by Tom Upton

Created on: May 21, 2008   Last Updated: October 06, 2008

Life Along The Okie-dokie Highway

June 24

Dear Winny Girl, How is your summer vacation going so far? I hope I am not disrupting your fun with this unsolicited letter.

First, forgive me for the shakiness of my writing. We are currently on the road, headed hell-bent for nowhere, and the family car is obviously in bad need of new struts. As I write this, I am hunkered down in the corner of the backseat, trying to get as far away from Mike as possible without having to open my door and hang out over the road. I can never tell which of his bodily odors is worse, but all of them combine to create an aroma that at once waters the eyes, congests the nose, and makes me crave badly fried fish. The wonder of it all is that, through his own reek, he can still sit there, head tossed back and snoring like a tornado ripping through an apple orchard.

My parents, on the other hand, sit quietly- too quietly, if you ask me- in the front seat. I honest to God have no idea where we are headed. These family summer outings are so spontaneous and so cloaked in secrecy you'd swear that they were military operations. All I know so far is that we stopped once, somewhere in Indiana, to gaze briefly at an enormous quarry. It is just like my father to think this a fun sort of thing to do- drive out of the way to stop and look at a big hole in the ground. I don't know, maybe he thinks it's the same as stopping to look down into the Grand Canyon, only better because it was all man-made. Really, it's impossible to know what he thinks, because he says so little. And my mother never does anything to straighten him out; she just sits up there, in the passenger seat, with her crossword book, trying to do puzzles she never, but never, finishes. If my father does say something, all she does is look up briefly, lets out a bored hmmmm, and goes right back to the book. It's all so bizarre, really, as if I've been abducted by a bunch of weird kidnappers who can't quite make up their mind where they want to take me.

I really don't think I could feel any more lonely than I do now-not even if I woke one morning to find that everyone in the world was gone, and I was the last living human on the planet.

Maybe it all wouldn't be so horrible if Mr. Stinky-Snorey would stay awake to share this nightmare with me. But, then again, he might just make it worse. He has developed a gift for doing that; he seems to suck the very life force of those around him. Maybe that's why my parents are the way they are. Frankly

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