Chapter 12

Eventually, we succumbed to boredom. Life is not always exciting ... money isn't everything. Pentwater and its winters insured a stable population of what my friend Mark calls, little breeders. There were NO student-less grades in the consolidated school. Mom ... Mrs. Phillips ... always had children in story hour and I had to work every Saturday.

Mr. Phillips expended his braincells contending with recalcitrant math students ... boring ... boring ... boring. He loved it.

"Junie Moonie, I'ze bored."

"Jimmy Moonie, I'ze bored, too."

"What sort of trouble can we get away with?"

I looked at her ... she looked at me..."Road trip!"

I called Mom. "We're going away ... be gone at least a month ... probably longer."

"Driving? or flying?"

"Both I think. I'll drive to Lansing ... June can fly the Beech turbo Queen Air down to Franklins. She needs her thousand hour teardown ... Not June ... the Beechcraft."

"Call the state and check road conditions."

"Yes mother."

"Clean underwear ... I'd be mortified if you had an accident."

"Mom ... if I have an accident, I doubt my underpants would be clean after."

"Jimmy!" Mothers who giggle are disconcerting.

Mom giggled a lot these days. I believe Mr. Phillips gets a lot of mom's pussy. They have been married seven years and I still don't know his first name.

"Mother!"

"Bye ... Love you ... let me talk to June."

All I heard of that conversation was:

"Yes mom."

About fifty million times.

There was a Canadian storm on the way but if we got out of Dodge we'd miss the worst of it. According to the Highway Department the roads were clear and getting better the farther south we went. NOAA said the mountains in Arkansas and Missouri were nearly impassable.

AAA suggested ... of course we were members... , don't leave home without it ... AAA suggested we take I -69 south to Dyersburg, US -51 to Memphis, I -55 to I -20 and connect to I -10 connect to I -8 and LA ... to San Diego.

We had already called the caretaker of our little strip and had him run the scraper.

I took June to the plane and watched her leave. Then I piled into the '32 three window and headed for Lansing. Nothing exciting there.

In Lansing, our plans were changed.

June was sitting left seat on a C-130 ... the ramp lowered and I was directed to load the Ford. According to June we were killing several birds with one trip. The 130 needed to go to Davis ... the crew needed to get back to Lansing. I had the 130 command pilot sitting left on the Beech. June was learning the 130 ... my guy was learning the Beech.