On the road again

Picture it. Road trip in the 1950's. Family car full of  4-5 children (depending on who got bribed to stay home) and two parents. No a/c.  Snacks like chips and pretzels. Thus water - in a thermos jug with a spigot and a top cap-cup which we all drank from with one accord.

And for entertainment? We played the Alphabet Game, scanning billboards (remember them), advertisements, license plates, place names, business signs, anywhere letters were lurking was fair game, until you reached the end and shouted "Z done!" Loudly. The Q, X and the Z were the toughies, and J was no easy get either. I remember in a bleak prairie stretch I snatched a J from a passing Henry J and was jubilant! Quaker State Motor Oil gas stations were our friends.

Or we played the Animal Game. Yes, that's right, we counted animals. Most four-legged critters had a value of 1, but dogs were 5 and cats were worth 20 lovely points - if my distant memory serves me. And if you came to a graveyard on your side (you had to pick a side at the start) you had to "bury" all your animals and start over. These were the big times.

Or we sang. Lots. Within the car most likely we had four-part harmony and it was lovely.

Or we played Twenty Questions or other mental guessing games.

And sometimes - if we were lucky, we hit along the wayside, a series of  rectangular signs that contained a little poem and the end sign which read Burma Shave. I never knew anyone who used Burma Shave, but it has a warm spot in my heart always for the sprouts of laughter it brought along life's highways. Two I always can remember

A man, a miss
A car, a curve
He kissed the miss
And missed the curve
Burma Shave.

and

Cattle crossing
Please go slow
That old bull
Is some cow's beau,
Burma Shave.

There were no CD's, DVDs, smart phones, iPads, Kindles - no one was plugged into his or her own electronic world. The time traveling on those four tires was shared. And yes of course from time to time there was bickering, "picking on (fill in the blank)", irritable, hot, sweaty, tired, hungry people ---- but for many more miles we played together.

 I would just like to return for just one sweet draught of that simplicity.