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Sooooooo I have successfully completed my first foray into driving in New York City... gotta say, after all the hype and the terror and the OH GOD NOT DRIVING IN NEW YORK!!! I've gotten over the years... I traversed the roads worn long familiar by many a car trip with Mom (albeit, never from the drivers seat) and when I pulled up in front of The House (where, serendipitously enough, there waited a perfectly sized parking spot for me right in front and a passing Imm to help talk me through parallel parking into it), my first thought was "huh. That was it?"
Granted I didn't go through Manhattan. But still, as![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
booboo_berr can attest, Queens and Brooklyn are "nervewracking" enough.
So yeah... got here safe and sound, everything but EPeen is downstairs ready to be shoved into the car, Dad was very happy to see me and told me the famous story about how right after Mom got her license (at the same age, I might add), the first thing she did was bundle her five young children into the car and drive across the country to California, and how Dad was admonished by a coworker about "how could you let your wife and all your children go winging across the country by themselves like that? Are you crazy?" (I suppose this was a somewhat legitimate concern in 1966 - I can't imagine all the places Mom drove through on that trip would have been all that hospitable to a young black woman in a car with five kids...) Dad did end up flying to LA and joining them for the trip back, much to his own discomfort. *chuckle* I'd heard the story before of course, but never from Dad's POV. Mom did love to drive - I've posted little stories of how she would put me in the backseat and just take off on whims when I was very young - off to Chicago one week to see the sisters at college, off to Michigan another time to see another sister, off to points elsewhere to watch Nuke's away games, off to Ohio to visit Grandma... Seriously, that "Ive been everywhere, man" song could apply to her. Mom loved being on the road, and I always loved going with her - when I was old enough to sit up front I officially became her copilot... and by that point the siblings had all moved further out beyond the city so there were more places to go. New Jersey. Virginia Beach. Washington DC. Pennsylvania. The not so fun trips were when Dad would come with us, cause he'd sit up front, commandeer the radio so we'd be stuck listening to 1010WINS or CBS880 for as far as their signals would stretch, and if not that we'd be stuck with WQXR (New York had a station that was entirely dedicated to classical music back in the day that wasn't NPR) or worse WPAT (likewise for Muzak).
But anyway I babble. I seem to have inherited Mom's borderline insane Fahrvergnügen* was the main point... and after tonight? Not really all that intimidated by the city from an automotive perspective. Go me.
Speaking of Mom, September 1st would have been Mom and Dad's fifty second anniversary. Dad plans to suit up and hop the subway, then the Path train out to Newark to visit her grave; for the first time since she died, I find myself kinda wishing I could go with him. I haven't been since her funeral... I don't know, while I love cemetaries (plan to walk out to the one by the river in Sunderland once I get settled), I've never really gotten the whole going out and spending time with basically a rock with your loved one's name chiseled on it thing... It's not really like they're there, you know? Hell, charging down the BQE to the Leonard Cohen cover of "Woke Up this Morning" (oh yeah, I was getting all Tony Soprano with my bad self, you know I was) has been the closest I've felt to her in a long ass while. Her grave in Newark? ehh. I don't think I've even ever seen her headstone, honestly. But I feel like I should go. Maybe I'll head out next January for her birthday. Anyway, Dad's looking forward to the trip, as he gets to take trains and also act like he's getting away with something, since I'm sure once everyone else finds out how he plans to get there they'll be their usual appalled that he didn't take a car service. Honestly, I can sorta see his take on things... He's fine if he takes his time and doesn't rush, he enjoys the exercise and the man quite possibly love the subway more than I do, and that's saying something - it'll be a sad day if it comes, when he will no longer be able to take it, even at a slower speed.
Right... I need to grab a shower and some shuteye - I don't know which side of the street I'm supposed to be on, and anyway, it's not going to matter as I plan to be long gone by 7am... and after I get to MA, I get to haul furniture in and out of trucks for the second day this week. No rest for the wicked, so they say, and I suppose if I weren't the wicked, I wouldn't have had it tattooed on my shoulder. :)
I can't WAIT to get in my own goddamn bed tomorrow. You have no idea. Shit, I need to buy a hammer. For that matter, shit, I need to get a desk for EPeen. and we need a crapton of bookshelves. And yeah, crap, click on these guys please?
Granted I didn't go through Manhattan. But still, as
booboo_berr can attest, Queens and Brooklyn are "nervewracking" enough.So yeah... got here safe and sound, everything but EPeen is downstairs ready to be shoved into the car, Dad was very happy to see me and told me the famous story about how right after Mom got her license (at the same age, I might add), the first thing she did was bundle her five young children into the car and drive across the country to California, and how Dad was admonished by a coworker about "how could you let your wife and all your children go winging across the country by themselves like that? Are you crazy?" (I suppose this was a somewhat legitimate concern in 1966 - I can't imagine all the places Mom drove through on that trip would have been all that hospitable to a young black woman in a car with five kids...) Dad did end up flying to LA and joining them for the trip back, much to his own discomfort. *chuckle* I'd heard the story before of course, but never from Dad's POV. Mom did love to drive - I've posted little stories of how she would put me in the backseat and just take off on whims when I was very young - off to Chicago one week to see the sisters at college, off to Michigan another time to see another sister, off to points elsewhere to watch Nuke's away games, off to Ohio to visit Grandma... Seriously, that "Ive been everywhere, man" song could apply to her. Mom loved being on the road, and I always loved going with her - when I was old enough to sit up front I officially became her copilot... and by that point the siblings had all moved further out beyond the city so there were more places to go. New Jersey. Virginia Beach. Washington DC. Pennsylvania. The not so fun trips were when Dad would come with us, cause he'd sit up front, commandeer the radio so we'd be stuck listening to 1010WINS or CBS880 for as far as their signals would stretch, and if not that we'd be stuck with WQXR (New York had a station that was entirely dedicated to classical music back in the day that wasn't NPR) or worse WPAT (likewise for Muzak).
But anyway I babble. I seem to have inherited Mom's borderline insane Fahrvergnügen* was the main point... and after tonight? Not really all that intimidated by the city from an automotive perspective. Go me.
Speaking of Mom, September 1st would have been Mom and Dad's fifty second anniversary. Dad plans to suit up and hop the subway, then the Path train out to Newark to visit her grave; for the first time since she died, I find myself kinda wishing I could go with him. I haven't been since her funeral... I don't know, while I love cemetaries (plan to walk out to the one by the river in Sunderland once I get settled), I've never really gotten the whole going out and spending time with basically a rock with your loved one's name chiseled on it thing... It's not really like they're there, you know? Hell, charging down the BQE to the Leonard Cohen cover of "Woke Up this Morning" (oh yeah, I was getting all Tony Soprano with my bad self, you know I was) has been the closest I've felt to her in a long ass while. Her grave in Newark? ehh. I don't think I've even ever seen her headstone, honestly. But I feel like I should go. Maybe I'll head out next January for her birthday. Anyway, Dad's looking forward to the trip, as he gets to take trains and also act like he's getting away with something, since I'm sure once everyone else finds out how he plans to get there they'll be their usual appalled that he didn't take a car service. Honestly, I can sorta see his take on things... He's fine if he takes his time and doesn't rush, he enjoys the exercise and the man quite possibly love the subway more than I do, and that's saying something - it'll be a sad day if it comes, when he will no longer be able to take it, even at a slower speed.
Right... I need to grab a shower and some shuteye - I don't know which side of the street I'm supposed to be on, and anyway, it's not going to matter as I plan to be long gone by 7am... and after I get to MA, I get to haul furniture in and out of trucks for the second day this week. No rest for the wicked, so they say, and I suppose if I weren't the wicked, I wouldn't have had it tattooed on my shoulder. :)
I can't WAIT to get in my own goddamn bed tomorrow. You have no idea. Shit, I need to buy a hammer. For that matter, shit, I need to get a desk for EPeen. and we need a crapton of bookshelves. And yeah, crap, click on these guys please?
