Riding in the Way-Way Back of the Station Wagon
Revisiting a place where children in bell-bottom jumpsuits play
He honked the horn and leaned out the window giving an enthusiastic thumbs up to the family van in front of us — one of those cool 1970s retro numbers with a kitchen table inside and a white leather-covered wheel on the back. His right hand reached for the radio knob, turning up the volume, much to the eye-rolling dismay of my mother in the passenger seat. I’ll never forget the song thumping through the speakers. It will forever make me think of my dad and our one big family vacation to Old Orchard Beach, Maine; the song was Miss You by The Rolling Stones.
Only a year later they would divorce. But it was the happiest I remember them.
Perhaps it was the ocean air or the summer vacation we took with their best friends, or maybe it was all a facade I was too young to see through. The perception of innocent naivety. What I did see, and what stuck with me throughout my life, was my mom and dad at their most beautiful.
Malone, NY — August 1978
We were awakened in what felt like the middle of the night. It was probably dawn. But it felt like the middle of the night. My dad set up blankets, pillows, and treats — kind of like you would for a dog today — in the way-way back of our candy red station wagon.
The blankets were great, but we were far too excited to sleep. I was eight years old, my brother was four. At our ages, a road trip from Northern New York to Maine felt like a week-long trek across the country.
My brother Jason and I stumbled into that way-way back to assume our positions for making faces at cars behind us, holding our breath when passing cemeteries, and doing that hand motion thing at tractor-trailers so they’d honk their horns. Road trip vacations will never be quite like they were in the 70s — you know, back when kids could camp out in the back while fathers drove with beer between their legs.
We rolled out of town following my parents’ friends Nick and Sharon and their two boys in their super cool van; we would be shacking up with them at the beachfront adjacent apartment we rented for the week.
“I wanna ride in the van!” I whined incessantly.
I was so wicked jealous. I could picture the boys sitting at the table, playing games, and eating fluffernutter sandwiches and Jean’s potato chips.
Alas, I was not allowed to leave my post of blowing raspberries on the back window of our wagon or steaming them up with my breath to make “footprints” with my hands.
On the Road With Bucky
His dirty blonde hair whipped wildly in the wind as he balanced the red, white, and blue can between his legs. After a couple of hours of winding through mountain roads, we were finally on the highway and had just had a snack at a rest stop along the way.
He patted the steering wheel in time to the music as a smile crinkled around his eyes. This was Bucky at ease. He wasn’t nervous or stressed. He was free. He was lost in the music and the wind blowing through the windows. His left knee bopped up and down, matching the movements of his hand, in between giant swigs from his beer. Yes. This was happiness. This was it.
This is the vision of my dad I’ve loved all my life. The vision of my dad I always wanted to remember, even when he faltered. Even when I turned away.
That’s when it came on. The song. Their song. We always partied at Nick and Sharon’s house. Well, the parents partied while we kids swam in the pool and ran off into the meadow — God knows where.
Whenever Miss You by the Rolling Stones came on, Nick and my dad — each sporting a decent beer buzz — would lunge into their best interpretations of Mick and Keith singing at the top of their lungs, twerking in ways fathers embarrassingly shouldn’t. Were they fun? Yes. Were they funny? Oh yes. Did my mother hate it and cite his repeated drunken shenanigans as the main problem in her marriage? I probably don’t need to say.
My dad and Nick were tuned into the same radio station along the 8,000-hour road trip to Maine. With a whoop and a holler, Dad cranked the music up and honked the horn while leaning out the car window to give Nick a thumbs-up in his van ahead.
The warm air slapped me in the face and made my hair dance as I watched my dad channel his inner-Mick Jagger — singing, chugging his beer, dancing in his seat awkwardly — and I giggled along, despite my brother burping in my ear. I’m not sure I have any other memories of my dad happy like this. Not in this way. And — the thing is, he always wanted to be happy. He was full of love. He just became so sadly lost.
Old Orchard Beach, Maine
I crawled out of the back seat.
It was like Dorothy stepping out of her house after landing in Oz. I was in awe of the number of people I saw and the stunning ocean straight ahead. It smelled like sea salt and seagull shit. It was divine. All I had ever known were the small towns and lakes of the Adirondack Mountains.
We bolted out of the car.
Funny the things we remember as being fascinating when we were young— things we would never consider interesting today.
Against the building, I spotted a vending machine. I was mesmerized by the deposit return signs, which I had never seen before. (Yes. Television had been invented, thanks very much.)
I thought Tab was the neatest-looking soda I had ever seen. The can was beautiful.
We didn’t drink much soda back then and when we did, it was usually bottles of RC Cola that we got from the town bottling company. Tab was like a city soda or something. I realize it’s odd that one could get so geeked out over a vending machine in 1978 featuring Tab, but whatever. It wouldn’t be the only strange thing I got excited about over the years.
The building we stayed in was three floors high. It was blue with white trim and run down. Weathered. We stayed in the top floor apartment — eight of us crammed in for the week. It was old and creaky. And it shook and rattled every couple of hours from the passing trains. There was a small black and white television on a little metal stand in the corner of the kitchen that we watched Tom and Jerry on in the mornings before going out to play.
While our parents baked themselves silly on the beach every day, we kids ran amok all over the place — flying kites, riding the waves on our environmentally sound Styrofoam boogie boards, digging up sand dollars, shells, discarded pull tabs from soda cans (Tab!), and plastic six-pack rings from the beach.
I’d make a good bag lady.
It didn’t take us long to befriend the local ragamuffins what with their dirty faces and wily city ways, not unlike a scene from, say, Oliver Twist. The truth is, they were just locals whose parents managed the various buildings in the area, and they were very friendly and welcoming to vacationing kids of the same age. We would play tag, hide and seek, and even musical chairs in the parking lot.
Put striped shirts on us and a round of Ubbi Dubbi speak and we could have been on ZOOM.
The first local broad I met was named Wendy. A saucy little nine-year-old with unkempt dark brown hair, and a neat bell-bottom denim jumpsuit. I love to bring Wendy up to my mother because she drove her nuts. Mom never remembers this, but it’s true. Wendy would never leave. She’d be up on our balcony, eating with us, watching Tom & Jerry…she was always there.
She’s even in a couple of our vacation shots — kind of like that character Rich Hall played in the 80s that always popped up randomly in the White House on Saturday Night Live.
I was just excited to have a little friend — I was stuck with a bunch of boys after all. Sadly, the ebb and flow of our friendship waned. Perhaps Wendy found a new little vacationing friend. Or perhaps I did. Perhaps we simply just grew apart. Like sands through the hourglass, so are the days of our lives….
Everything else spirals into an amalgamation of white pants, disco shirts, music, sun tans, soda, our train-rattled ocean-adjacent apartment, and that place in the way-way back of the station wagon where my brother and I harassed folks behind us. The colors of this portrait have always had a special place in my heart because it is the one vacation I remember taking with both my parents and my brother as a family.
On that trip, I fell in love with the ocean.
I fell in love with the feel of the sun on my body.
I fell in love with the beach.
And I fell in love with vending machines.
The next summer, my parents were no longer together and Old Orchard Beach was a distant memory. One that for a long time I wished I could relive and touch again.
If we could just go on that vacation again, perhaps everything would be all right.
I’d see my Dad with his floppy blonde curls giving the thumbs up out the window, honking the horn, and sipping on his beer excitedly when the Stones played on the radio.
I’d see my mom with her deep tan and reddened cheeks with her beautiful, shiny Cher-esque hair and relaxed spirit.
I’d see my brother wandering around in the crowds, watching me try to fly my kite.
I’d see my parents and their friends dancing and cooking on the balcony.
I’d see Tom & Jerry on an old black and white television, a pesky little girl with unkempt hair and a denim jumpsuit edging her way into our family snapshots, a gaggle of kids posing for a new entry in our photo album after a few rounds of musical chairs.
I’d feel the rattle of a train, and I’d smell ocean, salt, fish, seaweed, and tanning oil.
I’d smile and run along the sand carefree, none the wiser.
And everything would be OK.
Everything would be the same.
Nothing would ever change and we’d be frozen in time, and I wouldn’t feel sad and I wouldn’t miss my Dad.
But things do change and vacations don’t last forever.
As I grew older, I understood, and it became clear that changes are essential for our growth in life and our quest to find happiness. And I wouldn’t trade the smile of my Mom once she moved on from that phase of her life for all the false promises of vacation in the world.
However, what a wonderful time to think back on. A lifetime of memories and lessons from one little trip that will always live on in the pages of my mind and in a dusty photograph album under a bed somewhere in Malone, New York.
A place where children in bell-bottom jumpsuits play… a place where Tab vending machines are still all the rage.
Epilogue
When my father passed away in 2015, I made a playlist of all his favorite music to play after his wake and at the celebration of life we had for him at a beautiful waterfront home in Saranac Lake.
We had our tough moments throughout the years, but the one thing we always connected with was music. Music — from the time I could walk — was such a strong thread in our bond. I knew every song that needed to be on that playlist. Every one. And they all told a story. So many songs. So many stories.
When I hear “Miss You” play — he is alive again. And warm air is slapping me in the face. I am a young girl. It is summer. We are free.
Such a gorgeous story, KiKi. What precious memories. I remember TAB! I used to drink it by the gallons! We all did. Any road trips of my youth were very different. You didn't make a noise with my father in the car. Oh boy. Your Dad sounds like the Dad I wish I had :))
Riding in the way, way back was such a hallmark of our childhoods. We weren't just free range out in the world. We were also free range in the car.