Reset Password
Reset Link Sent
| Blogs > TrucknLuvn > Songs of the Trucker Babe |
My Summer Vacation (The 32nd Virtual Symposium)
|
My Summer Vacation (The 32nd Virtual Symposium) The votes for the topic of July's Virtual Symposium were cast and tallied! Twice! After a nail biting tie breaker, the chosen topic for the 32nd Virtual Symposium is... "Summer Vacations." Also: Be sure to check out my fellow bloggers' amazing Summer Vacation Symposium contributions here: #32 Symposium Link Topic July:Summer Vacations ***** I hope y'all enjoy my little summertime stroll down Memory Lane! ♡♡♡ Growing up, my family never traveled during the summer because my Grandparents owned an adorable little seasonal ice cream shop. Some of my fondest summer vacation memories happened there! The Family Drive Inn was open Tuesday through Sunday, 11:00 AM to 9:00 PM from June 1 to August 31 every single summer from 1979 until 1999 when my Grandparents decided to retire from the business of serving burgers n fries, strawberry milkshakes, and chocolate ice cream cones. From when I was in Kindergarten up until my Sophomore year of high school, I spent every moment of my summer vacations from school with my Grandpa in that sweet little snack shack. It may sound boring, but I truly had a blast spending my summers there! Obviously when I was still a kiddo, I couldn't help out much around the shop. Grandpa would have me wipe down the tables and fill up the napkin dispensers to keep me busy during the slower times of the day. I was a bit of a social butterfly as a and I would chat many of our regular customers' ears off. Did I mention that I was a in an ice cream shop? Yep, I had all of the ice cream I could eat! Needless to say, I was a chubby . As I got older, my Grandpa allowed me to ride my bike around the small town of Reinbeck, Iowa during the afternoons. I spent many sunburnt afternoons jumping off the high dive at the local swimming pool. When I didn't go to the pool, I spent my time at the<b> library </font></b>where I discovered my love for reading and eventually, writing. Over time, I spent less time getting sunburnt and more time with my nose in a book. I would literally read a 200 page R.L. Stine book in a day and check out another book the next. As I got older, R.L. Stine was traded in for Stephen King and Anne Rice, two of my favorite authors to this day. The local librarian got to know me pretty well during my book worm phase and she would often suggest books for me to read. I have her to thank for my love of Ray Bradbury and John Steinbeck. Once I turned 13, I started to work around the shop more. I took the customers' orders when they came in and I handled the to go orders over the phone. I helped my Grandpa out with the nightly clean up and that is how I learned to disassemble and reassemble a multi compartment ice cream machine. Cool huh? Okay, okay... Maybe not. The Drive Inn was technically my first paying job. Grandpa paid me $40 a day to help him out and I did earn some decent tips in addition to that. By the time I was sixteen years old, I had saved up a little over $2,000 and I used that money towards my very first car. Grandpa and Grandma chipped in towards the purchase of my car for my Sweet Sixteenth Birthday and on August 11, 1998, I was the proud owner of a turquoise blue Geo Metro convertible aka The Smurfmobile. Hey, don't knock it! I was a sixteen year old girl! And The Smurfmobile was awesome! I spent my last summer at Fast Eddie's Diner buzzing around town with the convertible top down almost every afternoon. I also had your run of the mill, totally cliche Teenaged Summertime Fling that summer and I spent more than a few hot and sweaty afternoons getting dirty with him in the garage at his house. Ah... There's nothing quite like the smell of young romance and motor oil in the air! Fun Fact: My Summertime Fling had the exact male version of my name. He was Jesse Lee and I am Jessica Leigh. Everyone we knew thought it was the most adorable thing ever. And in all reality, it really was kind of cute. I guess you could say that he was the closest thing I had to young love. I know I was definitely smitten by him. He was the first boy that I ever felt the butterflies floating around in my stomach for. Then again... He was responsible for giving me the first orgasm I ever had during sex. It could have just been that. Who knows? Anyhoo, the Jesse/Jessica fling lasted until just after my seventeenth birthday in August. I was devastated because his Dad took a job in California and they moved. Obviously, we lost touch after he moved, but I've always sort of wondered how he's been doing all of these years. I guess you could say that he was my "one that got away." A couple of weeks later was also a bittersweet time for me and my family. Over the summer, my Grandparents had sold the Drive Inn and we closed our doors for the final time on August 31, 1999 after 20 years of being in business. Many of our regular customers stopped in that day for one last pizza burger, black raspberry milkshake, or hot fudge sundae. We all fought back tears as we locked the doors and put up the closed sign that night at 9:00 PM. I disassembled the ice cream machine for the last time that night and it was never reassembled again. The man who purchased our beloved Sugar Shack tore it down and got licensed to have a trailer park there instead. The Summertime Staple of Reinbeck, Iowa was gone forever. Years later, many of our regulars told us that the town wasn't the same without us there and it broke my heart. The following summer, I spent most of my time traveling the fifteen miles from my hometown of Gladbrook over to Reinbeck to spend my time with my friends that lived there, but it wasn't the same for me either. I drove by the empty lot where The Family Drive Inn once stood every single day in an attempt to move on. The day before I started my senior year of high school, I had one of the most pivotal moments of my life. I drove over to my childhood hangout and parked The Smurfmobile in the vacant lot that was once my Grandparents' twenty year business. I just sat there in my car, looking at the empty space around me. In my mind's eye, I saw the little yellow building and the red outdoor picnic tables. I could hear the sound of the little wooden gate inside as the spring snapped it closed. I heard the whirring of the ice cream machine and I could almost smell the burgers cooking on the flat top. I learned a valuable lesson that particular sunny Sunday afternoon. Even though the physical building that I spent so much of my childhood in had been destroyed, the memories that I had made from spending eleven of my Summer Vacations there will live on forever. ♡♡♡ |
||||
|
TrucknLuvn replies on 7/6/2017 1:56 am: Thank you for reading! This is one of my all time favorite posts. I loved writing about my childhood summers! It is truly a rare treat to find an old school soda fountain anymore! You sent me a message but because I am a standard, it is blurred and I cannot read it...could you possibly send it to my private mailbox on my blog so that I CAN read it? Thank you
| |||
|
This is such and awesome story!! I read it through twice, thinking about all my summer joys and memories. Thanks for sharing and for making things come so alive!! Jessie Lee and Jessica Leigh--boy there's some magic in there somewhere I loved this PS I am VERY LATE with my contribution- shame on the moderator (Virtual Symposium Group) use Virtual Symposium Group
| |||
|
Thank you for a great read.  
| |||
|
Very Pretty "madeleine of Proust" Sommaire Et la souffrance vgtale L'être idéal ? Un ange dévasté par l'humour. E.M. Cioran
| |||
|
This is a great read! It's too bad that those old style drive inns along with the old soda shops are a dying thing. Thank you for sharing your memories!
| |||
|
Summertime Blues... [image]
|
Become a member to create a blog
