My younger brother and I pulled out of the driveway of our childhood home at 7 a.m. on Sunday morning.
Before leaving Farmington, we topped off at our neighborhood repair shop, a locally owned place at the corner of a couple state highways on the edge of town. The entire convenience store could fit inside the coffee section of one of the new Kwik Trip stations that have popped up across the Midwest. (Sorry, Canadian readers. I don’t know the gas stations here well enough to make a comparison yet).
My dad has lived within two miles of the place for most of his life and is regular enough to have the owner and lead mechanic’s cell phone numbers. Twenty-some years ago, I rode along as he dropped off a case of Busch Light and a card for the guys in the garage the week before Christmas. I still stop for gas and a Gatorade every time I’m in town. Old habits.
We were bound for Pictou, Nova Scotia. I pointed the Jeep to the east.
The night before we left, my brother and I visited Grandma Akin. It was the first time I’d seen her since she moved to an assisted living apartment at the end of the summer.
Grandma was waiting inside the main entrance when we arrived. She was excited to see us. We were introduced to a new friend of hers in the lobby before heading to the elevator to see her apartment.
When I was a young child, before my brother was born, we lived three doors down from my paternal grandparents. Between being their first grandchild and living so close, I spent a lot of time with them. I learned to play baseball in the back yard with Dad and Grandpa, went on walks and wagon rides with Grandma, and cuddled up next to her in the living room to watch Sesame Street and Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood. When I was at their house, my nap took place at the same time as the soap operas that Grandma liked to watch. Funny how that happens.
Grandma showed us around the new apartment, taking extra time to point out her curio cabinet full of the angel figurines that she’d collected over the years. She grew up poor and her father passed away when she was a child. There was no money or room for things that didn’t have a use besides being pretty to look at. I’m glad she has them with her now.
We sat in the cozy living room, her organ squeezed into a corner by the window that overlooks the parking lot. She told us about the move and joys and challenges of learning to live in a new place. She mentioned the forgetfulness that had started to creep in, that she’d lost some independence.
My brother and I tried to keep things positive. I was glad he was there with me to make a few jokes that lightened what could’ve been a much heavier conversation. It had been a year of change in our family, in so many ways, and nobody quite knew what would come next.
In the last days of packing up the house in Saint Peter, I came across my childhood teddy bear and blanket. Nestled in the same box were a smaller blanket and clown doll that had been my nap-time toys at Grandma’s house. I knew the Jeep wouldn’t have much room, but I couldn’t bring myself to let them go. They made the move to Canada.
When we were leaving the apartment, Grandma grabbed my hand as we walked down the hallway. She squeezed three times in quick succession. I immediately recognized the secret code from childhood: 1-2-3 = I. Love. You.
As we say in Minnesota, uff da.
My brother picked up the conversation as I took a close look at the bird enclosure in the lobby.
We hugged our farewells. I managed to keep it together.
My brother promised to visit and show her pictures when he got back from Nova Scotia.
Early in the drive, my brother pointed out a field of cannabis plants along the highway, the result of Minnesota’s legalized market. The world’s come a long way since we were kids.
Growing up, I was pretty much a rule follower. I wanted to know the parameters for whatever sport or game or activity was at hand, then would do the best I could to win within those guidelines. I didn’t break curfew, or drink alcohol until I turned 21.
My brother often had a more flexible interpretation of the rules.
Whenever we left the house as teenagers, we’d hear two things from our parents.
“Make good decisions,” they’d say. “Be a leader.”
I always thought those were expectations and worked hard to meet them. First borns, right? My brother, I think, sometimes saw them as constraints. He’d readily push back on people and ideas he didn’t agree with. Looking back now, I think we both held the line a little too tightly on our respective ends of the rules-and-expectations spectrum.
Our route took us down US Route 52 to catch Interstate 90. We drove past John Hardy’s BBQ in Rochester, a family favorite and perhaps the best restaurant of its genre in all of Minnesota. My dad and brother still make the two-hour round trip from Farmington just for the shredded pork dinner with fried potato slices.
We drove through the Minnesota bluffs of the Driftless Area and crossed the Mississippi River into Wisconsin.
Illinois, Indiana, and western Ohio passed uneventfully. Conversation topics included the number of billboards for personal injury attorneys in Chicago, the University of Notre Dame and American higher education, and the Great Black Swamp in northwest Ohio that was drained in the late 1800s and is now primo farmland.
When I started talking about the swamp, my brother asked one polite question then turned up the music.
Blame Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader and Wikipedia rabbit holes.
We stopped for a late supper at a Ruby Tuesday in Streetsboro, Ohio. As kids, it felt like a restaurant that was a little bit special. Your whole family would go out on your mother’s birthday. You’d take a date there once you could drive a car. Good food, and that great salad bar.
Not this trip. It wasn’t necessarily bad, but everything was sort of flat and lifeless. We couldn’t decide if the quality of the restaurant chain had taken a hit or we had lower expectations as teenagers when there was a location in a neighboring town.
Then again, a lot of things look different to us now than they did back then. Part of that’s life experience, I guess. Your perspective evolves.
And the world continues to change at what feels like a steadily increasing rate.
Everything seems optimized for speed, revenue, and topical gotchas—rarely for quality, nuance, or depth. Some of the changes are for the better. A lot of it seems worse.
How can you help but feel nostalgic? Even if what you’re remembering isn’t the full picture of what actually happened.
After settling up, we pulled into the lot at a neighboring Hampton Inn.
It had been a good first day. We’d covered more ground than I’d hoped.
I slept better than I usually do on the road.
Better than I had for the last couple months.
To be continued…
If you need a repair shop in Pictou, go to Glen Heighton's little shop across from the post office. My dad was a regular there. 🙏
Beautiful description of your Grandma’s new place and your recollection of nap time. Blanket and teddy in mint condition!