It may have been the Summer of ’74. I know I was a teenager and did not possess a driver’s license, but I was close. I already had a stripped-down Toyota Corolla my brother-in-law gifted me with about 250K miles on it. I had been driving heavy equipment, tugs, and tow motors at the cotton compress with my dad for years, and I was a very competent driver of my stick-shift Corolla. Cops did not care back in the day because they knew I could drive. But at vacation time, Dad drove because we were now on the interstates with highway patrolmen.
That would be one of my last vacations with my parents. After that summer, they always gave me the option of staying home, and come on— a week by myself as a teenager? No way I was turning down that offer. June and July were months of the greatest vibe and the best memories. Our days were filled playing tennis, practicing, and winning tournaments. We floated down the San Gabriel River at least once a week, relishing the moment, unconcerned about the future, never anticipating getting older. Flip flops, blue jean cutoffs, and tank tops were the attire of the day. My hair was on my back. Songs such as “Seasons in the Sun,” “The Loco-Motion,” “Bennie and the Jets,” “Jungle Boogie,” “Sunshine on My Shoulders,” and “Feel Like Makin’ Love” from the AM radio filled the air. Time stood still in July. The Sandlot describes my childhood, and That '70s Show mimics my teen years.
Our vacation that summer was like most trips, driving from town to town, seeing the sights, and gobbling up the road. Leaving Sweetwater, we headed for West Texas and Laredo so we could cross the border into Mexico. I have no idea why we did so. Mexico was safe back then, but the food was the same on both sides of the river. However, trinkets, leather, and ponchos were extremely cheap on the Mexican side. On the way to Laredo, our A/C went out, and it was hot! We traveled with all four windows down and the vents open. I felt like I was being cooked in a convection oven, but there was no such thing back then. I sweated so profusely that I destroyed the back seat on the driver’s side by soaking it with salty perspiration. There would be no A/C for the entire trip. Dad got lost in Nuevo Laredo. I kept telling him which turn to take, but he did not listen and finally told me to be quiet so I zipped it, sweated, and smiled, knowing what was coming. After about 30 minutes, my dad pulled over, got out, opened my door, and said, “Don’t say a word,” and I drove us out of Mexico.
I had one request for the trip. I wanted to stay at motels (that is where budget-minded, poor folks stayed) that had a pool. I loved diving boards and learning new stunts. At one such place near the mountains, there was indeed a pool, filled with runoff water from the snow. I did my normal and dove off the board without checking the water. It felt like I had dived into liquid nitrogen. It took my breath away, and I am sure I was turning blue. My dad came out to join me and, of course, I said, “Just jump in, Dad, it’s great!” He trusted his son, so he dove in, stayed underwater the length of the pool, jumped up the steps, and headed straight to the room saying, “I hate you, boy!”
On a narrow road high in the mountains, we stopped at a roadside viewing point with picnic tables and ate our bologna sandwiches while looking at the majesty of the peaks and valleys. We only ate at restaurants once or twice on our vacations. They were expensive. This viewing point overlooked a valley and had a steep cliff. I got to the very edge, and my mom got nervous. What she could not see but was clear to me was a shelf about six feet below the edge that extended out at least twenty feet and was sloped inward so there was no way to roll off. I waved at my parents and jumped off, crouching down when I landed. I waited about 15 seconds and jumped back up to my dad saying “idiot” and my mom having that “I’m going to kill you” look. She hammered me with her purse for a good bit while I laughed. She had to change her capris.
On the way home, the engine of the Buick LeSabre blew a hose, and we were going no further. We were somewhere in the middle of the West Texas plains with no town in sight. My dad spotted an old, abandoned truck in a field. He crawled through a barbed-wire fence and, with extremely limited tools, “borrowed” a hose, cut it to size, and with a “borrowed” clamp, installed it in our car. My dad rose about ten feet in my eyes that day.
What we thought at the time was that we had experienced the vacation from hades. But we told the stories repeatedly, and that vacation stayed among our favorite memories. They were beautiful days. We got up early to beat the heat and saw amazing sunrises. Our “restaurants” were roadside parks, experiencing the grandeur of the Creator while sharing sandwiches, Lay’s potato chips, and a cold Coke in a bottle. In the evenings, my parents would sit by the pool and relax while watching me do my signature dives. There was little, if any, TV in the evenings, and we would drift off to sleep just after sunset. There were no cell phones, and we did not make a single phone call the entire trip. If people needed us, they could wait until we got home. And when we arrived home, we discovered that life was just as it was when we left. Summer vibe. We laughed. We talked about the sights. We read historical markers. My dad would make jokes about the old signs that said, “Litter Barrel 5 Miles” and say, “Who would name a town Litter Barrel?”
Those are forgotten days, and that is okay. Time marches on, right? However, my prayer for you is that you discover the summer vibe that offers those groovy feelings all year round. We kept that Buick for at least another decade, and I smiled every time I looked at the ruined back seat upholstery.
