A Legacy Project

Recall a family vacation. A funny one. A disastrous one. An unhappy one. Where did you go? What did you do? Why is it memorable?

When I was in the third grade our family went on a week-long vacation. We drove from our hometown, Freeland, up to Michigan’s upper peninsula. We drove through Marquette, on to Houghton, and up into the Keewanau Peninsula, to Fort Wilkins, to Lake Fanny-Ho (my mother thought that was a funny name). We saw black bears in the dump near Lake Gogebic. (And had fun pronouncing and mispronouncing that word). A distance of 300-400 miles, one way. We went in a new pickup truck my dad brought. Four of us, and the dog, in the cab. It was tight. We didn’t complain. But then, I think my brother and I had learned not to complain. It didn’t do any good. We pulled our 14 foot boat behind the truck. That week, 2-3 times we put the boat in the water and water-skied. It was cold and rainy. Even so, we went in the water. People thought we were crazy. We did too and enjoyed the fact that it was kind of crazy. Every so often we passed gift shops with Indian stuff, mocassins, dream catchers, pipes. We never stopped at one of those shops. My parents were absolute on that matter–it was junk, it was a waste of money.