My sister-in-law Kathy DiMaggio asked me to write about our family trip to Yellowstone sometime back when the kids were teens and tweens. In the photo above, you can see Kathy, my husband Tony and Arlene (the teenager) discovering the Continental Divide. Against all odds, we met every challenge with a little ingenuity and a lot of laughter, and Kathy's the one who tried the buffalo burger. We all of us love remembering that journey. The poem's called "Cross Country" and you'll find it as usual at Tupelo. 

We didn’t know what switch

would light the bedroom—

the middle kid had to show us—

or that it’s ten hours to Niagara, or that six

people in a rented camper

with three beds—

that would mean a lot of paper-rock and scissors.

We didn’t know that the youngest

would wake up with a case of puberty,

refuse to put down her book

to see the Mississippi,

but love her birthday pizza in Lake Erie.

That the Bad Lands

are a moonscape from an old movie,

When I tried to find a way into this, I couldn't escape the thought that we must have been crazy. We decided to rent a 24-foot motor home and pack into it three adults and three kids, one of them 14 and the other two 12 and then drive (in only two weeks, mind you) from CT to Yellowstone and back. On the way, we figured we could squeeze in stops at Niagara Falls, Mount Rushmore, Keystone, Devil's Tower and (unforgettably) a place called Jellystone. By all rights, we should have come home barely speaking to one another and unable to look another motor home in the face. We came home even better friends than we started, and Tony and I had bought our own tiny, second hand motor home by the time the month was out. You never can tell. 

So, thank you, Kathy, for the prompt and the pictures and the trip and everything else. And thank you, Lisa, Arlene and Tom for being such a wonderful part of the ride. The whole ride.