Throwback Thursday -- Vacations

I'm sure if you're on Facebook any amount of time, you will have noticed it's not nearly as interactive as it was in the beginning stages. From the beginning one of the things I loved most about it, was that it allowed me to share my life, children and our daily activities with family. Now I almost only see memes and political jabs or fake news. As a way to try to get a little less "noise" and more real conversation, I've started asking questions to prompt conversation and stories. Today was my first day and the question was:

What is the first vacation you can remember taking? Who all went? Where did you go? Why did you go there?

I felt like this was a good blog prompt too. It will allow me to share my memories with my kids (if they ever care enough to read my blog someday).

So here's my answer to the above question:

When I was about 4 years old (it was actually Aug 1985 so I was 5. This was right before I started kindergarten), my parents, myself and my little brother traveled to California. On the way there we traveled South and made a little trip into Mexico (I think). I can remember driving slowly and people approaching the car from all angles trying to sell us things. We drove a little brown car, a 1979 Oldsmobile Cutlass.

I don't remember where in California we went but we visited my stepdad's father and his family. We went to the ocean. My Mom will tell you I'm overly dramatic but a wave nearly swallowed me whole and drug me out to sea! (I might be a little dramatic but to a 4 year old that was a terrifying experience). And I pouted and complained the entire time afterwards because my clothes were wet. My dramatic little self also remembers being outside at an apartment complex and being approached by a young man (maybe 10 or 12) who looked just like Mr. T. He asked me where I was from and when I told him, Arkansas, he sucker punched me right in the gut. He knocked the breath clean out of me. I don't remember how long we stayed. I know we went out on a boat on the ocean and saw seals. And I remember when we came home we traveled North and got to see antelope somewhere around Wyoming. 

Later mom told me we went to Los Angeles, San Diego, and Pasa Robles. And we even went to the Zoo. I didn't even remember that part.

She also shared her memories of her first vacation and her sisters helped fill in a few the details. The whole of the story came about in several different questions and replies on Facebook, so I'll summarize it.

One hot summer around the year 1967, this family of five traveled in a single cab '66 blue Chevy pickup with a  3 on the tree. They were headed to 6 flags over Texas, Carlsbad Caverns and further South into Mexico. Michelle recalled purchasing lunch boxes at Carlsbad and taking salt from the salt flats and keeping it in the lunch boxes. They ate pizza in their motel rooms. If you're wondering how all 5 people (kids ages 9-5 ish) fit in that truck, Michelle said sometimes she rode in the floorboard and one of the other girls would lay behind the seats up against the back windshield. 

The hubs also shared his first vacation memory:

I think my first vacation was to New Orleans with mom and dad when I was 13. Lots of time was spent on Bourbon Street, which was actually scary for a kid that young from a town as small as Jay. Drunk men have no qualms about asking a kid for money. I loved the smells of the restaurants on Bourbon Street. The plantations homes were neat and so were the white alligators at the Audubon Zoo (which, incidentally, I had seen on TNN just a few months earlier). We rode a river boat and I also got my first taste of public transportation. What I didn't see was just as memorable. According to mom and dad, when we were on Bourbon St once, this woman in a tube-top was yelling at a man down the street. When I got right next to her (again, this came from Roy Drake and Kay Drake), she yanked her tube-top down and flashed her boobies to that guy and everybody else who looked. I didn't look. Didn't even know there was real live boobage right next to 13-year-old me.

Later on in the Facebook conversation my MIL Kay, confirmed the boobage event and the hub's recollection that maybe the New Orleans trip wasn't his first vacation. My FIL was the Superintendent of Jay Public Schools and traveled to different conventions and the rest of the family could tag along. When I asked the hubs if they drove to New Orleans this was his response:

We flew. But I don't remember the flight. I remember the flight to Anaheim, because I threw up in a trash can at John Wayne International. And that makes me think California was my first vacation. Went with mom and dad and DisneyLand was closed just for the people with the convention. DisneyLand sucked. Got diarrhea from Mexico. So, maybe California/Mexico was my first vacation/

My maternal grandmother also shared her first memory:

When I was 10 or 11 we came to visit Aunt Dood and Uncle Hoyt (In Fayetteville) It was when Polio was raging. The adults wanted to go to the movies but didn't want to take the kids for fear of polio. Uncle Hoyt had a sister who lived next door so they thought it would be OK to leave us with her so close. Everything went OK for a while until Doyle started snoring and Joyce convinced us it was a ghost (she was the oldest) It scared Darlene and me so bad we all ran over to Elsies and got her out of bed in the middle of the night. She had some choice words for our parents.

Aunt Dood and Uncle Hotyt were actually my grandmother's great aunt, Effie Equilla "Dood" ACORD and her husband Hoyt KARR. Doyle, Joyce and Darlene were their children. Elsie was Hoyt's sister. She married  Chester Eldridge.

My MIL shared her memory as well:

I don't know if you would call it a vacation but when I was about 10 I spent the summer with my oldest brother in Altus, Oklahoma. Tornado Alley! We went to the storm shelter often. 

She also remarked that she and her SIL spent the summer going to watch the movies. Her oldest brother was Troy Lynn Bates.






I hope you enjoyed our memories!

Until next time,
Becky