I woke up this morning, with only the thought of getting to my Great Aunts funeral on time. There was no way that we weren’t going to get there I would not let that happen. Even though Ciara already had the face of defeat, it did not stop me, from being positive about us getting there. We packed up quick and began are journey, but first we stopped at the Denny’s in Cedar Rapids. We both ordered the Harvest Oatmeal which costs twelve dollars total.
As we began our long drive ahead, all I could think about is my great aunt. I always remembered when we visited her in Montreal, my Cousins and I would be at her house and we would all play in her back yard. I remember us all jumping in her yellow and brown piles of leaves in the cold thanksgiving air. Even though I didn’t know my Great Aunt that well, she gave me the gift of unity between my extended family. If it were not for her house, I would not have the same relationships I do with my aunts, uncles and cousins. My pondering thoughts were abruptly interrupted by the puttering sound the car had started to make. The car suddenly began to slow down and to our horror the car had run out of gas.
I started to panic, know we would never make it to my great Aunts funeral. After repeatedly punching the steering wheel and calling it names that I would rather not repeat. I pulled my self together, I checked the GPS on my phone and saw that there was a Kum and Go gas station 100 meters away right outside of North Liberty. So we began to sprint to the Kum and Go in the frosty winter air. When we got there we bought a two-gallon gas container, we then ran back to the car and filled it up. That took us a good fifty minutes and we still had to drive to the Kum and Go and fill up the car all the way. This ended up costing us sixty-eight dollars and valuable time. I knew deep down that this set back made it impossible for us to make our great aunts funeral. I looked into Ciara’s eyes and her eyes showed the same sickening feeling that was in my stomach. But we had to move onward, even though we aren’t going to make the funeral, we should still go and see the family. We cruised through Iowa and finally reached Illinois. We went right through Gary and could see the outskirts of Chicago the home of Michael Jordan’s bulls. As I drove onward I could not help but gaze of into the beautiful waters of Lake Michigan. I grew up on Lake Tahoe which I always thought was a big Lake but Michigan was a 100 times it’s size. It looked meaner and scarier than the Pacific Ocean. Its howling winds and treacherous waters have been the culprits of many shipwrecks. We ended up veering of the coast of the lake and stopped at a BP gas station in Paw Paw Michigan, the gas cost fifty-six dollars. We also stopped at the subway in Paw Paw where we bought two five dollars foot longs one for Lunch and one for dinner.
We got all the way to the border, we decided to stay on the US side, in a Super Eight in Marysville Michigan it costs sixty-four dollars. As I went to bed that night, I had a sickening ach in my stomach. I had failed to be there for my family when they needed me the most.
