Europe by the Seat of Our Pants. Part, The End.

Sunday, March 15

My father turned 80 years old on March 25, 2020. For the past year, the family has been talking about having a big bash for him. We kicked around the idea of having a surprise party for him and then sometime in January, he made it known of his plans for his own surprise party. How does one have a surprise party for themselves? His answer was “It will be a surprise if I live that long!” He lives in Victorville, CA, the high desert area north of San Bernardino, which is an hour east of Los Angeles. He scheduled to use his local church building for March 27, in the evening.

When I looked at what my schedule would be after coming home from our trip, it was going to be very difficult to get back to CA two weeks later. My sister RoAnn and my mother had driven down from Utah for the trip and there was no way that they would be able to come back. Just to clarify… my parents have been split and remarried for over 30 years, but have a healthy relationship. Long past are any hard feelings or animosity toward each other. This has proven to be a blessing for the whole family and there is never an instance of “chose one over the other”. RoAnn and mom wanted to be at the birthday party. Since we were going to be coming through Los Angeles on the weekend of the 14th, we decided to have a family get together on Sunday afternoon.

Back when I booked our flights to and from Phoenix, I had booked an early Sunday flight to return home. Joe and Amy booked with us, so we could travel together. We were staying at the airport so there was no reason to linger. Once the birthday plans were set, I changed our flight home to late Sunday. We would rent a car in the morning, drive out to my sisters in Rancho Cucamonga for the party, and then return to LAX to fly home. The Haggards would leave in the morning.

As our trip progressed, the plan for the party started to fall apart. Sometime during the last week, it was flat out cancelled. Dad said he would have an 80.5 party late summer, and it would still be a surprise. Now I needed to change our flight back to the morning. On Friday, I checked with Southwest Airlines, and it was going to cost me $166 to change our flights back to the ORIGINAL time. I tried again before we left Paris, with the same result. I decided to leave it and see what I could do at the airport in Los Angeles. Once we got to the hotel on Saturday night, I tried one more time and the price had dropped to what we paid originally. I immediately made the change.

Our flight was at 7:50am, so we decided to catch the 6am shuttle from the hotel. Check-in was seamless and we were at the gate in no time. The flight was less than half full and Rhonda and I sat in the exit row. That doesn’t happen very often. A quick hour and a half flight and we were on the tarmac in Phoenix. Home and my own bed was a 35 minute drive away!

I had ordered a private shuttle company and the email confirmation said we would be picked up by a van. After gathering our luggage, we headed out to the pick up point. With the uncrowded flight, we were off and out quicker than anticipated, so we had to wait a few minutes. An older black Lincoln Navigator pulled up and I watched the driver pick up his phone and dial it. I grabbed mine out of my pocket, just as it started to ring. No reason to answer it.

As we pulled out of the airport, the driver lamented that the west bound Interstate 10 was closed for the weekend. Over the past two years it had happened seemingly every other weekend. He would drive out a major street past the construction and back onto the freeway. Ten minutes into the drive, the vehicle started to jerk and slow down. The driver shifted into neutral and hit the gas and the engine revved. He shoved back into drive and the result was nothing, as we continued to slow. The upcoming light was green and the Lincoln coasted through the intersection and into an empty parking lot.

Two weeks of staying a step of ahead at every corner, cheating disaster with every decision and here we were sitting in a trash strewn parking lot, 25 minutes from home. I’ve had transmission problems before so I recognized the symptoms. I couldn’t believe that our luck couldn’t hold out for another 30 minutes. So close…

I thought of all the things that had happened on this trip, how we had done and seen amazing things, to find out that they were closed right after. All of the sites in Rome that we visited on the first Tuesday, closed two days later. Piza was closed right after we left. In Paris, we visited the temple which was closed the next day. We went to the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre which shut down right after. We had decided to stay in Paris until Saturday and our flight was half full instead of overbooked. Rhonda and I had skated through Customs, while others spent more time getting through. There was no doubt that we had been watched over for this entire trip. It could have easily been a disaster. No doubt this would be a memory that would live in each of us for the rest of our lives. A memory that deserved to be put into words.

The driver turned off the vehicle, then started it back up and put it into gear. We moved forward and he merged into traffic. I cringed a bit as he pulled onto the freeway a few moments later, but I didn’t hear or feel any slipping of the gears. The four of us kept our fingers crossed as the car left the freeway at our exit. Every stop sign was tense, but in a few minutes we were in front of our house. Luggage was unloaded and the driver left. The four us stood in the driveway and laughed at how we had done it again…

I have learned quite a bit in the writing of this ten part mini-series. This journey has given me a small glimpse into the process of writing and more importantly, publishing. As I wrote, I found myself going back to add or change things that were three of four paragraphs up. Rhonda has been a second pair of eyes in proof reading and finding typos or misplaced words. I can see why writing a book could be an arduous task. Juggling the desire to publish what is written quickly, versus the need to read, reread, add and change to make the story flow and keep a reader interested. On occasion I remembered things that clearly should have been a part of the story. Sometimes it was too late because those events were 3 chapters back.

One such event took place while we were on a bus traveling between Piza and Florence. We were in the city and traffic was very heavy. The tour guide was at the front of the bus explaining all the history of the places we passed. We had turned a tight corner and the guide commented how great the driver was. He was one of the best. Not 30 seconds later, the bus shuttered as he hit the brakes hard. We moved forward a few feet and he slammed on the brakes again. Everyone lurched forward, including the guide standing in the front of the bus who was knocked from her feet. From the back, we couldn’t see, what happened, but the bus had hit a motorcyclist. In the busy traffic, a guy on a scooter had buzzed between the bus and a line of cars on the right. He was obviously wreckless, as just before he got hit, he side swiped a car and removed the mirror. The driver got off the bus and the motorcyclist was walking around in front, so he wasn’t injured bad, if at all. I imagined that the rest of our day would be spent sitting here during an investigation. Within ten minutes, we were on our way. It was a reminder of how crazy the driving is over there.

I am grateful to those of you that have stayed with me from the beginning. Your support and positive comments have fueled the desire to stay on top of this and finish it in a timely manner. The current situation in world has proven to be an accomplice also. I have never sat at home, in my pajamas for two straight weeks. I have had time to sit and write, take a break, and then write some more. If you feel inclined, please feel free to share this story with anyone that you think would enjoy it.

I need another vacation… and something more to write about.