Tucson

A little known fact; I was born in Tucson, Arizona, but remember nothing of that time since I was an infant and my brain capacity was not capable of long-term memory yet. But on the trips we were able to visit Tucson on a few occasions. The first visit I remember was one of the early times on the trip when Mom was along, we made it a point to visit the apartment building I lived in after I was born. It was an ordinary building and it looked a lot like some of the motels we stay at. The thing that impressed me the most was that it had a pool (like most every home or apartment in Tucson) and I was happy to think that I once lived in a place that had a pool at my disposal - even though I was only a baby and couldn't swim. Mom told me all about some of our neighbors and pointed out what apartment they lived. One of our neighbors at the time, and good friend of my mom's, was Linda See, who later went off and married a Beatle and became Linda McCartney. At the time we were visiting the apartment I don't think Linda had married Paul yet so Mom spoke of Linda only as an old friend that she missed very much. Linda had a baby daughter at the time I was born so my mom and her had something in common and spent a lot of "mommy time" together. Mom said that Linda had a car with air conditioning, so they would do their mommy errands in her car with some comfort since the temperature in Tucson would often be over 100. I remember nothing about these times and have no recollection of Linda and her daughter, Heather, but there are pictures of Linda holding me as a baby and things seemed quite normal for us.

But the most memorable visit to Tucson by far was the year I went on the trip with just me and Dad. Mom stayed at home for some reason and I think this was the beginning of the end for Mom and the trips, I think it was because my sister Katrina was too young to make the trip that year, at least that was the excuse, but the real reason was probably because Mom was sick of the traveling. But this year was just me and Dad for the whole trip, we were going to Wind River Ranch and share a cabin with my cousin, and unbeknownst to me, I was to have my first whole can of beer and throw up over the excitement, but that's another story all together.

Dad and I started out the trip as usual and this year we were to do something different and special and go to a whole other country: Mexico. The thought of going to another country that wasn't the United States was exciting and I was really looking forward to it. We started off the trip in San Diego and stayed at one of the first Motel 6's of all of the trips, very close to the border, so close that we could actually see across the border into Mexico from the motel. The next day we drove into Tijuana, parked the car on what seemed like a safe place and walked around the shops for a couple of hours. Tijuana was like one big gift shop with lots of Mexican things like big belt buckles, leather whips, sombreros, and Mexican jumping beans. I got a small scoop full of jumping beans from a very friendly Mexican lady who enjoyed selling her beans to Americans, even though we had already bought some when we walked past again for a second time she insisted we buy some more jumping beans, like already buying from her didn't matter, or she didn't recognize us again a few minutes later. But then again a lot of the buying in Tijuana was like that. I also wanted a pair of bongo drums, and since we were in Tijuana where bargaining was encouraged, we searched for the best deal on bongos, and there were many choices for sure. Having found an acceptable deal we got back into the car and headed for our next destination, Tucson, Arizona.

We drove along the border in Mexico, which was fairly unexciting and I ended up sleeping most of the time, but a few times during our drive in Mexico the car made a strange noise, This caused minor concern for Dad and we continued our trip as usual. We crossed the border into Arizona without incident, declaring the bongo drums and jumping beans as the only things we were bring from Mexico, which didn't seem to be a problem. We drove through the desert and it was typically hot, we were just passing an observatory toward our right in the distance when all of a sudden the car made a terrible noise and began to shake violently. Dad pulled over and we checked the problem; one of our rear axles had broken and the wheel had come completely off. Had there not been a fender covering the top of the tire the whole wheel might've come completely off and would've flown across the highway, luckily it didn't. But here we were, in the middle of the desert about 50 miles away from Tucson, I was convinced we were going to die since there wasn't another car to be seen anywhere, I thought we were completely stranded with no hope of survival and I thought of my Mom's friend Linda and her daughter Heather and how Tucson was going to be my place of birth, and death. I started to cry.

Dad calmed me down and tried to convince me we weren't going to die. He first opened the trunk and got out the cash from the tool box and a few other valuables, I think I was also told to get my small bag of stuff. Dad got out one of those faded red gas station rags and waited for a car to come by, one car did come by shortly and he waved the red rag to stop the car. The car that stopped had 3 or 4 Mexican men and they all looked suspicious and mean, and they didn't speak English, Dad politely told them we were okay to wait for another car and they drove off without saying anything, Dad said he didn't like the looks of that group and we were probably better off waiting for another car. And shortly after that another car did come by again, and this was an older family with an adult daughter. They agreed to drive us into Tucson, this time them being suspicious of us, but Dad convinced them we were harmless and so they drove us an hour to Tucson, having forced small talk with occasional periods of awkward silence along the way. As a way to break the silence I told them I was born in Tucson, which they politely acknowledged but really didn't seem to care about.

They dropped us off at the first Holiday Inn we came to just entering Tucson, all of us being relieved from this inconvenient encounter, we quickly forgot about them as soon as they drove off. We checked in to the Holiday Inn and Dad immediately called a tow truck to deal with the car. We got something to eat and waited for the tow truck to arrive. It was early evening when the tow truck finally arrived and Dad explained that it was just him and me so I needed to come along to retrieve the car. The driver was really friendly and nice and told me to hop in and sit in the middle between him and my dad right with all the many stick-shifts and levers. The driver was really good natured and more than glad to be helping us out, I was relieved by this fact and proceeded to make conversation with the guy, talking about cars and our recent visit to Mexico. Since he was a tow truck driver all of the conversation tended to be about cars, and the hour drive to our car went fast. It was dark by the time we reached our car and the driver quickly and efficiently hooked the station wagon up to the truck, the atmosphere now didn't seem so perilous and I had forgotten about how scared I was that afternoon, and a few minutes later we turned around and were back off again toward Tucson. When we got back to the Holiday Inn it was late, around midnight, the driver waited while we unpacked the ice chests and essentials, and was off to take the car to be fixed to some location he and Dad had discussed. We never saw the nice tow truck driver again.

But that's not the end of the story. We spent the next couple of days at the Holiday Inn, mostly hanging around the pool since it was hot and we had nothing better to do, Dad would occasionally make some phone calls to deal with the car. But in a couple of days the car was fixed and we set off to pick it up. The thought of taking a cab was mentioned but Dad thought it would be a better idea to walk to the Ford place and pick the car up, Dad assured me it wasn't too far, only a couple of miles. So we set off on foot sometime in the late morning and it started off not being too bad of a walk. I kept thinking that over the next hill or right around the next bend we would see the Ford dealership. Well, the short walk turned out to be longer - a lot longer, than I expected. I suspect Dad knew this all along and was avoiding getting a cab, and Dad kept telling me we were almost there, sometimes showing me on the map where we were, but the distance on the map was misleading, and to make matters worse it was getting really hot. The neighborhoods we were walking through weren't much to look at either, being regular neighborhoods with houses and streets, or desolate commercial areas where we had to cross vast highways with no crosswalks. About halfway through the walk Dad agrees to stop into a 7-11 and get a drink and an ice cream, this is when I first realized the value of water in the desert, and found out that drinking a Coke when you're really hot and dehydrated actually makes you more thirsty. Dad was eager about teaching me this lesson about the importance of water and continued to remind me that drinking Cokes (like Mom) wasn't a good idea. The more we walked the more irritated and hot I got and kept suggesting that we get a cab for the rest of the walk (not that there were any taxicabs in this part of town) Dad rejected the idea every time and we kept walking despite the 100 degree heat and the successive degeneration of each neighborhood we entered. We finally came into an area that was totally undeveloped except for some freeway construction, we walked up a big hill with no traffic and toward the top of the hill we could see the Ford dealership and garage, in the middle of nowhere. Boy! I was glad to see that place, and even more glad to find out that the car was fixed and ready to go. I relaxed in the relative coolness of the garage while Dad paid a lot of money for the car. Dad later explained to me that he used some of the "emergency money" for the car, anyway, it seemed like a lot what it cost to fix the car. Soon again we were back in our car and driving back to the Holiday Inn, it seemed like luxury to be driving again after that miserable walk and I tried to forget the whole afternoon hike.

We got back to the Holiday in late afternoon, we packed up the car, checked out and proceeded on my first "night drive" as Dad called it, to make up for lost time.