All Who Wander Are Sometimes Lost

An essay

My brother Bobby had a great summer job for a seventeen year old, ushering everything from baseball games at Wrigley Field to concerts at an outdoor music venue. And then, one morning, everything changed. Bobby’s boss told him he was required to work crowd control at the upcoming Democratic convention in Chicago, to be held in late August.

My mom panicked. Newspapers predicted an extremely volatile situation. The year 1968 was already extraordinarily troubled with violent rioting, the escalation of the Vietnam War, civil rights conflicts, mandatory draft, and two assassinations—Martin Luther King Jr. in April Bobby Kennedy two months later. 

There was no way Mom was going to let Bobby go into that fiery furnace. The only way my brother could be protected was to get him out of Chicago.

We packed the car and just left. No plans. No reservations. A vague direction, but no particular destination. Like every other road trip we took as a family, it never even occurred to my parents that we should know where we were headed. My three brothers and I just needed to be back for school, which started right after Labor Day.

My grandmother who lived with us knew full well how these things went down. She had no desire to be stuffed in a station wagon with six other people with no destination in mind. She stayed at home, praying for our safety and thanking the good Lord that she didn’t have to go.

Our vehicle at the time was a sky-blue Chevy Impala station wagon. My father, a chemist, inventor, and more than a little bit like the nutty professor, concocted a matching sky-blue water-proof coating for our canvas luggage carrier, which looked like a ridiculous malignant growth on top of the car. However, we had no suitcases. Mom threw in anything she thought we could possibly need, from winter jackets to swimsuits, and her ever-present enormous sun hat.

Mom determined a long time ago that every trip needed to be educational. On the bench seat, front and center between Dad and Mom, was a complete set of the World Book encyclopedia, just in case we might need to look something up, like armadillos.

Dad commandeered the steering wheel as soon as we picked him up from work. Living in Chicago, even the summers were not hot enough for Dad. So, we headed south. Some 1400 miles later—after stopping only for gas, a rotation of drivers, and a blown-out tire at the Will Rogers Memorial in Claremore, Oklahoma—we landed in McAllen, Texas. Dad stumbled upon a bargain no-name motel with a pool. That night we discovered why it was so cheap: it was situated next to the tracks. All night, two-mile long freight trains rumbled past the hotel, shaking the beds.

The next morning, Dad declared Texas wasn’t warm enough, and so we headed further south, crossing the Mexican border. On this second leg of our journey into the unknown, we stopped only once, spending the night at the solitary motel of a small Mexican town. Two beds for six people meant that two of us had to sleep on the nasty floor or in a chair. I chose the chair.

Mom ventured into a small grocery and purchased a crate of Coca-Cola in small bottles and anything with an American label, including every cellophane-wrapped snack cake they had. She didn’t trust the food or water.

We drove past little villages on a two-lane highway, through deserts and over mountains, often leaving behind a cloud of dust. Our windows were rolled down for a hint of a breeze as we had no air conditioning. We were so remote, the radio didn’t even pick up a signal. We sang self-composed operettas and reinvented Beach Boys lyrics, until my dad exploded. 

Eight hundred miles into Mexico, the road suddenly ran out in Acapulco. I think Dad imagined a tropical resort vacation by the sea. 

But we didn’t have money for a resort, nor reservations. When we pulled into town just before sunset, Dad spotted a little A-frame cottage, the only completed unit on a construction site for a new motel. Knowing no Spanish, Dad used his universal language, pointing to the A-frame and offering a wad of pesos. The workers smiled enthusiastically and unlocked the door. It was all we needed with four built-in twin beds on the main floor, a large bed in an open loft, and a small refrigerator. But what really cinched it was that Dad could walk across the two-lane to the beach.

A Kentucky Fried Chicken down the street kept us fed. It was cheap, and the pieces of chicken were enormous. Bobby questioned if it was even chicken. Tommy declared it was fried roadkill. I ate only biscuits. In the evenings, Dad bought a half-gallon of ice cream which we shared with six spoons.

At the beach, Mom coated herself in sunblock and hid under her huge hat and a rented beach umbrella. My brothers and I slathered on baby oil for maximum tan, bought canvas hats from a beach vendor, and swam all day in the ocean. My dad, a life-long beach-goer with tough leather-like skin, stretched out on a towel and sunburned the very first day. The tops of his feet were so blistered he couldn’t even wear shoes. 

No pictures exist from that trip. Bobby also worked part-time at a photo shop. Every time we pulled out our Kodak Brownie camera, he asked us if that picture was really worth the fifty cents it cost for film and developing. We have no visible proof we were even there, and no way of knowing it would be our last road trip with the whole family.

Relaxing late one afternoon in the A-frame, amidst construction noise, Bobby took a nap on the large bed upstairs. My nine-year-old brother Doug, always the observant one, called out: “Look! There’s a huge scorpion on the ceiling.” No sooner had he spoken than it dropped down on the bed. Bobby spun like a corkscrew coming down the spiral staircase.

We spent the rest of the evening searching for that deadly scorpion. Dad borrowed a broom from the workers, ready to use as a weapon. After a few hours, Dad yelled, “I got him! Just swept him out,” as he slid the glass door shut. “Better get to bed. We have to leave early in the morning if we’re going to get you kids back to school on time.” Just like that, our vacation was over.

Dad was uncharacteristically prompt the next morning. He shoved our stuff in the car and high-tailed out of town.

He looked terrible. Meanwhile, Mom’s head bobbed against the side window. She was sound asleep.

“You didn’t sweep the scorpion out after all, did you?” I said to Dad. He didn’t answer. 

Dad drove like a mad man. By this time, Mom was more terrified of being in Mexico than of the Democrats. 

We didn’t stop. A few days and 2,265 miles later, Dad was back in his laboratory, lost in another world. Mom was teaching violin lessons to fledgling students. We kids started school.

That first day, my English teacher assigned an essay. She wanted us to write 200 words about “What I did on summer break.”

But I had only three: You wouldn’t believe.

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Karen Wells is a Nashville-based writer and survivor of spontaneous family road trips. A member of The Habit community since 2022, she writes short stories and essays, and has maintained two blogs for more than twenty years www.worddujour.blogspot.com and www.nightlytea.blogspot.com.