Weep Not For The Memories...

My mind took a trip down Memory Lane. Strangely enough the trip I took through my memories lead me to another trip I had taken with two of my friends in real life nearly five years ago. This trip was not my most exotic or most adventurous, but it will remain one of most cherished trips I’ll probably take in all my life. It was a girls’ trip taken with my friends Red and S.

My friend Red and I have this common, though bizarre, thread of a thrill-seeking love of spooky things. (This is before my ghostly experience at Chickamauga Battlefield when I was transformed into the wuss I am now.) During this time, I was brave and ready to investigate ghostly phenomenon. Red and I both knew that Gettysburg, Pa. is one of the most haunted places in this country. And the history buff in me loves visiting that place anyway and I know a LOT of the town’s Civil War history and the reported haunted places. Red and I discussed how cool it would be to be at Gettysburg on the anniversary of the battle (July 1-3, 1863). It seemed like the perfect time for something paranormal to happen. Before the end of our conversation, Red and I had planned a trip to Gettysburg during the anniversay of the battle.

Tuesday night has been girls’ night for me and my girlfriends since 1994. (This tradition still continues, by the way.) The Tuesday after Red and I had planned a Gettysburg ghost hunting camp out and shared it with the rest of the girls, our dear friend S. was jumping onboard with us. And then there were three! However, there was no convincing our other gal, La-la to join us. Camping is just too icky for her!

I have said this before...I cannot plan a direct trip to one destination. There are too many other things I feel I must see along the way. I am one to want to get the most out of a trip...and of course, drag everyone else along with me!

Bright and early on June 30, 2001, Red, S., and I hopped into my car and headed north to Pennsylvania. Through South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, and finally, Pennsylvania we drove laughing, chatting, and singing many bad 80s songs. When I say that we listened to MANY bad 80’s songs, I do really mean MANY! We arrived at Gettysburg just past 3:00 p.m., just as we had planned, set up the tent, and hit the town.

I have to mention that S packed enough junk for a month! She wasn’t exactly the camping type either, but she sure was a trooper! As long as she could fill her air mattress up every night, the girl was happy. With mention of that blasted mattress, she decided to fill it up with the extremely loud air pump powered by my car’s cigarette lighter and always at nighttime. Surely the neighbors in tents surrounding us did not appreciate this noise at 10:00 pm.! So each night, we would drive away from the campground so she could re-inflate her mattress. That, of course, left the problem of carrying a full-size mattress back to camp. We rolled the windows down so that we could stick out our arms to hold the mattress on top of the car as we drove, laughing hysterically at the few people who were still awake watching us curiously as we passed by. S would laugh so hard that she would throw Red into fits of laughter and I would try to suppress my hysterics whispering “shhhhh” to remind them of our neighbors in tents. Since we had poisoned our brains with so many ‘80s songs, I would sometimes sing that song by Til Tuesday that says “Hush, hush…Keep it down now…Voices carry.” That would, of course, make the fits of laughter louder.

We had so much fun in Gettysburg and did so much exploring and investigating. We toured the battlefield, took ghost tours to learn more of the creepy places (that we would, of course, go back to later without the crowd), ate good food, and met many people. I could go into detail about the things we did, but instead, I will just sum up the funny things. So many hilarious events happened on this trip that we decided to write all the things down. Some things about Gettysburg that I will always remember are becoming addicted to Fierce Grape Gatorade and going to Wal-Mart every day to buy more, the ghostly event that happened one night on the battlefield at the Devil’s Den, eating at the Lincoln Diner everyday, and our Washington, DC daytrip from there, and these crazy boys we met at the supposedly haunted Sach’s Covered Bridge who kept asking us to go into the haunted woods with them. Our response, to the request? A very sarcastic, “Yeah, right. Because you need girls to protect you?” Granted, these dudes were a far cry from a genius IQ. One of the guys, noticing my southern accent, asked where I was from. “Guess,” I told him. He answered with a very sharp, “Some state in the south?” Again, I asked him to guess which one. His response was, “Kansas?” I stared at him blankly and replied, “Yeah, because Kansas is in the south and not in the midwest.” Not catching the sarcasm and thinking he was a great guesser, he smiled brightly. Looking back, maybe they did need three girls to lead them through the haunted woods, not for protection, but maybe just so they could find their way back?

We took a tour bus from Gettysburg to DC the following day. S. and I had already been, but Red had not and we really wanted her to see some of the sights. The things I will remember about our day in DC…Park Ranger Aaron outside of the Korean War Memorial that talked directly to my chest, the rude New Yorker who refused to compromise her reclined seat position on the bus, thus crushing Red’s knees, barely missing seeing the President at the Lincoln Memorial, and the bird that pooped a HUGE load on S’s shoulder as we were enjoying lunch on the lawn of the Mall in front of the Smithsonian.

After leaving Gettysburg, three days later, we traveled to upstate New York to the small town of Trumansburg where some of Red’s family lives. It was only 10 miles to Ithaca so we took a “Road Trip” there a couple of times to check it out. (Though, strangely enough, most of the movie was actually filmed here in Georgia) We camped at Taughannock Falls while staying in New York. Our most memorable day would have to have been the day trip to Niagara Falls. I’ll always remember how ridiculous we looked in our “souvenir ponchos” when we took the Maid of the Mist boat ride at the base of the falls. (They were more affectionately referred to as our “souvenir trash bags” since that was more or less what they looked like!) I’ll always remember how funny S, in particular, looked. With her baseball cap on and the poncho over her head she looked like a blue duck. We drove over to the Canadian side of the falls and spent some time there as well. After stopping in downtown Buffalo and a side trip to Fort Niagara on Lake Ontario, we headed back to Trumansburg. For kicks, we did some dirty Mad Libs to pass the time as we drove along the boring interstate. I’ll never think of Scooby Doo the same way again! S., who was the calmest, quietest, sweetest of the three of us came up with some of the funniest adjectives and she really impressed us with those nouns…DIRTY! Haha.

We left New York after three days, but the adventure was not over yet. Next,we drove into Philadelphia. First off, I loved the history of the city. We did the whole touristy thing there checking out Independence Hall, Betsy Ross House, Ben Franklin’s house site, and of course checked out the Liberty Bell. I touched it. I touched its crack and I have to admit that the goofy side of me was quite disappointed that I couldn’t find a souvenir tee shirt that said so! That would have been cool…The Liberty Bell: I touched its crack! I enjoyed all the history, beautiful old buildings, and of course a genuine Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich, but I have to say that the city that is dubbed as the City of Brotherly Love should truly reconsider dropping its claim that it’s “The city that loves you back.”
In the welcome center, I inquired about purchasing a map of the whole city. The woman behind the counter snapped at me to “Just take one of these maps of downtown.” I explained to her that I wished to have a map of the whole city. She insisted this was all I needed. This would have been true if we had been staying downtown, which we were not. We were staying out toward one of the airports on Roosevelt Blvd. Then this lady talks me like I am an idiot and says, “Why would you need a map of the entire city? Don’t you know this is like the fourth largest city in the entire United States?” I stood there calmly but with my blood quickly rising to the surface. Oh no she did not just say that to me! Don’t mess with me when it comes to trivial geography! In a calm, yet stern, voice I replied, “Actually Philly is number 5 in the ranking of largest cities and with you being the information center you should know that!” She had the nerve to ask as I was storming out, “So you don’t want the map, then?” Ugh! S was laughing hysterically at me. So much for loving me back, right?

Because of this woman who upset me terribly, I used the small, un-detailed city map in my atlas. And I drove us to New Jersey across the toll bridge…twice…before finding our way to where we thought we should be going. Finally, I stopped at a gas station in a BAD neighborhood (against the protests of Red and S) and marched up to a cop’s car and asked him for directions. He, unlike the welcome center bitch, was sweet and helpful. Though he did tell me that I was in one of the worst neighborhoods in Philly and shouldn’t be walking across parking lots alone. Yikes. We crashed hard in our first hotel beds of the trip and if felt soooo good!

The next morning we drove back over into New Jersey…intentionally, this time. We spent the day in Atlantic City and drove homeward bound via the long coastal route. S was very disappointed that we didn’t visit Lucy the Elephant while in Atlantic City. Red and I were just happy to walk along the boardwalk down by the sea (singing the song, of course) and eating foot-long hotdogs.

We drove through Delaware just so we could say we went through there. (Remember the scene in Wayne’s World where Wayne and Garth are doing a commercial for different states and they pretend to be cowboys for Texas and when they get to Delaware they just stand there bored stiff and say… “Hi…I’m…in…Delaware.”?) Well, that sums it up best. Yeah…we…went…to…Delaware.

Next was Maryland, where we took an off-the-main-route side trip to a town called St. Michaels along the Chesapeake Bay. There was a cool little octagonal shaped cottage-like lighthouse there. That place made me hungry for seafood so we continued south towards Virginia Beach, Virginia. I could almost taste shrimp and fresh crab legs! I was willing to face any obstacle to satisfy this desire to stuff my face full of seafood. However, for a few moments there I was afraid that my need would go unfilled as my two friends weren’t necessarily as willing to face obstacles as I. That obstacle was the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel. I knew Red was terrified of bridges, especially those over water so I didn’t really say anything about having to cross this 10 mile bridge over and under (yes, it also goes underwater in tunnel form for a stretch) the choppy Chesapeake Bay. I know! I know! Bad Outdoorsy Girl for not telling her! S didn’t have a problem with the length of the bridge, but being a girl who will take something she has already bought back to the store to save $1 (no exaggeration here) she didn’t want to pay the toll. But there we were in line to cross, so we had to pay and we had to cross. I’m so glad we did. Red didn’t pass out and felt proud of herself for crossing and S agreed that the sunset we saw setting over the bay as we crossed was worth the $10 toll and I say that the seafood waiting on the other side was worth the crossing!

We packed in so much on this trip and it was awesome. I have so many fond memories and funny stories from those 9 nine days. I began making a scrapbook of the trip shortly after we made it home. I was almost halfway finished and then stopped. I haven’t touched it since.

A month after this trip, S, my very best friend in the world suddenly passed away at the age of 26. She had a clot move into her brain. I was devastated. As I held her hand as she lay in the hospital bed, I knew she was gone, but I still felt she could hear me. I told her again how much her friendship meant to me. (Luckily I told her this while she was alive and well, too) I promised her that she would always be a part of my life.

But, for a while, I lied. I stuffed the scrapbook out of sight. I removed her pictures from view. One month later, on September 11, 2001, the United States received its greatest moment of panic, fear, pain, and uncertainty. I felt nothing as I watched the Twin Towers crumble down on my TV screen. Some people freaked out this could be the end of the world. The words to R.E.M.’s song played through my head.
It’s the end of the world as we know it
And I feel fine
I was the walking dead anyway. That shock slowly wore off and became unbearable pain. I blocked S out of my mind so completely that I forgot the sound of her laughter and the sound of her voice.

You can force your waking mind to block something out, but you have no control over dreams. Mine evolved into nightmares. In one of my eerie dreams, I could hear the song that I mentioned, “Voices Carry”, playing and I could hear S’s laughter echoing through the darkness. I knew I was in our tent on the camping trip but I couldn’t find her. Just when I got close enough to her, there would be silence. Then I would hear her laughing on the other side of the tent. It was an exhausting dream.

Two years passed before I was able to come to terms with this loss and celebrate her life with the memories that I have of her from our 12 year friendship. Three more years have passed since then. I feel at peace with her now, 5 years later, though I still miss her deeply. Sometimes on Tuesday nights I still notice her empty chair. But most times I can feel her there. And I’m happy to report that I can now listen to “Voices Carry” and all the other wonderful ‘80s songs we listened to on the trip with a smile on my face. I’m really glad because I surely do love that song, “Bette Davis Eyes”!

I think it’s time for me to finish that scrapbook now.