NATION’S CAPITAL GETS COVERED BY THORNBERRIES

July 8 to July 11, 1999

In a relationship that was only a few months strong, Jennifer and I both eagerly anticipated this vacation, as much as we worried about it. The journey represented our first trip together and a chance to see how we would do when placed under stress. We lived in two different locations, such that even getting us together in one place was going to be an effort, before we could even think about beginning the trip itself.

Thursday, July 8, 1999: The First Long Road Trip

Since Washington D.C. is east of Kentucky, and I lived in Paintsville at the time, it made more sense for Jennifer to travel my way Wednesday evening and stay with me the night before we began the trip. We intended to leave out early Thursday morning; even from my little dump of a trailer, the journey would span at least eight hours behind the wheel of her spacious wine-colored Dodge Dynasty. Not entirely to our surprise, however, both of us had trouble sleeping and woke up several hours earlier than we had anticipated. Giving in to our excitement, we went ahead and left out in the wee hours of the morning, egg salad and bread in hand. The trip had begun!

Jennifer's beloved Dynasty carried the pre-Thornberries to Washington D.C. and back.

Geometric Theory Hits the Skids in non-Euclidean Space

• Fact: There is a time and place for theories about how the world works.
• Fact: Traveling the hard, black highways is neither that time nor that place.
• Fact: The previous fact is not one that a traveler wants to learn by experience.

Having been studying diligently for my upcoming retake of the Graduate Record Examination (GRE), I had been trying to confront an old fear that reached as far back as the primordial roots of my sophomore year of high school (1988) - geometry. In fact, I had purchased a used textbook on the subject from eBay and could already say much about interior angles, rhombi and transversals.

So it was that I had proudly studied the map of our intended journey, with my little fledgling geometric goggles metaphorically perched on my mind’s nose. It seemed so obvious to me that we were going to put unnecessary distance on Jennifer’s car by swinging south and then continuing east across West Virginia. Why? Because the geometric principle stated that the two shortest sides of any triangle will always add together to be longer than the longest side. If we went south then east, we’d have to go further than just traveling east. With Jennifer’s help, I found a road that went directly to the next stage of the journey east, cutting out miles we didn’t want to spend seated with our buttcheeks stuck to the soft seats of our Dynastic stallion. I was quite smug with my observation and Jennifer was happy to support my new Geometric Vision [insert resonant echo].

Ye Gawds!!

Apparently, it is true that most geometric truths only hold in Euclidean (that is, flat) space. In three dimensions, the rules change a bit. There is a reason why West Virginia is also called “The Mountain State.” True, we did save six miles in distance traveled. And it took us 40 minutes longer! The road that represented that theoretical “third side” of the triangle was a freakin’ dirt trail, as wide as my outstretched arms, that climbed at a 30-degree angle over the mountains in an undulating nightmare. To one side of us, a wall of trees and rock. To the other, a senseless plunge of thousands of feet to certain death. We drove slowly. Very, very slowly. So slowly, in fact, that we were younger when we got to the other side than we started out. I didn’t feel younger, though. I felt like I’d been basted insufficiently with cooking spray and then stuffed into a rotisserie oven half my size. Every part of me, including those previously mentioned buttcheeks, had grabbed as much of the car as possible to hold on for dear life. Six miles. Talk about a Pyrrhic victory. After we rolled at last onto more stable territory, Jennifer and I both agreed that we’d take the longer, less scenic and less deadly route on the way back.

Arrival in Manassas, Virginia-- ¿De que me hablas?

Yep, it wasn’t Washington, D.C. to which we initially made our proverbial camp. Jennifer had mustered her little army of AAA’s and reconned the area in advance. Her determination was that we could save money and headache if we found a cheap room in the reasonably proximate hamlet of Manassas, Virginia.

We rolled in, found our motel and checked into it. At this time, we were quite tired, and the excitement of that far distant morning was becoming a remote memory. Jennifer and I settled down for a nice, fuzzy, muzzy nap, without any distur—

KNOCK, KNOCK, KNOCK!!

Yes, no sooner had we started that seductive slide from alertness to soothing hypnogogic brain wave activity than someone knocked on the damned door. We wondered who the hell could have found us so quickly, since we knew no one in the entire city. I slipped on a robe and opened the door a crack and confronted one of the cleaning staff. She asked me about something, probably if we needed the room cleaned or such. Irritation and sleepiness likely contributed to my lack of exact recollection. The short story is that I got rid of her and we finally achieved the rest and relaxation we had so obviously earned.

450 Miles to Find Another Chain

We live in a Standardized Age. The more the large business chains buyout the smaller businesses, the more we start to see of the same. Here, California, Yorkshire or the Jovian moon, Ganymede, it seems that all cities and towns have about the same suite of places to shop and eat. Jennifer and I ended up finding our dinner that evening at one such chain. At this point, we really can’t agree on which one it was as the exact memory eludes us. Maybe that makes the point better, though; the fact that it really didn’t leave much of a mark tells us that one would have been pretty much the same as the other. Suffice it to say that we didn’t go anywhere or do anything special in Manassas.

After we finished our meal, we hobnobbed around the motel area, just taking in the scenery and experiencing being somewhere other. Jennifer had purchased a new, light summer outfit just for the occasion and she was enjoying being out in the bright sunlight, letting the breeze riffle said outfit.

Lighter Fluid on Ice — Brandy Ain’t So Handy

As was said above, we were not able to invest a huge amount of money into this trip. We were not like those people who can afford to go to the beach and pay $7 for a case of beer or sit on a boat paying $8 for a shot of overpriced sipping tequila. Ergo, we had brought something with us that was a little cheaper and new to our palettes…brandy! Yes, that evening, Jennifer and I poured a couple of motel glasses of good brandy, closed our eyes, inhaled deeply of their fragrance, drank heavily…and tried not to wretch up our livers onto the well-made beds. Our epiglotti spasmed in protest. Our bile mixed with our spit. Sorry, but it just didn’t work for us. Maybe it was the brand or the uniqueness of the liquor or that we just weren’t ready for the change. But we could not make brandy go down smoothly, regardless of how we prepared it. Ultimately, we ended up making other arrangements. As far as we were concerned, we were done with brandy for good, though we did heavily dilute this bottle with sodas; we couldn’t let liquor go to waste, regardless of its failing.

The evening ended with full tummies, clouded judgement and eager anticipation of the morrow….


NEXT: The pre-Thornberries start exploring the nation's capitol.

Click for Part II