1,800 Miles, Drive By Wine Tastings and A Plane I Couldn’t Board.

My BFF was moving to Texas to go to college, and what better way to get her there than a road trip!

We headed out in Lynn’s red, Pontiac Sunfire, which happened to be a standard. I didn’t really know how to drive a standard but just figured – oh hell, I’ll catch on.

We were armed with a Triptik that let us know where every hotel, gas station and winery was along the way. Yes, we hit up wineries for free wine tastings because we were poor, young and thirsty. We also brought a journal and a camcorder to engrave the memories.

It was some of the best car Karaoke you’d ever hear. I burned some of the most epic CD’s for that trip. I’m positive had we sent the tape of us singing to a big record label, I’d be a bon-a-fide diva by now.

We became so delirious from the non-stop driving, our laughing fits nearly killed us. It was the kind of laughing where you stop breathing, start crying and you don’t even know what the hell is so funny anymore.

Our third day in, we stopped at a truck stop, called Betty Beaver’s Truck Stop, for gas. It wasn’t until stopping for coffee, two states later, that I became incredibly grateful for my juvenile sense of humor – it’s the reason I remembered the name of that truck stop.

I reached for my wallet to pay, but couldn’t find it. We tore that car apart and it was no where. Not only was all of my cash in that wallet but so was my driver’s license. Ya know, the thing I would need, in order to board a plane back to NY!

It was gone. I tracked down that truck stop on the Triptik and called them. I had left it, but there was no way we could go back. The lady I spoke with was willing to overnight my wallet to Lynn’s aunt’s house, where we would end up.

We filled the last leg of our trip with car jam sessions, conversation and jotting down random things in the journal that today, mean absolutely nothing to us. We spent our last night before Texas, with a friend in Kansas. While there, I called to confirm the woman mailed my wallet, like she said she would.

Now this lady is telling me that no one is available to drive my wallet to the “over night drop off” which is “20 miles away”. What? This turned in to a huge ordeal. Even though we were able to iron out a plan to get me my ID, it became clear that I was not going to have it in time to catch my flight home.

I had to call my boss and explain why I wouldn’t be at work, knowing this was going to sound completely made up.

We made it to Texas the next day and celebrated with a bottle of champagne.

The contents of my wallet arrived two days later, in a brown envelope. I got lucky. Even though they took all my cash, they sent me everything else in that wallet, credit cards included.

Our road trip was officially over. I had driven a car I could barely drive, across the country. My faith in people was somewhat restored. We perhaps became, the very first drive-by winos.

And then I had to say “see ya soon” to my BFF. That was 13 years ago. We still talk at least once a week. It was a road trip I’m glad I took, but was sad to take.

**************************************************************************************************************************************