Some Observations from the Hill
By HH (Hub) Brown of Owego

About 24 years ago, my granddaughter, Karen, got a job in a hospital in Portland, Oregon. She wanted to drive her Chevy out there but her parents didn't want her to make the trip alone, so they said if I would ride out with her, they would pay my airfare back home.

I think it was about the 20th of May, just before noon when we left her home in Big Flats. By the time we got to Cogan Station, she had to stop for soup and coffee. We got out in Ohio late in the afternoon. She was driving through quite a long stretch of road with steel supports on her left. They must have supported a railroad or highway crossing. I noticed the car kept getting closer to the steel. I took a quick look at her eyes, they were open but she wasn't seeing anything. I got a firm grip on the wheel and moved it to the right a little. As soon as that happened, she said, "Was I sleeping?" Then the story came out: seems she and some friends had stayed up till 6:00 saying goodbye, then she had delivered some tires she had sold and finally she went to bed for a couple of hours.

When we got near Elyria I told her some people we used to run around with in Florida had told us if we ever went through their town, be sure and look us up. Karen called information and asked for MacDole's number. The operator asked, "First name, please?" I told her in Florida everyone called him Mac. She told the operator we didn't know and she said, "Well, there's only one in the book." We had some sandwiches and coffee with them and they insisted we spend the night and have breakfast before starting on.

Karen didn't have much money with her but she had a credit card. Trouble was, it was issued by some small oil company and we didn't see many of their gas stations. I had only about $70 with me. That night we stayed in a truck stop near Des Moines, Iowa. That morning Karen said she thought if we ate a hearty breakfast she wouldn't have to stop so soon for coffee. That lasted until almost 10.

She is an excellent driver when she gets enough sleep. It seemed a long, long way across Nebraska and when we pulled into Cheyenne, Wyoming, she was low on gas. It was late in the afternoon and the radio was warning of snow in the mountains but she drove around looking for cheaper gas. She got mad when they all had the same price and so started for Laramie without buying any.

Her car had sports car tires, broad and not too deep treads. It was snowing a little as soon as we got into the mountains but there was enough traffic to wear a track. I sat and watched the needle on the gas gauge say we were running on vapor. And then we saw a little sign on an arrow saying Buford. I didn't have to say anything, she pulled off and we came to a little complex all made of logs. A little motel, store and best of all, a gas station. We made it down into Laramie without mishap and stayed there. The next morning she went out and brought back a coffee for each of us and then drove to Rawlins where we stopped for breakfast.

(I'll finish this next time.)