spring break recap: a series of unfortunate events

The Day Off:  Part Three, In Which The Author Will Borrow Heavily From The Lemony Snicket Books Because Listening To Tim Curry’s Audio Versions Of Said Books Was By Far The Most Enjoyable Part Of The Remainder Of Her Family’s Spring Break Trip.

Dear Reader,

If you are hoping for a happy ending to this tale of mountain adventure in Colorado, an ending that would possibly include cute forest animals and singing, then you are reading the wrong story.  In fact, I would urge you to close this window right now, exit your web browser of choice, turn off your computer and walk away.  Perhaps it is a sunny spring day where you are, and you might find some morsel of happiness there.  No such morsel awaited the unfortunate members of the Jones family, as they continued their trek across the western wilds.  If you continue to read, you will most certainly find yourself weeping into your keyboard, and I can only hope that you will be careful enough to avoid an electric shock.

Fate is like a strange unpopular restaurant filled with waiters who bring you things you never asked for, and often don’t want.

A Series of Unfortunate Events:  The Slippery Slope

Well friends, as you certainly must have guessed by now (what with all the foreshadowing), our day off did not end nearly as well as it began.  As we left Salida (Bryan, me, and the boys – Elizabeth was riding with friends) we were caught in a heavy snowstorm.  Traveling back to camp, we rounded a curve and suddenly saw taillights.  Bryan tried to slow us down (even though we weren’t going very fast to begin with) and we ended up sliding around and eventually into a guardrail.  I remember realizing we were going to hit it, and yelling at the boys hang on hang on and then we did and crazy enough, bounced off and spun all the way around, finally ending up facing basically the way we started out.  The whole time we spun, I was waiting for us to hit again – the rocks facing us on the other side of the highway, a car coming from the other direction…I was sure it was coming.  But nothing more.  After Bryan checked the damage and decided we could keep driving, we headed back to camp.

It was scary for all of us; Jonathan didn’t hear my warning because he had headphones on, so he was completely taken by surprise.  Will hurt his toe (I’m still not sure how that happened, exactly).  I was shaken.  I can’t remember the last time I felt so truly out of control.  The next night, when we again found ourselves driving in blizzard-like conditions, only in Kansas this time, I kept dozing off only to jerk away minutes later, heart hammering, convinced we were about to crash.

It is difficult, when faced with a situation that you cannot control, to admit that you can do nothing.

A Series of Unfortunate Events:  The Slippery Slope

We were not the only ones affected; two of the vans never made it all the way back into camp, but ended up parked various places on the mountainside, with their passengers carted back in another vehicle or walking in.  People slipped and fell, backs and heads were knocked.  We were set back a little.  Reminded of how quickly things can get out of our hands.  I did make myself feel a little better with a little retail therapy.

The next morning our camp split up, as some headed toward Denver to ski at Copper and some chose to stay where we were and ski (and some chose to stay where we were and get our car checked out.  It was the prettiest day of skiing we had, so we enjoyed the cold and then began the trip home.  The drive was funny too, all of us spread out all over the place – sleeping in a church gym in Denver, or a hotel in Limon (where I wanted to stop, and no, I haven’t let it go yet) or even a hotel in SALINA, KANSAS.  At which we arrived at 4:00 am.  Not that I’m bitter that some people wanted to keep traveling.  I’m looking at you, banditos…

In the end we were all just grateful to be back home, in our own beds, safe and sound.  The Yukon made it all the way back like a champ and is having some cosmetic work done (although she’ll tell you it was just diet and exercise) and everything is pretty much back to normal.  Which is pretty much what I want at the end of a vacation; it just took a little longer to get there this time.