08/30/2024
It's On, We're Off
Asheville to Pittsburgh to Newtown
Planning a month-long trip is no easy task. The planning is pretty enjoyable to me. I get to use the skills I acquired as a band tour booker and a production manager for commercial film production. I love mundane details and spreadsheets. I love the fact that you can plan to be in a certain spot 1,000 miles away months or years in advance and when that day finally gets there, you’re likely going to be in that certain spot you’d imagined you’d be. I find that amazing.
We drove eight or so hours from Asheville to Pittsburgh to visit Murph, who was a childhood friend of Jen’s father, Don. Don passed away several years ago and we all miss him. He was a one-of-a-kind in ways I can’t begin to explain, and his absence leaves a hole in the world. Murph and Don had known each other since childhood, lived on the same street in Allison Park, and remained lifelong friends. Murph was diagnosed with MS in his early twenties and as far as I can see that has never interfered with his super-sweet disposition and amazing attitude.
That old saying that God only gives you what you can handle is so stupid. Number one, it’s yet another confused misinterpretation of the bible. I’ve honestly seen precious few on-point interpretations of the bible now that I’m thinking about it. But either way, it’s such a dumb thing to say. It’s like saying, “You deserve that because you’re strong enough to handle it.” People either rise to whatever they get or they don’t. Plenty don’t and if you ask me, that should be the default. Those that do are inspiring. It’s luck or the opposite, and if you get the opposite and turn it into something positive, you’re a badass. So instead of biblical platitudes, let’s just say, “Hey, you’re a badass.” We had a great visit and then headed to the back parking lot of a Cracker Barrel that I’ve actually frequented as an overnight guest on some work filming trips I’ve done in Pittsburgh. My spot behind the dumpster was just as I remembered it.
We didn’t eat breakfast (or dinner the night before) at Cracker Barrel which I sometimes feel guilty about. I love parking the RV at a Cracker Barrel for the night. I’ve stayed at tons of them. They always feel safe and most of them are fine with it. Every once in a while I’ll get some food there to try to balance the scales. We pulled out and put in the eight hours to my hometown of Newtown, CT where my mom and sister live. We parked the RV at my sister’s house, where my mom’s hubby Gary was waiting for us. He gave us a ride to my nephew (Brandon) and his fiancé (Alex) newly purchased first house in Fairfield where we met my mom (Marie) and my sister (Adele) who were at the bridal shower earlier, and my sister’s husband (Paul). My nephew is such a cool kid. Well, not a kid anymore. But cool for sure.
I’m not sure what you call this feeling. But there’s a feeling you get when you’re around a person you’ve watched grow up. When you see them give their fiancé a look across the room that makes you smile. When you get a tour of their newly purchased house and hear their plans for what’s going where and what the future holds, and you can almost touch the happiness that all of that potential is feeding them. To see success born of hard work and intelligence right in front of you. It’s a feeling adjacent to pride, but I feel like I’m too far removed to have the right to pride in this case. Maybe it’s just plain old joy. It might be as simple as that. It gives me joy to see this couple just starting out with their lives. And there’s probably a small bit of nostalgic melancholia there too because it brings you back to when you were in that same phase of life. But as Tony Soprano so wisely said, “Remember when is the lowest form of conversation.” Anyway, we’ll be back for the wedding in October and I can’t wait.
Now that I’ve given specific props to my nephew Brandon I feel obligated to do the same for mom, Gary, Adele and Paul. All of them deserve it and I’d have no problem gushing for paragraphs for each of them. But since I feel obligated, I’m not doing it. Ha! But seriously, not only do I love my family, but I like them. I enjoy hanging out with them. They’re a fun group and everyone is on similar wavelengths enough to get along well but different enough to keep the conversation interesting.
I had coffee with my sister in the morning and we got caught up. We talked about plots of land and tiny houses for communal living, New Zealand dual citizenship (Paul’s a Kiwi), family gossip of the sort that only my family could generate (and probably yours too), and most importantly, we talked about Tuk Tuk Races across India. I first posted about this idea back in February. But I’ve been trying to convince Jen to do this crazy trip with me since then, with varying degrees of success. I feel like I’ve had her to 96.7% a couple of times, but she’s also been as low as -33.4%. Her biggest issue is that she doesn’t want it to be just her and I because she fears that I will have a maniacal need for Tuk Tuk speed that she will not be able to contain. It turns out that my sister is in. And if you knew Paul, you would know that he was in before being asked. So now we have the voice of reason Jen has been looking for! Also Adele, being brilliant, had a great idea. She found this amazing fancy spa at the end of the race route. She told Jen that we’d go there after the race. Jen’s still reluctant, but she’s in. How could she not be!? It’s on! IT’S ON! January 2026. Ladies and gentlemen, start your tiny little engines. Epic adventure/comedy awaits.
Tomorrow we head to Belgrade Lakes to see TAT Steve…
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