The heavens declare the glory of God;
the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
Day after day they pour forth speech;
night after night they reveal knowledge.
They have no speech, they use no words;
no sound is heard from them.
Yet their voice goes out into all the earth,
their words to the ends of the world.
Psalm 19:1-4
The van died.
Six years ago when we took the old family van on vacation, I did not want to take it. I did not trust that van!! After 10 hours of driving, a half-mile into my turn to drive, the transmission went out! We had to have it towed, spent a day determining repairs were not worth it, and drove all over Cheboygan, MI in second gear until we found a replacement van. Cheboygan’s most expensive souvenir.
Now, six years later, when we decided to take the old family van (v.2) on a random vision quest to Las Vegas, I did not want to take it. I did not trust the van!! The first leg of our trip, we drove it 8 ½ hours through 4 states, stopping only when we absolutely had to, and arrived at a Holiday Inn in Middle-of-Nowhere Missouri at 12:30 am on Saturday night.
And when we went to park the van…the van died.
Me: “Colin, you made a good point earlier.”
Colin: “I made a point?”
Me: “When I asked you, ‘Why in the world would you want to drive for 30 hours one-way to take an antique coffin to Las Vegas?’ and you said, ‘I like the drive. It’s interesting.’ I think you nailed it.”
When The Beast opened at Kings Island in Mason, Ohio in 1979, it was the world’s longest, tallest and fastest wooden roller coaster. People stood in line for hours to ride that ride. There was such a cool factor to being in that line….but I was just 11 years old, and I had not figured out “cool” yet. I thought I was doing very well to not look terrified!
The wait took hours…hours of rock music, surrounded by teenagers in concert Ts, everybody with long hair and NOBODY looking near as terrified as they should, given their impending doom… and eventually we’d come up to the sign…
The turnstiles were right around the corner and there was no time left to run, and I remember really hoping my head was below that line!! I mean really…is it safe if I’m just barely tall enough?? Are we sure about this? Has anyone tested this theory??
Unruly Hope 