing copies of For Frying Out Loud.

  This trip, our longest ever, has been, by necessity, different. We’re cooking more in the RV since traveling for a month is no two week vacation and we’re trying to stay out of debtor’s prison. Luckily we have a grill and don’t have to count on our suspect campfire girl skills.

  Today, on a tip from the book 1000 Places to See Before You Die, we drove to La Malbaie, in the mountains. The narrow, impossibly steep road up was so long and winding, I hoped it would not be a place we’d see right before we died.

  At the summit we found yet another fairytale Fairmont Chateau with turrets and battlements and all manner of gables and things. Even though the weather turned nasty, with heavy rain, the vistas of the mountains running down to the river, socked-in with low-hanging clouds, provided quite a show. In just a few weeks they will start to get snow—22 feet each winter.

  Then, on our way back to the campsite, we stopped at Chute Montmorency, a waterfall that is dramatically taller than Niagara Falls and ringed by a series of walkways. If the thundering falls doesn’t take your breath away then the walk from the parking lot up to it will. We logged about a mile on the path and stairs up, crossed the falls on the somewhat scary footbridge and then headed down to the bottom via a series of switchback stairways. They reminded me of some kind of torture rack from the film Bridge on the River Kwai. I’d like to point out that once again we seemed to be the oldest people enjoying this particular adventure.

  Me, at the bottom, panting like a St. Bernard: “I’d pay $12 not to have to walk back up.”

  Bonnie: “Why $12?”

  Me: “That’s what the tram back up costs.”

  We took the tram. Early night tonight. I think I have a full-body sprain.

  August third or fourth, maybe

  Driving eight hours today from Quebec to New Brunswick, along the St. Lawrence, then inland. Amazing mountain and lake views. Passed the town of Saint-Louis-du-Ha! Ha!, the only municipality in North America with exclamation points in its name. Nobody seems to know from whence came the name.

  From Ha! Ha! we passed a sign for the New Brunswick Potato Museum and I made Bonnie stop. Now she’s seriously questioning taking me cross country.

  We did pass up stops in towns featuring the world’s largest axe and the site of the last official duel in North America. So many largests and lasts, so little time.

  August 7

  Made it to Fundy Park where we climbed down another ridiculous series of staircases to get to the floor of the bay, at low tide, where the gigantic 40-70 foot Hopewell Rocks stood exposed. These giant sculptures were formed by ages and ages of the largest tidal changes in the world. And it’s amazing how fast you can climb back up those stairs when that huge tide starts coming back in.

  August 8 (for a full report, turn the page)...

  August 2013

  CHESTER, NOVA SCOTIA, PARADISE

  August 9

  Yesterday, we arrived in beautiful Chester, Nova Scotia, where we are visiting a friend in a house with spectacular water views. This morning said friend had me out walking three point five miles. Who is this typing and what have they done with Fay? We are having a positively grand time, even if I may need to detox from the great outdoors when we return.

  August 14

  Except for the 3-4 mile forced marches, we have had an amazingly relaxing time. We traveled across to the Northern shore one day for lunch at Lucketts Winery, where they have scrumptious food and drink, plus, in the middle of the vineyard, an old-fashioned English red phone booth. And, from it, you can call anywhere in the world for free. Hence, their most popular wine is Phone Box Red and Phone Box White.

  For the past few days Bon and I did little but lounge on the deck reading (Bon), writing (me), and having a vacation from our vacation. By today a soupy fog rolled in. We could hardly see the drinks in our hands. We managed.

  August 16

  Now we get it when locals say there are two seasons here, winter and construction. We drove, through miles of road cones and flaggers to a teeny lake community in the center of Nova Scotia. We’d been invited to stay with two women we met last year at the campground in Lunenburg. They have a spectacular log home, decorated entirely
in Southwestern Cowboy décor, with Georgia O’Keefe cattle skulls and boots and spurs everywhere. It’s really a showplace, overlooking a small river and lake.

  One of the cowgirls took me on my first all-terrain-vehicle ride and it was a doozy—we flew along snowmobile trails, through rutted roads and humongous mud puddles. I came back laughing, covered in terrain.

  Canada is so cool. While the gals are the only lesbians in the community, back in June they threw a Pride Party and all their straight neighbors came in rainbow shirts. But the girls were sure glad to see us and have an opportunity to make U-Haul jokes, and chat about the fall of DOMA, Edie Windsor, and other topics their neighbors aren’t apt to discuss.

  Tomorrow we have plans for a ferry ride to Big Tancook Island, where they make sauerkraut.

  August 17

  Trip Advison.com will hear from us. We called the trip The Hunger Games. Took the 1 p.m. ferry to the island to discover only one restaurant, which appeared less than clean, with rude staff. Asked about the art gallery and we heard it was closed. That was IT…nothing else on the island! What about the sauerkraut? It seems that 25 years ago a couple of deer swam over from the mainland, went back, and told all their friends, and the herd came back to decimate the cabbage patch. No more sauerkraut. You’d think the islanders could manage to grow a head of cabbage or two during rutting season, but no.

  So we walked around the island—FOR FOUR HOURS!—on dirt roads, amid a thundering barrage of pre-teens on ATVs, kicking up dust storms in our faces. A police car drove by, but when it got close we saw that the star on the door said BEER PATROL and the officers appeared to be bubbas. Cue the banjo music!

  Got back to the ferry an hour early, ‘cause believe me we did not want to miss it. And you could hear our stomachs rumbling over the ferry engines. Okay, some of the scenery was pretty, but jeesh, a trip to nowhere. I don’t even want to think about Little Tancook Island. As for the editor of 1000 Places to See Before You Die, her credibility is kaput.