Marital Separation

Day 17 found us in Chicago visiting George’s parents. Since they’re late risers, we had the morning to ourselves—which in our world means, of course, a bike ride. This time we knocked out 19 miles from our hotel to Lake Michigan and back.

George and I are together basically 24/7 on this trip (actually, even before this trip), which is both delightful and…a lot. So sometimes, we need to embrace a little marital separation. On this particular ride, I hung out in Illinois while George casually chilled in Indiana. Because what better is there than a literal state border to keep “healthy boundaries.” 

Later, George’s parents took us to Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry, where we toured a German U-boat. Turns out 59 crew members lived on that narrow 252-foot metal tube for weeks at a time. Which, by comparison, makes our narrow 18-foot camper for just the two of us feel downright luxurious. I did the math—each crew member had 4.27 feet of space. George and I will be living large with a whopping 9 feet each. Honestly, we’ll be practically glamping. 

Day 18 was our big push west to Denver. We logged miles, played “Would You Rather” (apparently George would not rather have to sing everthing for the rest of his life, but he would rather have to say everything in rhyme), and pondered life’s greatest mysteries, like why Exit B sometimes comes before Exit A. We also shelled out $175 to fix a windshield chip roughly the size of Rhode Island, which has me considering a new line item in our budget. 

Entertainment came courtesy of a thunder and lightning storm. I spent a solid hour with my phone camera poised like a wannabe storm chaser. When I finally gave up and set it to rapid-fire every three seconds, I actually caught a few bolts. Sure, I had to delete 150 pictures of a dark road, but totally worth it. Also, somewhere in Nebraska, we had our first gas out in the car. I won’t name names to protect the guilty, but let’s just say… it wasn’t me.

Day 19 brought us to Colorado, where we reunited with George’s old college roommate, Chris, and his wife, Kathy, for dinner. We’d planned on biking Cherry Creek Reservoir during the day, before our dinner appointment, but instead, we discovered a large crack in one of our car's tires. These tires were the sad remnants of the ridiculous 22-inch “summer tires” our car came with—basically rubber bands pretending to be wheels—from which we were trying to get the last vestiges of use. After wasting hours hunting for affordable and timely replacements that didn’t exist we gave up and headed to our dinner date. Spoiler: when we finally got home, the tire threads were showing. Mission accomplished—we squeezed out every last mile of those sad excuses for tires.