I had just completed my first year at the University of Kansas though a more accurate way to describe the experience would have been that I "wintered in Lawrence." Despite my lack of scholastic success, I managed to squeeze as much fun as humanly possible out of each and every night of the week and on one of these drunken evenings at the tail end of the semester, managed to meet a beautiful girl named Kelly. Kelly was a sucker for adventure, and having just completed and been inspired by Jack Kearuac's On The Road myself, we quickly became an item. Despite our burning desire to see the world in shoddy motels together, the semester ended and with it's end, we returned to our respective home towns. Mine in Oklahoma City and hers in Wichita.
Upon returning home, used to the freedom of coming and going when I pleased, all I could think about was the adventure that Kelly and I had talked about. Good fortune came my way when my friend Parker's mother suggested that he and I drive her Ford Explorer, her dog Chief, and some of her finer clothing to her house in Northern Michigan where she planned on spending her summer. My family had a summer house there as well and without thought, we agreed.
Harbor Springs was a tiny harbor town about fifty miles south of Macinac Island and another thirty from the Canadian border in Sault Saint Marie. By winter, Harbor Springs is a lightly populated village where everyone knows everyone and by summer it is a bustle of tourist activity. The town has a tiny Main Street with more fudge shops than stop signs.
The town also plays summer host to a series of exclusive yacht, golf, and tennis clubs where members wore sear-sucker and talk about the good life over long putts, cocktails, and Gurney Sandwiches (a local favorite). Despite its perennial and pastel-clad summer residents, many of whom had kids our age, Parker and I were asked to drive up long before any of these summer dwellers would arrive. Given that I had just completed my first year of college and was itching for freedom, a week in a cottage in the woods with Parker, though transcendental as it may have sounded, would require some modification and I had the perfect solution. Kelly.
Armed with one fake ID, a little over five hundred dollars, and the self proclaimed title "The Road Warriors," we bid our families good-bye, agreed one last time that we would drive straight to Michigan and with that, headed to Wichita where Kelly and her lovely best friend Carrie, hurriedly packed their bags for their summer adventure. We picked them up and headed to Chicago where they shopped Michigan Ave. while Parker and I got life advice from a homeless guy (this was a rare site in OKC and unheard of in Lawrence) and went to a Cubs game.
After a fun-filled day dodging Parker's mom's phone calls, we made our way to Harbor Springs. I felt a keen loyalty to this little town, deeming it a heaven on earth and expected Kelly not only to think it was pretty but to also be as emotionally connected with it upon arrival as I was. This proved troublesome for our relationship. We fought constantly and what had been a romantic getaway over a thousand miles from our homes, designed to stimulate her adventurous side and charge her libido quickly became a nightmare and while we bickered, Parker and Carrie fell deeper and deeper into an outwardly affectionate state of teenage lust.
After three days of quarreling, I longed for that Walden inspired time in the woods alone but it was not in the cards. The only adventure, spare the road trip itself, was that Parker and I lost a bet and the girls got to highlight our hair. We sat around and later that night and the topic of travel came up. Kelly, who had been to Italy and was happy to talk about it to anyone willing to listen chimed in on the importance of international travel.
I quickly pointed out that Canada was only 90 miles north and almost out of spite, I suggested we go at that moment. After all, we were Road Warriors. Parker, always the contrarian and perfectly content in his summer home with his new found love, resigned the title Road Warrior but offered to pay for the gas were we to make it all the way to Canada. With that, desperate to defend my honor, I walked out the door. Kelly, sat on the couch frozen and confused. That confusion deepened as she heard the roar of Parker's mother's Explorer followed by a blast of the horn.
With the squealing of tires, we were off. Almost immediately, Kelly and I were in love again and all anger and resentment subsided. As Sister Hazel sang the song "All For You" through the blown Explorer speakers, we pushed our way into the Northern Michigan night, discussing everything from the relevance of music throughout history to the nature of God. My dream of adventure was rapidly coming to fruition in a way greater than I had imagined. As millions of stars shined on us through the sunroof, we pressed onward towards our international destination, happy once again, to be with one another.
Just after midnight, we arrived to Sault Saint Marie. The closest to an international border guard I had ever been up to this point was crossing from Arizona to California to check for fruit. After watching several cars breeze through the border as though they had some kind of international speed pass, we decided to cross.
As a stout border patrol officer made his way to the car, I quickly put a piece of gum in my mouth. Over the course of the drive we had consumed at least four beers apiece in addition to countless ones before our hasty departure. "I thought he was going to just wave us through!" said Kelly as he tapped on the window with his flashlight.
I rolled down the window. "What brings you to Canada?" he asked.... Good question.
"We just wanted to... go to Canada?" I uttered with wavering confidence.
"Please step out of the car, sir," he said stoically.
As I opened the door and stepped out, I felt my bare foot hit the cold Michigan pavement. I had left for our adventure with such urgency that I had forgotten to put on shoes.
"Can I see some ID?" he asked.
I fished around in my pocket until I found that familiar plastic and presented it. The officer looked at the ID fora moment and then said "Colorado, huh?" My heart began to race. Though my alter-ego, two years my senior was from Colorado, I certainly was not.
"Sit on the curb," he ordered.
He walked over to Kelly's side of the car and after a brief conversation, she joined me, furious. She scolded me as my feet froze and my heart raced. We watched as the officer pulled Parker's mother's expensive clothes, the ones we had been asked to deliver to Michigan to ensure their safe arrival, and tossed them in a pile on the ground. A moment later, an empty Labatt's Blue Ribbon Box plopped onto the roof of the car, followed by at least eight empty cans.
After an agonizingly long time, the office made his way towards us. "Is this your car?" he asked.
"No sir," said, my voice shaking.
"Does the owner of the car know that you have it?"
"No sir."
"So you have stolen the car," he said bluntly.
"Well the owner's son said that we could take it," I said in a week effort to defend myself.
"and how old is he?"
"Seventeen." I said, resigned.
The officer took a long breath, shook his head and began to speak. "Do you understand," he said, "that right now, you are crossing an international border in a stolen car while intoxicated and in possession of a false form of identification?"
"That's one way to put it." I thought as a tear ran down my face and Kelly huffed in disgust.
I was going to jail and she would never speak to me again. How quickly the tides change, I thought as my new found summer freedom had me in a downward spiral, plummeting towards a life sentence for international crimes.
"I want you to know...." continued the officer, "That you are quite possibly the stupidest person I have ever come across." I agreed. He took another long, contemplative breath, allowing for an uncomfortable silence. I noticed other officers watching. "There's a hotel on the other side of this bridge," he said. "I want you to go to that hotel and I want you to get a room and when you wake up in the morning, I want you to look at yourself in the mirror and take a long hard look, remind yourself of where you are and then just ask 'why?' Then I want you to get into your car, cross this bridge, take this car back to whoever you stole it from.... and never, ever, ever come back to Canada again."
My body melted into a massive puddle of ecstatic relief. "Do you understand me?" he asked. I certainly did. "Good. Now get into your car and go." I couldn't believe it. "Oh and one more thing," he said, as I put the car into drive. "It's illegal in Canada to drive without shoes. Be careful you don't get pulled over."
We got into the explorer and only then did I realize that I hadn't taken a breath in five minutes. As oxygen gallantly returned to my blood stream, we triumphantly made our way across the Sault Saint Marie Bridge as Sister Hazel continued to sing from the speakers. With no emotion left in us from the experience, we simply began to sing joyously as we crossed into Canada.
We checked into a perfect shoddy motel, the kind we had talked about back in Lawrence when we first met. That night, I looked at myself in the mirror and did as the officer had asked. I took a long hard look and as I did, I didn't see the screw up he had been addressing but something else entirely. A smile curled up on my lips. I may not have been the world's greatest student, but I had done something. I had managed to drive across the country with an alternate ID, avoid arrest for international crimes, and all the while in the company of a beautiful woman. I was a road warrior.
Totally hardcore!
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