Day 23 -- Houghton Lake to Byron Center, Michigan -- 171 Miles

Today we just needed to rack up a few miles since we suffered quite a bit of down time when we had the recent electrical problems. After we left Houghton Lake, we rolled west to the edge of town, then jumped on Route 131 south, a lightly-traveled and heavily-forested divided highway with a great lack of 18-wheelers to keep us company. That is, we eventually rolled south on Route 131. Before that, I misheard the GPS instructions and went north on that highway. Concetta caught the mistake, thankfully, and told me I had to turn around. I tried to argue, but to no avail. As we were just then approaching one of those tiny roads that connect the north and south routes that are forbidden to anyone except emergency vehicles, I decided on the fly to consider myself an emergency vehicle, and I quickly reversed direction.

That bit of drama was the extent of our excitement for the morning which had started several hours earlier with a trip to the Laundromat to do the bedding. This was made much more easily accomplished as now the bedroom slider will actually slide. It's impossible to "unmake" the bed and extricate the sheets when the slider has pinned the edge of the bed under the wardrobe.

Perhaps I should relate to you how laundry-day goes for us while we're out seeing the country. First of all, Concetta is absolutely meticulous and fussy about the condition of washers and driers in the local laundry facilities. The machines must be squeaky clean or she won't use them. If we simply must stay and do our laundry at a less-than-perfect spot, Concetta immediately descends on her intended machines with a bottle of spray disinfectant and a giant roll of paper towels. Usually, it's ten or fifteen minutes later before the clothes go into the washing machine.

In all the time we've been traveling by RV, only one laundry facility has actually passed this inspection with flying colors. That one was in a rather dusty, dirty little frontier cow town in northwestern Oklahoma. The disreputable camp in which we had found ourselves the previous day had no building for doing laundry. In fact, the site was weed-choked, the utilities were marginal and hard to find, and we had to walk two blocks to leave a check in a drop box since there was no manager present. It was barely a legitimate camp at all.

So, the next morning, after breaking camp, we found a Laundromat in town. When we arrived we could hardly believe our eyes. The whole facility was immaculate and state-of-the-art, wall-to-wall, and floor-to-ceiling. Brand new, digital machines gleamed like they'd only been installed that morning. Needless to say, I think Concetta found SOMETHING to clean, but it was hardly necessary. You could eat off most of the surfaces in the place.

So today, the usual cleaning of machines in progress, I poured over the Rand McNally Atlas searching for a reasonable route south toward Ohio. I knew we wanted to visit the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, but aside from that we hadn't chosen a route. It was at this time that I noticed that the Gerald Ford Library was in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Grand Rapids wasn't exactly the direction I had been thinking about, but once Concetta was back in the rig while the clothes washer did its thing, we mutually decided that Grand Rapids would be our next destination. So, once the laundry was finished washing and drying, we made up the bed with the clean sheets, and then hit the road. The sliders were working perfectly and it was a beautiful day for adventure.

At this point it was getting very close to lunch time and I knew I would need to find a nice level place to pull out, preferably one that was well away from the traffic noise. So it was then that we arrived at Denny's house. I couldn't tell you the off-ramp, and I never learned Denny's last name, but Denny turned out to be perhaps the most interesting person I've met so far on this vacation.

The story began like this. The road that I picked to exit Route 131 south turned out to be perfect for our lunchtime stop, as just at the top of the off-ramp we came across an out-of-business restaurant. Thinking that the dilapidated old place at least had a level parking lot, we pulled in and I shut off the engine. The concrete didn't turn out to be perfectly level, but I decided it would do. Then for the next thirty or forty minutes we had a nice quiet lunch with no traffic noise to keep us company.

Later, when we were about ready to leave, I decided to grab a photo of the spot just in case I found nothing else to photograph today (photo top left). I walked across the road in the direction of a neat and tidy home and workshop. Standing on the far shoulder, I snapped a couple of shots, then I headed back for the rig. It was while I was thus occupied that a gentleman emerged from his house and made for his mailbox out by the road. When he saw me he waved, then immediately came over to talk to me.

And that's all it took for he and I to become friends. The reason for the instant camaraderie was a simple hat, or maybe TWO simple hats, as the guy was wearing a ball cap emblazoned with a patch for the 101st Airborne, and I was wearing my U.S. Navy ball cap

Naturally once we had exchanged pleasantries, I immediately asked him about the hat. I had just never met anyone who served in such a historically revered and famous outfit. "Yup," my new friend said, "I was a parachute rigger. Though I have to tell you that the first time I tried to get in they rejected me for being one pound under the weight requirement."

"You're kidding," I said.

"Nope, he said, "My buddy and I decided to go down together and join up. He got in and I didn't. I had to go home and put on some weight before they'd let me in. By then my buddy had gone on, but we met up later and got assigned to units under the same command. So it worked out pretty good."

"And you were a parachute rigger," I said.

That's right, he said. "I liked the work and did a good job. But sometimes you ran into guys who didn't do so good. I was jumping one time and I was the last out of the plane. I pulled my ripcord and the chute didn't open. Whoever had packed the chute, and I'm pretty sure who it was, didn't pack it carefully enough. Those lines were all tangled above me and I was trying to clear them by tugging as hard as I could." My new friend spread his arms wide to indicate how he was trying to untangle the lines. He went on. "And I didn't want to pull the reserve chute because I knew it would probably get tangled in the main chute."

"Dang," I said. "What did you do?"

"Well," he said, "I just kept yanking on those lines and I finally got them loose and the chute deployed. A second later I hit the ground."

"That's cutting it close," I said.

He nodded. "I think I used up one of my nine lives that day. Made 23 jumps in all," he said.

Now I had learned all of this and I hadn't even learned the guy's name. I had told him about my time in the Naval Air Corp and about my non-existent experience with jumping. "They told us that we really wouldn't need a chute since anit-submarine planes always flew too close to the water for the thing to open," I said. That got a big smile out of him.

Finally I asked him his name and learned that he was Denny. I never asked his last name, probably because I had trouble sometimes getting a word in edgewise. It was like Denny hadn't had anyone to talk to for some time.

"What brings you up this way," Denny asked when he learned I was from Nevada. When I told him that I had to travel north to pick up some 1929 Ford seats in Minneapolis, Denny's eyes got a sparkle in them and he said, "Come on, I have something to show you."

I looked back at the rig hoping that Concetta would understand that I needed to accept Denny's invitation, but didn't see her. "Come on," he said, "you'll like this!"

Before I knew it, we had briskly walked over to Denny's barn and he had thrown open the door revealing a bright orange Mustang inside. "It's a 1966 with only 38,000 miles on her," he said. "Come have a look. I got it from the original owner."

Denny was right, it was a peach of a car. It had the original 289 and three-speed shifter on the floor. I was certainly happy I was still holding my camera, as I put it to good use shooting several different angles of the pony car. I could tell it was Denny's pride and joy, so I was a bit taken aback when he told me that his wife was insisting that they move down to Indiana to be nearer to their sons, and he would only have a single-car garage down there. I didn't have the courage to ask him what was going to happen to the Mustang.

At this point I knew that Concetta was probably wondering if I had been abducted by aliens or fallen in the creek or something, so I started moving toward the door. Denny didn't really want to break off our conversation. I'm sure if I had said, hey let's go make some coffee and sit and talk for the rest of the day he'd have jumped at the chance. In fact, if Concetta hadn't been with me, I would have done exactly that. But the road was calling, and if we ever wanted to make our deadline in Ohio, I had to drive a few more miles before we slept.

I came away from my encounter with Denny completely humbled by the way we bonded almost from the moment we shook hands. Like I said, I've never met anyone in my life who had the guts and fortitude to join the 101st airborne, or any wartime parachute regiment for that matter. Though Denny didn't tell me when he had joined, I expect it was the early 1960s, right during the buildup for Vietnam. I'm not sure he spent a lot of time there, because he told me he worked as parachute rigger for about 18 months. What he did before or after that period, and where he did it, he didn't say. But as we parted, I handed him my card and told him when he visited his daughter in Las Vegas to come north and I'd take him to dinner. I meant it, and would truly love to see him again. I think in the space of thirty minutes we became great friends. And THAT is the real beauty of life on the road.

Tonight we rented a camp space in the town of Byron Center, which is south of Grand Rapids, Michigan. The camp is small, and has lots of full-timers, I suspect, by the rather settled look to things. The camp is quiet, has lots of mature trees to shade the RV, and it has an additional feature that I have not encountered before: it has a young lady behind the registration counter who genuinely seemed to care who I was when I walked into the office to register today.

After I filled out the registration card she ashed me for my email address. I still have the same email address I've had since I was 47 years old. I spelled it out for her as she entered the data in their computer. "Writeguy47@aol.com," I said.

The woman paused and looked over at me. "Do you really write?" she asked.

"Well," I said, "I was writing a murder mystery back when I invented that email name".

The woman brightened when I said that. "Really," she said. "I love to read!"

"Yes, well, I never got it published," I said. "I tried to get an agent for awhile, but when that didn't work out, I put it away and went on to write other things. Now I just give the book to anyone who expresses an interest in reading a copy."

"I'd really love to read it," the woman said, sounding hopeful and giving me the broadest smile I'd seen in a month.

I hesitated, wondering if she was being sincere. "Well, I think I have a copy in the RV. If I find it, I'll bring it to you after I get set up."

"That's great," she said. "Thanks!"

With that I left with my map of the park showing the space number, and a strangely warm feeling that someone -- once again, a complete stranger -- would take an interest in who I was and what I'd done for the second time in a single day. After setting up the rig, I rummaged through the things I'd packed for the trip, and found a copy of my murder mystery that I'd brought along just in case one of the relatives wanted a copy. As I walked over to the office, I tried to think back on all the camps in which we'd stayed in the last 40,000 miles of RVing, and all the people who'd asked for my email address. I decided that I could not remember a single person showing any interest in the sort of nom de plume that I'd chosen way back when I started writing. Her name was Michelle, and today was the first.

It's kinda funny to think that if we hadn't stumbled into trouble with the truck that ultimately altered our travel plans, our intended direction, and the stops we would have made, I never would have encountered the two individuals I met today. I never would have had a lively discussion about collector cars and parachute jumps with Denny, and I never would have spent many minutes talking to a bubbly young woman about famous writers, writing groups, and how I came to write a book myself. Who knows, maybe she'll read my book and decide that she can write a book, too. Maybe she'll even be famous someday. I'd love it if that proved true.

And there's plenty more stories out there on the two-lanes that are just waiting to be discovered. So when you venture out to find those stories and those future friends, the Happy Wanderers wish you happy travels and exciting adventures.