The jOYs of Life

by Michelle Hoppe

  I moved to sit on the bed next to the side table, hoping to find a phone book in the drawer. Ok, I’m normally a pretty easy person to get along with, however when I sat on the bed I discovered there was no mattress. Throwing back the spread and looking, I discovered there were two box springs, stacked on each other, and honestly, there was NO mattress. Quickly moving to the other bed, I discovered it had a mattress, sort of. It had a lumpy thing that might have once been a mattress.

  Ignoring my sister’s look of horror, and forgetting the mission to find a phone book, I picked up the phone and hit the O for operator. Within seconds a nice voice came over the line, “May I help you?”

  “This is Michelle Hoppe in room 156. You have to be kidding, right?”

  “Excuse me.”

  “This room. It’s a trick right. We‘re on candid camera or something.”

  “I don’t understand your question.”

  “Never mind. This room is unacceptable, these beds are unacceptable. Your internet site shows very nice rooms, where are they and why didn’t you put us in one?”

  “You have a standard room, which is what you booked.”

  “Then where are the comfortable beds, the patio, the Jacuzzi tub, and for pity sakes what is this smell all about?”

  Seemingly unphased by my insult to her hotel, the desk clerk asked, “Perhaps you would like to see another room.”

  “I think that would be a good idea.”

  Her voice never wavered. There was no hint of humor at all. She responded. “I’ll send someone down.”

  Hanging up the phone I turned to my sister, who in her calming way stated, “You were too nice. This place sucks.”

  “They are sending someone to show us a different room.”

  At this point Yvette found the phone book, got out her calling card, sat very carefully on the edge of the bed and started making calls to other hotels. I left the room to meet the nice housekeeper they sent down to show me the other room.

  Fast forward to room two—number 161.

  Upon entering, I was immediately aware of the same smell as the last room. It had the same color scheme, however upon inspection I discovered these beds actually had mattresses, a plus. I walked to the sliding patio door to check the condition and found the door handle was broken and neither the housekeeper nor I could get it opened. Leaving that frustration for later, I walked into the bathroom to see if this room had the famous Jacuzzi tub, only to find the shower walls covered in mold and a broken toilet seat.

  Not needing any additional assistance from the maid, I sent her on her way with a message for the front desk. “We will be there in a few minutes to discuss the situation.”

  When I returned to room 156, I found Yvette making notes of hotel addresses and phone numbers. “Did you find anything?”

  “Not yet. How was the other room?”

  “You don’t want to know.” I assured her.

  “We may have to stay here tonight. I’m not sure if we can get another room this late in the day, and they may charge us a cancellation fee.” Yvette looked as green as the pine trees in the rain forest at home.

  “I’ll pay the damn fee, we are not staying here. I’m going to call the front desk, you get the bags ready.” I told her.

  It must have been the vein in my forehead or maybe the look in my eye, because my sister gently told me she would call the front desk. “I don’t want to deal with the police.”

  Like I would make a scene, oy.

  I must admit she was much nicer than I would have been. She dialed the front desk and told them, “I don’t want to hurt your feelings; however this room is terrible, the place smells like cat pee, and I simply cannot stay here. We are checking out.”

  Ok, that was handled, we loaded the car, went to the front desk and in less the ninety minutes we were homeless in Michigan. Sitting in the air-conditioned comfort of our Park Avenue, we discussed options.

  “I need a shower!” My sister stated, as if I didn‘t want the same thing.

  “Me too, however, that would require a hotel room, which if you haven’t noticed we don’t currently have.”

  “Just drive. I have a map, addresses, and at the moment I just want to put as much distance between us and this place as possible.”

  “I’m hungry.” After all, we hadn’t eaten since the sausage and cheese snack in Chicago.

  “Let’s find a hotel first, then we can eat.”

  I hate to say famous last words again; however, we soon discovered we were no longer in Kansas…

  The Never-Ending Day 5

  The Great Hotel Hunt

  Armed with the hotel list my sister made, a map of the greater Flint area and a rental car, we started the search for a place to stay. Driving in the general direction of the airport, we quickly found the first hotel on her list. Pulling into the driveway we had great hopes this one would be a step up from the last. At least the car suspension wasn’t groaning from potholes and cracked pavement.

  “We are not giving them our names or credit cards until we inspect the room!” I told her.

  She really didn’t need to respond, I could read her mind, “No kidding.”

  Stepping from the car once again, I had to wonder if the humidity would finish the job a lack of food had started. Weak knees and shaking hands notwithstanding, I walked into the second hotel lobby of the day. Two inches into the doorway my nasal passages were assailed with a now familiar odor, referred to in Michigan as ‘evergreen’. I truly believe this name is derived from the fact that when you smell it, you turn green.

  Not waiting for my sister to clear the doorway, I turned to exit the building. Just as the woman behind the counter started to ask, “Can I help you?”

  Holding my breath in a vain attempt to avoid inhaling, I was unable to respond. My sister however, still standing mostly outside, smiled and said, “Apparently not.”

  We quickly climbed back in the car. “The evergreen salesman must be making a killing here.” I told her. Laughing for the first time in hours, we set our sights on the next hotel on the list, which by the way was another rather famous franchise hotel. Pulling into the driveway I couldn’t help but ask, “Do the idiots at corporate headquarters have any idea what these hotels look like before they sell ‘em the signs?”

  “Doubtful,” my sister replied as she was being pressed against the door, as I made a quick U-turn out of the parking lot. “We aren’t even going to look?” She questioned.

  “Do you really want to look?”

  “Ok, next we go down…” Once again her directions were perfect, leading us to yet another driveway, which I again entered and exited very quickly. Pulling into a gas station, I parked the car with the engine running, there was no way I wanted to lose the comfort of the air-conditioning.

  “I wonder how far these seats lay back.”

  My sister’s eyebrow rose higher then I’d ever seen it do before, “You’re not thinking of sleeping in this car?”

  “As a matter of fact I am! It beats the hell out of any hotel I’ve seen thus far. In fact, it looks downright comfy at the moment.”

  “We need food.”

  It was my turn to be sarcastic, “No kidding.”

  “Why don’t we head back to the other side of town? I think the area where the car rental lot is was a newer area.” This confirmed she was thinking along the same lines as I, no way was I staying in the ‘evergreen’ belt to eat.

  It was about this time, when my brain started functioning again, “Why don’t we call the big guy (my sisters hubby is 6’4) and have him get on the internet and see if he can locate a room in a decent hotel.”

  “Good idea.” I could tell sis wanted nothing more than to give me the calling card and make me exit the vehicle, which I had no plans of doing. “This is the first time in six months I’ve missed my cell phone,” she whined.

  “This is the first time in my life I’ve wanted to own a cell phone. You get to brave the humidity and call him.” Looking rather p
ut out; she exited the car and made the call.

  “I told him we plan to find a restaurant and would call him back in an hour.” Putting the car in drive, I quickly back-tracked our route to the rental lot and found a nice little country buffet conveniently located across the street. Now we were in business. They not only had food, they had restrooms, coffee, a phone, and to my vast delight, a smoking section.

  Having availed ourselves of the soap and water in the ladies room, we both felt a little better about approaching food. Filling our plates, we found a seat and at 6:30 p.m., we finally had our first true meal of the day. Not much talking went on during the first few minutes. I think we both wanted to savor every bite and gain some energy back.

  Once we finished desert, we again set our sights on the elusive prize—a hotel room.

  “Why don’t you call home and see what he’s found.”

  She returned in less than five minutes with the news we had a room. The Holiday Inn was holding a room in our names and all we had to do was find it. Spreading the map on the table, we quickly realized the hotel in question was just over the freeway, about six blocks from where we sat.

  “The only thing is this room is a lot more expensive than we planned for this trip,” she told me.

  “Do they have showers?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do they have ‘evergreen’ rooms?”

  “No!”

  “Then let’s go.” I said this as I picked up the keys from the table, dropped a tip for the waitress, and started to head for the door.

  It was at this exact moment when a light bulb went off in my sister’s head and she suddenly remembered she is a government employee. “I bet we could get a discount with my government id.”

  Turning back to look at her as she swept the map from the table to join me, I queried, “You get a discount on hotels?”

  “I can get a discount on a lot of things, airline tickets, rental cars, hotels…”

  “And you’re just now remembering you have these benefits?” I think my voice held a note of surprise.

  Laughing a little, she said, “Guess I should have thought of that sooner.”

  “Ya think?”

  “Well we got a good deal on the car already, they probably wouldn’t have given us much more of a discount.”

  “Doesn’t matter, just get that puppy out and let’s see what the hotel has to say about getting a discount.”

  The drive to the Holiday Inn was uneventful. And the hotel was a blessing. Walking into the lobby we found ourselves in the lap of luxury. Well, probably not the lap of luxury, however compared to where we had come from, this hotel was a five star in ours eyes. Taking command of the situation, my sister quickly whipped out her government id and obtained a very nice discount for us. Ten minutes after arriving we entered our suite and fell onto beds. I must add, beds with mattresses, a room with calming colors, a bathroom with a real tub and no mold. Comfy chairs to sit in, furniture that matched and carpet which was not stained. Best of all—no ‘evergreen’!!

  You may be thinking…ok the worst is over, surely the trip went smoothly from there…keep turning pages to find out about our Road Trip!

  Day 6

  The Road Trip

  Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise. Have you ever noticed this doesn’t work? First of all, can someone please explain to me how the heck you get to bed early…oh I have the early rise down pat, it’s the long list of things to do that keeps me up ‘til the wee hours between eleven and midnight. You’re right this has nothing to do with the road trip, just a burning question I’ve been dying to ask. Back to the story…

  The shower in the new hotel room worked great, it even had hot water. After about an hour, my sister and I had our make-up in place, hair done, and we were dressed for a day of adventure. The plan you ask…get in the car, as fast as possible so the make-up doesn’t melt off our faces…turn the wheel and head for a great lake.

  Backing up a bit…we decided as long as we had traveled all the way to Michigan, it was pointless not to take one day and see some sights. So we didn’t tell anyone in the family we’d arrived. Before closing our eyes to sleep last evening, we reviewed the map and chose a route that would take us from Flint to Port Huron. So at approximately 8:15 a.m., with a bag of McDonald’s Sausage McGriddles on the seat between us, we headed east. Blissfully unaware the phone in our room was ringing off the hook.

  After leaving the city limits and reaching wide open spaces filled with farmland, we were suddenly hit with a smoldering need to know the following: “Why is there nothing growing in those fields?”

  “I’m not sure. I thought this was farm country.” Looking in my sister’s direction I could see the confusion written on her face.

  “I expected a lot of green things to be growing.”

  “Me too,” I ventured.

  “Have you seen any farm animals?”

  “Not a one, maybe we are in the wrong part of the state.”

  “We are not in the wrong part of the state,” she informed me. “You can see the fields, there just isn’t anything growing in them.”

  “Maybe it’s the wrong season.”

  “It’s July. The corn should be waist high by now.”

  The search for fertile fields ended when the trees lining the freeway blocked our ability to see anything else except leaves. Leaves I might add which were not, I repeat not, blowing in the breeze. There was no breeze.

  “It’s still pretty.” I think she was trying to reassure me.

  “Yes it is.” I had to agree.

  For the next eighty or ninety miles we talked about a lot of things, however one topic stands out most in my memory. The conversation went something like this.

  “I’m surprised there is no wildlife.”

  “It’s probably too hot for them to be out.”

  “That’s true.”

  It was seconds after this conversation started that we were treated to our first glimpse of Michigan’s wildlife population.

  “Oh gross!”

  “You said you wanted to see wildlife.”

  “Yes, but not dead on the side of the road.” My sister looked a little green as she said this.

  “Oh look there’s some more.”

  “Ok, enough. I don’t want to see anymore wildlife.”

  Unfortunately for us, the road between Flint and Port Huron was a cornucopia of road kill.

  After about an hour and a half, three detours for road work, and little over a quarter of a tank of gas used, we arrived on the banks of the St. Clair River. Parking the car, we steeled ourselves for the heat, grabbed a camera, and strolled down the path to a park.

  Standing on the sidewalk, the St. Clair River in front of us, we gazed across the turquoise waterway to Canada. Sailboats floated past, their masts standing tall against the blue sky littered with drifting puffs of white cloud…hey maybe I should write travel brochures. Taking each other’s picture, we walked a short distance down the river, hoping for a hint of a breeze, which didn’t come, as sweat dripped down our backs and the heat made breathing difficult, we headed back to the air-conditioned comfort of the car.

  We'd planned on spending time touring the city of Port Huron, however the state of Michigan in their infinite wisdom decided the height of tourist season was a good time to close down the main road through town and tear up the streets and sidewalks.

  On to plan B.

  Looking at the map we determined since we had all day—after all, the family didn’t know we were in the state—we could make the drive around the thumb. Setting the cruise control to fifty miles an hour, we started a lazy, relaxed drive up the coast of Lake Huron. With the calming waters of the lake visible every so often, we followed the turning, twisting road north; lots of houses, closed gates, and trees blocked most of the view.

  Just as the car settled into its rhythm, the van in front of me hit the brakes. My foot instinctively reacted quickly as I brought the Park Aven
ue to a screeching halt behind the blue beast, now sitting sideways across the road.

  “Oh gross!”

  We watched in horror as the driver calmly exited the vehicle and dragged the newest addition to Michigan’s road kill buffet toward the shoulder. Stepping back into his car, he pulled the van to the side of the road, allowing those of us behind him to continue on our merry way.

  Needless to say we drove on in silence for a little while, the speed now down to forty miles an hour as my eyes darted back and forth, looking vigilantly for any sign of leaping deer determined to enter the roadway in front of me.

  Finally arriving in Lexington, we decided to stop and explore.

  We avoided the sweet shop, the ice cream parlor, and the fudge factory, instead concentrating our efforts on t-shirts, postcards, shot glasses, etc. Proud of our ability to resist the temptation of sweets, we purchased bottled water and a small bag of salted peanuts at the corner drug store before getting back in the car to once again take up the quest for adventure.

  “I’m sure we will find a café or something at the next town. It’s too early to eat yet.” I assuredly told my sister.

  “Oh I agree, the peanuts will be fine for now. I’m sure there are lots of places to eat further up the road.”

  Oy, you would think we would have learned our lesson over the last few days. However, for some reason, we always mistakenly believed the next town would offer a host of food establishments.

  “So what is the next charming village we come to?”

  Looking at the map, my sister read off a series of names for hamlets, towns, and bumps in the road, which lined the path ahead. Mile after mile I drove on, hoping the next twist in the road or crest of a hill would reveal the ever elusive country diner. So much for eating!

  As we reached Port Hope, a small township over two hours away from Lexington, I noted a small grocery store as I zipped past. “Hey that was a grocery store.”

  “We could at least get some more water and peanuts. Turn around.”

  Pulling into the next available drive way, I turned the Park Avenue and returned to the site of the grocery store. Exiting the vehicle, we both noticed a small window on the side of the building clearly marked “Ice Cream”, and best of all, no line.