This is the third and final installment in my autobiographical Mount Airy Lodge saga. If you’re reading this before reading the first two parts, you’re doing it wrong.
Then read this one. You’ll be glad you did!
And, without further ado, sit back and enjoy the exciting conclusion of The Cray Cray Vaycay!
***
A game of tennis. That, I decided, would take my mind off of the ratty, scuffed up, boring bathtubbed awfulness of Mount Airy Lodge.
Maybe if I played tennis hard enough I would forget that Mount Airy Lodge forced me to pay 50 cents for a bucket of ice.
And if I played really hard, maybe I would forget that this Mount Airy Lodge vacation was all my fault. I was the one who had been conned by their commercials. I was the one who had begged my parents to book a vacation here. I had no one to blame but myself.
So a lot was riding on this game of tennis. The fact that I didn’t play tennis was irrelevant.
As my family and I tromped toward the indoor tennis courts, I lagged far, far behind. I was nervous about what I might find. Would the tennis courts have no nets? Would the space be overrun with sleeping hobos? I had no idea.
Mom was the first to enter. As she did so, she said, “Ooh!”
And it was a good “ooh!”
Unlike the rest of Mount Airy Lodge, the echo-y, indoor tennis courts were in beautiful shape, new and well-maintained. They were, dare I say, classy. They looked like a place where Jimmy Connors might practice his backhand.
Maybe this tennis game could shove our vacation in a new and more positive direction.
Doubles partners were quickly decided. My older sister, Gina, and I would be on one team, Mom and Dad on the other. The Young against the Old. Mom and I faced off near the net. Dad and Gina were at their respective foul lines. Dad would deliver the first serve.
Inspired by my surroundings, I eagerly clutched my racquet. I bent my knees a little and did that bobbing thing that the professional tennis players did on TV. I don’t know why they did it, but it seemed like the thing to do. I peered over my shoulder to find Gina doing the same bobbing thing that I was doing.
Dad bounced the ball a few times, gearing himself up for his serve. Mom, the only one of us who did play tennis, focused like a laser on the rectangle where the serve was to land.
Wow, I thought. Look at us! Just look at us! My family and I are playing a game of tennis!
I can’t overstate just how unusual the moment was. We didn’t normally do sports as a family. We didn’t normally do much of anything as a family. A typical day in our house was Dad hanging out in the basement, Mom ironing on the ground floor while watching a VCR tape of Psycho on The Big TV, and me farting around in my bedroom upstairs. Gina’s M.O. was to be out with her many friends driving off to God-knows-where doing God-knows-what.
Don’t get me wrong; we all liked each other—we just never felt like testing how much we liked each other. We were simply a house full of happy, satisfied loners.
So this moment on the tennis court was unusual. It was something special. I recognized it as a Moment To Remember. So, to this day, I remember every detail:
I remember Dad tossing the ball skyward.
I remember seeing his racket slice through the air in a whistling, whipping blur.
I remember his racket smashing that ball with a ferocity I didn’t think was possible.
I remember the ball veering a little too low and a little too left.
And I remember the deafening, sickening, echoing THWOCK! as the ball slammed against the back of Mom’s head.
Then I remember thinking: Oh, f—.
Mom wobbled, but she didn’t fall. She did, however, have a look on her face I had never seen before or since. It was a blend of emotions: agony coupled with fury coupled with a calculated yearning for some kind of terrible, horrible revenge. It was terrifying.
With my doomed father by her side, Mom staggered back through the door from which we came. I didn’t know what would happen next, exactly, but a plausible scenario played itself out in my mind. Once back in the room, Mom would ask Dad to open up the balcony doors so she could get a little “fresh air.” Dad would do as he was told. And, before he could see it coming, Mom would deliver a shove that would send Dad on a gravity-fueled, face-first journey to the parking lot three floors below.
Then Mom would force me to be her alibi.
Unlike me, Gina never wasted time worrying about plausible scenarios. She lived for the moment. “Let’s do the paddleboats!” she chirped.
***
The Mount Airy Lodge pond looked pretty on the commercials. But that was because they didn’t shoot any closeups.
The pond was green. Unnaturally green. Like lime Kool-Aid.
But I was eager to put the tennis fiasco behind me, so I sallied forth without comment. Gina and I hopped into the least waterlogged boat along the shore and began to pedal.
If I may digress for a moment, paddleboats are stupid. They are probably the most inefficient use of leg power ever created by man. For the average person to make a paddleboat sputter 20 yards from shore, he must expend enough energy to run a double marathon.
Even by normal paddleboat efficiency standards, this journey was unusually exhausting. Moments after pushing away from the shore, Gina and I, two healthy children, were wheezing in agony.
We soon discovered why. The pond wasn’t exactly liquid. As our paddle turned, a muck the color and viscosity of pesto sauce churned in the boat’s wake. As this pesto reached the surface, we were smacked upside the head with its aroma, which was not very pesto-y.
It’s hard to describe the smell. It was sort of like sulfur mixed with armpit.
“Jesus!” Gina sputtered.
A flock of geese appeared overhead. As they glided over the water, every last one of them took a large, runny dump. I am not so naive to think that there isn’t goose poo in every pond, but this was something else entirely; this rainstorm of feces was too well-organized to be a chance event. The Mount Airy Lodge Pond wasn’t a place for geese to poop, it was the place for geese to poop. Gina and I were paddleboating in an open-air goose sewer. Valiantly fighting the dry heaves, Gina and I pedaled like mad for the shore.
The rest of our vacation played out more or less the same way: even the most modest attempts at fun were met with crippling disappointment.
The indoor pool was blindingly over-chlorinated. The horseback riding horses were missing. The food was cold and icky. When we sent this food back to the kitchen, it returned the table hot and icky, which is even ickier than cold and icky.
One by one, each of us dropped the pretense of having a good time. Mom gave up the act the moment the tennis ball hit her head. The empty stables did Gina in. And Dad, usually so adept at mindless positivity, was unable to escape the gravitational pull of our collective despair.
A part of me wondered if this place was a psychological experiment to determine if a Poconos vacation could drive a well-adjusted family to murder. If that was the plan, Mount Airy Lodge failed spectacularly.
We didn’t murder each other. In fact, as the disappointments stacked up like cordwood, we became more stoic.
And together, as a family, we began to find fun in mocking the sheer awfulness of the place. The crappier things got, the funnier it all became.
We proudly checked out that Sunday morning with our tempers in check and our dignity intact. (Except for Dad. As he wrestled with our luggage, Mom gave him a swift, unexpected kick in the ass that sent him sprawling. It was belated revenge for the Tennis Ball Incident. It was also the funniest thing I had ever seen ever.)
It was time to go home. In a matter of hours, Gina would run off with her gaggle of friends to go God-knows-where doing God-knows-what. Dad would plod down the basement stairs and read a book on World War II. Mom would set up shop on the ground floor to tackle a load of dirty laundry.
And I would retreat to my room to reflect on the weekend—feeling older and wiser.
Hey, Look! A Writer Fellow! 
What a riot Mike. I guess any vacation looks good by comparison now!
Possibly. But did I ever tell you about the trip to DisneyWorld the ended up in an Orlando emergency room?
We Allegras don’t travel well.
Oh, No!
Cute story containing many “basic human truths.” Besides that, I think that most of us have experienced a similar vacation with our families:)
Well don’t be shy. Tell me a bit about your vacation fiasco. I won’t tell anybody!
One year we made last-minute plans to stay at a “resort” (motel, cabins and pool) near Rogers City, Michigan, on Lake Huron. That far north, the lake is often too cold for swimming, so the pool was nice to have. We had stayed there before in the motel part, but this time only a cabin was available. I was about 10 years old and was able to take a friend with me. We all heard strange noises late at night from the walls, and my parents said that it was probably “termites.” I didn’t know what those were and thought of something like rats. I think that I stayed awake most of the night expecting to see one. The next day, my parents were able to get us into the motel part after talking with the owners:) We went there some years later, and the cabins had been torn down.
Maybe the termites (slowly) tore the cabins down.
That might be…I think there might be a story there:)
Loved that the pond was THE place for the geese to poop! LOL! Family vacations are the best. 🙂
I still have nightmares about that pond.
Just finished reading part three of your saga. My Uncle Al is sitting across the kitchen table trying to complete one of his Sudoku puzzles. I believe he thinks I’ve finally lost my mind, as I am laughing out loud and wiping tears from my eyes at the same time. I’m sure he’ll react the same way once I send your story over to him. Keep up the good work ~ ~ I need all the laughs I can get!
Wonderful!
Of course you have the added benefit of knowing the full cast of characters.
I love your parents! They are pretty amazing. I have to say those old “Family Vacations’ which always included a road trip of some kind were the best. They built character and they were the glue that held families together at times. These days, (yeah! I know I sound like my grandmother) if people aren’t flying off to Disney Land or World they aren’t on a family vacation. All that does is build spoiled children.
My family is filled with large personalities, that’s for sure.
But even I must admit that Mom’s kick came as a complete — and welcome — surprise.
I think that was my favorite part!
I suspect there is a modicum of yearning to have a family reunion. Just because.
As long as we don’t vacation together, it’ll be a fun time.
Especially playing tennis.
Yeah. Tennis is out.
Personally, I am wary of participating in sports where my back is turned and a high velocity projectile is aimed in my direction.
You’re a wise woman, Cricket.
I hope you put your stories in a book or file for your children someday! They are priceless. Great summer share for the rest of us!
I’ve considered compiling a manuscript of family essays. It may happen.
The epitome of positivity if you could turn that vacation into an experience to be grateful for, Mike. Nowadays, with online reviews, I don’t think Mt. Airy would cut it, but back then, who could possibly predict until you were actually paddling in poop. Ugh. Very funny, though. And you all walked away with your lives and some laughs. 🙂
I think the threshold for “fun” was a bit lower back in the 1980s. But Goose Poop Pond would, I’m sure, be a bridge too far for even the most cheerful of travelers.
Some vacations weren’t meant to be. But hey, as you said, you didn’t murder each other. That’s always a win!
Yes! And thank goodness for that. Very few children’s book authors have a rap sheet.
We once went on a fishing vacation. Yeah… I was not excited from the get go on that one, but when you are adrift in a sea of testosterone for years and years and years, you end up doing things you would never in a million years choose to do on your own. My husband is the official vacation planner by default. I once bought plane tickets for a trip and he criticized the schedule and thought I should have done it different. Keep in mind, it really wasn’t life altering to have done it the way I did it. But henceforth, he has to plan every trip and take care of the reservations and plane tickets. He is also the bill payer by default. (you’d think he’d learn to be quiet, wouldn’t you? lol)
Back to the fishing trip to MN with 2 of our sons. We arrive at the lake and find our cabin which didn’t look anything like the picture on the internet. There was no television. A fact that greatly saddened all the males. I, on the other hand had brought bunches of books. The whole cabin seemed damp the entire time we were there including the beds, ugh. I spent a great deal of my time sweeping sand out of this little dump. It rained the entire time we were there. No fish were caught, unless you count the “dogfish” one of the boys caught. It was all in all, a dismal failure of a trip. It culminated in arriving home where we had left our 20 year old son on his own for the week, to discover a pyramid of beer cans in our basement.
I understand disappointment after you’ve been so eagerly looking forward to something. Loved the story. It would be so fun to hear the narrative from each of your family members’ perspectives. What I really want to know though, is did this sour your optimism on future trips?
But why did you go on the fishing trip when you coulda stayed home drinking with your son? Come on, now, Jude; that’s poor planning on your part.
As for your question, the answer is a big yes. My post-Mount Airy life has been veiled with a thin but bulletproof layer of travel cynicism. I never was much of a traveler. I usually prefer the comforts of home to an adventure on the road.
Only because I didn’t think of it first! Dang! I could have stayed home with my beer drinking son! lol Who was underage at the time. I think there was talk of the Mall of America that lured me away from my nest. Should have known it would be a jogging tour of the MOA. We literally only had time to wander through part of it and then we had to leave again. I have stayed home on subsequent adventures of this type. And I agree, paddleboats are not the most efficient use of pedal power. Kind of like a Flintstone car…
I’ve always been curious about the Mall of America, so I understand your thinking.
Awesome. I’m so glad you all were able to laugh about it in the end. Speaking of, glad your mom got her revenge. 😉 Mount Airy Lodge is lucky Yelp wasn’t a thing back then.
Even without Yelp, Mount Airy Lodge died a terrible (and well-deserved) death.
Really? Was it much later than this?
Sadly, it was much later. Mt. Airy Lodge closed in the late 1990s.
Wow! Maybe they had a brief resurrection before the end.
Mike, thanks for the morning laugh! As someone who took tennis lessons for years, I especially love the tennis scene. Although on a family vaca in Kansas one year, my sisters and I swam in a pool filled with algae and moss. Frogs, but no goose poo.
(My family and I rafted the Green River one summer. For some ungodly reason, some of the gates of the Flaming Gorge Dam were opened while we were on the river. We ended up floating down flooded irrigation ditches because the twists and turns were so altered, the guide go lost. Finally, just before sunset, we got back on the river. The water lifted our raft and deposited it against a snag on a tiny pebble beach. Another rafter sent help before it got completely dark. Our hero, holding a flashlight, yelled, “This raft can only hold four people!” There were six of us. “Everyone jump on and don’t move!” We were more than happy to oblige. This wonderful man deposited us in a grassy field and told us a truck was coming to get us. “Yeah!” Just as he pulled away a bull moose wandered out of the woods and decided we were a threatening looking bunch so came roaring towards us. Our little group had just enough time to run to a coral and jump over the wooden slats. All were saved, including Mr. Moose.)
Gosh, sorry this got so long!
Don’t you dare apologize for the length of this story, for it is the most amazing vacation disaster I have EVER heard. It’s got EVERYTHING! Write a blog post about it! Pleeeeease!
That’s got to be the best horrible vacation story, ever!
That butt-kick! Your mum is my new hero! 😀 … great story! 🙂
She’s been my hero for quite a while!
This was hilarious from beginning to end…though I never would have dared to go in the goose poo pond, even in a paddle boat.
I didn’t know what I was I getting into until I got into it!
Having high expectations is a good plot device for you! And paddle boats are really stupid.
Stupidest things EVER!
I have had vacations from hell when I wanted to commit murder but never one with my parents. Mine was with my husband who is lucky enough to still be breathing at this point. We went to Disneyworld in 1991 with our daughter, who was 4 year old at that time, and we almost ended up divorced WHILE we were there! Grrr.. I still see red when I think of that “vacation” that was anything BUT! It took him several years to get me to agree to go on any other trips. I’m glad you all made it home with your dignity somewhat still in tact. 😉
Oh, I do think you’ll need to provide a bit more Disney detail, my friend! What inciting incident led you to contemplate divorce?
I know from personal experience that the Tiki Room leads to suicidal thoughts…
We call this kind of vacation “A vacation from Hell” anyway my husband spent a winter weekend get away at the Mount Airy Lodge, that was when they advertised a heart shape hot tube in your room, not . . . . the year probably was 1975 and we were thankful our visit was for only two days. . . . just saying, Claudia
Hi Claudia! And, yeah, Mt. Airy sure knew how to sell unsuspecting vacationers a bill of goods, that’s for sure! Harrumph!