40 years ago, I married on December 8th, so, inadvertently, something in the news alerts me of my wedding anniversary to my kids' father.
Maybe it is an "un-iversary", because we divorced. That marriage lasted 9 years and produced three amazing children.
So December rolls around and so does nostalgia. Marriage, children born in my twenties, divorce, re-marriage... I take a trip down memory lane.
I was reminiscing the second time around and how I REALLY missed the signs. My second husband (G) had a temper. I really still was quite young when I married G and he and his son joined me and my daughter and two sons, growing us to a family of five. Drama came quickly on the heels of that wedding.
G and I married in April. In July, there was a death in my husband's family; his seven year old nephew had drowned in Alaska, so we drove to Montana for the services, on the last day of July. My step son was in Montana already, and we would be bringing him home from his grandparents' visit after the funeral.
I had never been to Montana; my husband was from there & had made the trip MANY times. We left for Montana late in the evening in our "Brady-Bunch" station wagon, loading the three kids in the back, rear seat down, so they could sleep most of the way.
At some point, my daughter and I traded places; she sat in the front passenger seat, and I used her sleeping bag, trying to rest up for my turn to drive. Around midnight, we pulled into some remote rest stop - way North East in Washington. I asked my daughter for my shoes, climbed over the boys, went in the bathroom & assumed because she knew, I had my bases covered.
My husband returned to the car, gave it a cursory look and left. I was still in the bathroom.
I was alone, had no money, no idea of where (REALLY) we were headed. I used a pay phone; dialed 0; got a soft-hearted operator who helped me for free.... she used directory assistance and found the phone number of Montana family and called them for me. I told the family: "If he arrives, I am in Washington, STILL."
The operator also connected me with police. They didn't help or come. My salvation was (after 3 hours) a trucker who planned to park there and sleep for the night. I heard him pull up. I explained my situation and he put the news out on the CB radio and later, another truck driver pulled into a different rest stop (God knows how many miles away from where I was at,) and saw a vehicle that matched the description he had heard on the CB. He approached the driver side window and knocked, waking my napping husband. He asked: "Are you headed to a funeral in Montana?"
Although my husband thought it was a joke, he got all the information, returned to "My Rest Stop" and picked me up.
Ironically, my husband was infuriated with ME.
(A true portend for the rest of that marriage...)
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Not to get into the rest of the deterioration of that marriage - I wrote a song while I awaited rescue. Here's the
"LAMENT OF THE STRANDED":
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This is a tale of the love that was lost
while primpin' and fussin'; not counting the cost
of a man with a schedule & things on his mind...
who drove down the highway with his woman behind.
Well she's read that map - about a hundred times
and she can repeat the graffiti rhymes.
And she sits & wonders how long til he finds
that he has took off with his woman behind.
Now she sits and wonders how long will it take?
And why was she left in this restaurant by fate?
The truckers all stare and the tourist sure know
it don't take a woman THREE hours to go!
Well she's read that map - about a hundred times
and she can repeat the graffiti rhymes.
And she sits & wonders how long til he finds
that he has took off with his woman behind.
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