My sister, Bonnie, and I just got back from a road trip to Arizona to help out our parents. This trip involved 42 hours together in a car, with a few strategic stops along the way to eat unhealthily and use bathrooms of questionable cleanliness. In short, it was a rousing success. Here are some deep thoughts from along the way.
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Dear Foil Packet of Cheap Shampoo,
I tried to open you as I stood in a robin's egg blue hotel bathtub somewhere in Kansas, surrounded by mango-colored tile, with a weak stream of lukewarm shower water drizzling down on me. I could not get you open. I tried with one hand, then the other. I dried my hands on a towel outside the shower curtain and tried again. I finally resorted to using my teeth. On the third try, I gnawed a tiny hole through. I was rewarded with a quarter ounce of vaguely soapy liquid with the scent of Generic Grandmother. Why did that have to be so difficult?
Sincerely,
Sarah
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Dear Texahoma,
I appreciated you for using a name that makes your town's position on the border of Texas and Oklahoma obvious. I also appreciated your 25-foot paper mache cowboy as a photo opportunity, even though some unkind soul had taken the liberty of punching a hole through his nether-regions. I wonder if it was the same unkind soul who shot a bullet through the groin bits of every sign with a cow on it in the entire state of Texas. Regardless, thank you Texahoma.
Sincerely,
Sarah
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Dear New Mexico Stuckey's Gift Shop,
I admit that when I saw the first poorly-formed, half-life-size plastic figurine of a Native American of Indeterminate Tribe, I thought it might be tacky. But when I saw that they were 50% off, so that I could get both of them as a culturally insensitive matched pair, suddenly that made it all better.
Sincerely,
Sarah
Dear Unnamed Officer of the Joplin Missouri Police Department,
Thank you for pulling me over at 1am as I turned into the parking lot of an utterly deserted gas station near the freeway, to remind me that a turn signal is important even if absolutely no one is around to see me use it. More importantly, thank you for not giving me a ticket, as you must have recognized from my frazzled hair and car full of McDonald's trash that I had clearly suffered enough already.
Sincerely,
Sarah
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Dear Foil Packet of Cheap Shampoo,
I tried to open you as I stood in a robin's egg blue hotel bathtub somewhere in Kansas, surrounded by mango-colored tile, with a weak stream of lukewarm shower water drizzling down on me. I could not get you open. I tried with one hand, then the other. I dried my hands on a towel outside the shower curtain and tried again. I finally resorted to using my teeth. On the third try, I gnawed a tiny hole through. I was rewarded with a quarter ounce of vaguely soapy liquid with the scent of Generic Grandmother. Why did that have to be so difficult?
Sincerely,
Sarah
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Dear Texahoma,
I appreciated you for using a name that makes your town's position on the border of Texas and Oklahoma obvious. I also appreciated your 25-foot paper mache cowboy as a photo opportunity, even though some unkind soul had taken the liberty of punching a hole through his nether-regions. I wonder if it was the same unkind soul who shot a bullet through the groin bits of every sign with a cow on it in the entire state of Texas. Regardless, thank you Texahoma.
Sincerely,
Sarah
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Dear New Mexico Stuckey's Gift Shop,
I admit that when I saw the first poorly-formed, half-life-size plastic figurine of a Native American of Indeterminate Tribe, I thought it might be tacky. But when I saw that they were 50% off, so that I could get both of them as a culturally insensitive matched pair, suddenly that made it all better.
Sincerely,
Sarah
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Dear Eagar Arizona Fire & Rescue,
When an anonymous caller phoned you on Monday to report that there was a large bonfire blazing out of control behind my parents' house, and that "two little girls" were running around it frantically with a garden hose trying to keep the nearby tree and woodpile from catching on fire, what they really meant was that Bonnie and I had the situation completely under control. I promise. Thank you for coming to hang out with us for a while anyway. Inviting the ambulance along was a nice touch, too.
Sincerely,
Sarah
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Dear Unnamed Officer of the Joplin Missouri Police Department,
Thank you for pulling me over at 1am as I turned into the parking lot of an utterly deserted gas station near the freeway, to remind me that a turn signal is important even if absolutely no one is around to see me use it. More importantly, thank you for not giving me a ticket, as you must have recognized from my frazzled hair and car full of McDonald's trash that I had clearly suffered enough already.
Sincerely,
Sarah
I hope you kept a "ledger".
ReplyDeleteI wish I would have known you were in NM, so I could have had a moment of silence in honor of the fact we were both in the same state.
Oh yes, a ledger was definitely involved. As you know, it's the only way to split travel expenses fairly! Fortunately, unlike the odyssey we took freshman year, this trip didn't involve subsisting solely on 2 dozen Krispy Kreme donuts or getting a speeding ticket in Pangwitch, UT.
ReplyDeleteSarah,
ReplyDeleteYou friended me on facebook, I saw you had a blog, and have spent the last few minutes perusing. You are hilarious and wonderful! I hope things are going well in St. Louis--t seems they are! Anna