The Ways My Trip Sucked 4: Dad's House and Minneapolis pt. 2
Archived from October 27, 2007
Dad’s house 1.
I originally planned on 4 days in between the festival weekends to do “Wisconsin stuff”. “Stuff” like go to all the thrift stores for clothes that fit (because in LA I am an obese Amazon giantess, but in Wisconsin I’m of average proportion), visit Ken and Joanne, buy sea salt and find a used Oster blender. Thanks to the Minneapolis impound, I had 1.5 days to do any Wisconsin activities. So, during that time I consolidated photos of my dad’s side of the family from approximately 1870 – 1970. Give or take 20 years. I also had terrible allergies because photos that are 100 years old and have been in an attic for 60 of those years collect shocking generations of dust. The dust collected on items in my father’s house is so advanced it has weeded out the generational weak links making it powerful enough to cause allergic reaction on contact - not just upon inhalation. It affects the epidermis. I was sneezing for hours out of my mouth and skin.
MINNEAPOLIS pt 2.
I still had a second weekend of shows to do at the Minnesota Festival, even though this time I REALLY did not want to go back there for fear of being arrested for not wearing reflective pedestrian clothing or some other extreme law I wasn’t aware of. But, I’d made a commitment, so I went back. This time, I was bringing my father, who although not yet 80, he is very much pushing it. So my boyfriend and I packed him in the boat-like SUV w/ no air-conditioning and headed back out for the 5 hour trip north.
First Impressions.
This time we were going to stay with my good friend Krista’s mom and stepfather, Dianne and Ralph. They live about 45 minutes outside St Paul. I made this choice because they live on a farm and I thought it would be a nice environment for my dad. Also, they said “yes” when asked.
Krista’s mother had a very flattering image of me, which I think I systematically dismantled during my visit. Her positive image arouse when my brother and half sister and I stayed at her house one night 10 years ago. She was impressed with how well we got along and how polite we were. My family is like a closet smoker except our cigarettes are dysfunctional relationships. You can imagine Dianne’s surprise when she found out that the last time my brother and half sister and I were in the same room together was at her house, 10 years ago.
Houseguests.
I try to be a good guest wherever I go. I really want to be good and I don’t want to be a bother. But wow did I miss the mark on this occasion.
First of all, we showed up at about 11pm. Krista’s mom was in her nightwear, Ralph was already in bed. She greeted us at the door and said “oh, there are three of you? I thought it was just going to be you and your dad.” She of course rolled with the punches, but I wanted to punch myself in the face for not being clear that my boyfriend, Trevor, would be with us. Dumb, dumb, dumb. I felt like a jerk.
That night there was a really big storm. I woke up from the torrential rain and started closing all the windows and sliding doors, the rest of the house got up when the WW2 style sirens, intended apparently to warn the entire county of a tornado, started going off 50 feet from the house. We were safe from the tornado, but thank goodness an air-raid siren went off for 30 minutes to let us know some county residents might not be.
The next day Krista’s mom got up really early to go shopping for breakfast after asking us what we liked to eat in the morning. My dad: coffee and oatmeal, me: fruit, Trevor: eggs, bacon and toast. So of course, she got all of it and prepared it while I slept-in like a hobo on soft hay. We ate (like hungry hobos after a night of sleeping on soft hay) and headed off to Minneapolis.
Gas.
This next part makes me want to hide my head because it’s so embarrassing; WE RAN OUT OF GAS.
Yes, if you can believe it, 3 adults in a car, 2 who drive every single day in Los Angeles and we ran out of gas. I apparently left my brain in LA for this trip. So, since we’re on Minnesota country roads, and I’m not exactly sure where, nor how long it would take AAA to get there and I have a show to do, I decide to call Krista’s mom. She sends Ralph with a jug of gas and he follows us to the nearest gas station to make sure we get there. We start to fill up and he leaves. What do you do? How do you thank people for putting up with your dumbness? (Don’t worry the dumbness doesn’t end there for this trip).
Late.
We go on our way, and are really close to the twin cities, when of course I get lost. I get lost after we ran out of gas and Trevor can’t figure out where we are on the map and my dad is just kicking it in his green shades in the passenger seat. At this point I start to panic because I don’t know if I’m going to make it to my show on time and the MN fringe festival is really strict about starting on time, and then I remembered that I needed more programs which are a vital part of my show, and we didn’t know where there’s a place to photocopy them, and the time was closing in. Besides that, our maps were now possibly obsolete because of the bridge collapse.
Trevor called 411 for Kinko’s, I called Fiona who got me back on the right highway, and my dad kicked it in the passenger seat in his green shades. Amazingly we made it to the show on time, Trevor got photocopies there within 5 minutes of the show starting. But what was especially amazing was that the door staff HAD programs because they’d apparently kept a stack from the previous shows.
It was intense. I wanted to go home.
We went back to the awesome farm house with our awesome hosts, where we had to ask to stay another night. That’s right, after arriving in the dead of night with an extra person and then having them bring us gas, we wanted to stay an extra night.
So embarrassing. Not as embarrassing as not leaving the next morning though.
Leaving
It’s true, we stayed hours past when we were scheduled to leave. For that, I feel embarrassed, but not guilty and I’ll tell you why – my dad was having a great time. My dad is at an age now where he has good days and bad days. Perhaps it was a passive-aggressive tactic on his part to have some control over the trip since I was dragging him all over Minnesota. Maybe it was because the weather had come cooler, or maybe it was because he’d been eating a dozen ears of homegrown corn every day. Whatever it was, he was totally “on” that morning. He was telling stories, he had no problem hearing what people were saying. He’d told me the day before that he “really liked that woman we’re staying with, Dianne” and he remembered her name, which is amazing since dad barely remembers the names of his children. Eventually, I had to rip my dad away from his new friends, and get on the road.
Then it was over. The festivals were finally over. I had my dad’s car, I was in the beautiful Midwest and I never have to do either of those shows again.
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