It's An Adventure

This past Labor Day weekend my husband, who should know better, asked me if I wanted to go for a drive. “Yeah!” “Where to?” “Terre Haute Cemetery!” I said without a second’s hesitation. A month earlier, I’d found an online listing for the cemetery. There were old graves I’d been, if you’ll pardon the pun, dying to check out. Too far, gas too expensive, frown frown, yadda yadda. So we took off for a short drive. Somehow, I managed to convince my loving spouse that a trip to “two little cemeteries” would be a great start to our drive. “It will be an adventure!” I told him. I’d use this phrase when Map Quest said to turn right instead of left on a Virginia trip. This put us on a one-lane gravel road that went on forever. It was one of those, if people thought you were trespassing, they could chop you up into little pieces and no one would ever find your body, kind of roads.

“It’s an adventure!” I had said, as the tune “Dueling Banjos” popped into my head. On this day, I used the phrase to spur my husband into climbing over a gatepost, tromp down a gravel lane and plunge into, what turned about to be, a cemetery swarming with dive-bombing bugs. Now I tend to exaggerate, but trust me, swarming is the accurate word. About 60 seconds into this foray, my husband said, “I’ll wait for you there,” pointing to the gravel road. He wisely elected to wait in the car at cemetery number two, which called for another little jaunt. 

As we left the second cemetery and started, what we thought would be a relaxing drive, the tire pressure light began to glow inside our Mercury van. Two hours later, after watching Canadian football in the store’s lobby and becoming the proud owners of a shiny new tire (a shredded tire can’t be patched evidently), our “adventure” was over. Well, not quite. As it turns out, some of those dive-bombing insects were mosquitoes. What they were doing out at high noon, I don’t know. Four days later, we were still scratching. 

I may have to retire my, “It’s an adventure!” Instead, maybe I’ll start using, “At least we’re not being chopped into little pieces and our bodies never found.” Yeah, that works. 

Until next time – Happy Ancestral Digging! Note this post first published online, September 11, 2007, at Desktop Genealogist Blog at The News-Messenger Online http://www.thenews-messenger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?Category=BLOGS02

©11 Sept 2007, Desktop Genealogist Unplugged, Teresa L. Snyder