Maude

 Okay, time for happy memories.  Maude was our old red station wagon.  She didn't always start the first time Dad turned the key so I would have to put a penny in her vent.  Paying her would start her up every time!  Maude had a special "Jenny seat" between Mom and Dad up front, which was really just the arm rests folded down.  Whenever all 6 of us piled into her I knew it would be a good day (Dory, Gary, and Dave strongly disagree with this statement, but in my 4 and 5 year old mind, we were all happy).  Sometimes we would just drive--from early morning until dusk.  We would see all of the beauty of upstate New York: the mountains, the farms, both crops and cows alike, small towns, rickety homes and mansions.  No one ever fought (everyone knew better than that).  Mom and Dad would laugh and joke and tell me stories about how I wasn't really a part of their family (I was blond and fair-skinned while everyone else looked very Mediterranian like Dad), they found me under a rotten apple tree and took me home.  I would beg them to take me to my birthplace (the rotten apple tree) and never understood why they found it so funny that I would want to see such a place.  Then they would go on to tell me that I had a twin sister as well named Becky but they couldn't keep both of us so the had to throw Becky into the Hudson River.  I was probably about 10 or 11 years old before I realized that I never really had a twin sister.  I was extremely gullible which must have made it great fun to tell me these great tales.  Oddly, these stories never upset me, they just made me more curious about who I was. 

These days were also the times I'd learn about Mom and Dad's childhood (like how Dad played superman as a young boy and knocked himself out on the floor 'flying' off of a table or how Mom had to dodge spiders in her outhouse as a young girl when my uncle would bang on the sides while she was in there to knock them loose).  I'd hear stories about Dory eating her poop as a toddler, Gary being a perfect baby who was happy no matter what Mom did to him (she'd gush about how if she wanted to hold him he was happy to be held and when she needed a break and put him down he was happy to be left alone), and how Dave always won the marshmallow stuffing contests and he was so tiny, how could he fit all those marshmallows in his mouth?   Dad would tell prison stories about two priests who did time for burning draft records.  It was always very intriguing.  I guess I was just happy to have Mom and Dad paying attention to me--undivided attention for hours at a time.  That's a basic dream day for any young child.

There was usually a destination. Sometimes historic places where a lesson was to be learned.  Sometimes Saratoga Springs, which I loved until we would get to the mineral fountains.  Dad loved this foul-smelling water and would drink it by the gallon (filling jugs whenever we went).  He also expected us to drink it and there would dare not be a complaint or a face made; we would just drink it as told.  Once or twice our destination was Albany but I think we generally steered clear of that because it was a busy, crowded city and that's just not what "Sunday" (they didn't have to be on Sunday, that's just what we called them) drives were all about.  They were about exploring and being together and that's just what we did.

Days like these formed a part of who I became as a parent.  I realize the importance of sharing life history with my children, forcing family togetherness (even and especially when the children became teens and didn't think they wanted family time) and I've always made time for our "Sunday Drives."  This is the flowing current that fills my brook.

Jen ;-)