Steven J Kolbe

Week Three: A Capitol Investment 

For the trip back, we mapped a route that would hit four new state capitals. Number one on the list was Tallahassee, and since no trip to Florida would be complete without visiting Florida-cousins, we coordinated with my sister and her girls to meet us there. 

As a native Floridian, I was excited to finally see the Capitol building after thirty-nine years of…well, not seeing it. 

It was extremely all right. 

The trouble with visiting Capitol buildings is that they’re all more or less the same. In Topeka, we posed in front of the John Brown mural, our arms outstretched savagely; in Jackson, we chatted with the Lieutenant Governor; in Salt Lake City, we marveled at the copious amounts of beehive art work; but everywhere else has been a blur of columns, domes, really old paintings of really old men, and stairs made of the hardest and sharpest material available in that particular state. I’ll give you one guess which part the kids have enjoyed the most. 

While Susan and I are quick to look for elevators and escalators, our children view every staircase as a challenge. (Which is why we aren’t in any hurry to visit Egypt.) Tallahassee gave them ample opportunity to walk up and down the stairs in the form of a scavenger hunt–SCAVENGER HUNT!!! At first, it seemed like a good way to wear them out after a day in the car. Then Lucy wanted in on the fun, and it became a great way to wear out their dad as well. 

Nevertheless, it’s always good to see my sister and nieces. (Even if they look basically the same as they do on social media.) 

It was between Tallahassee and Montgomery that the trouble began. Leviathan began to wobble. Since the wobble only manifested itself above 60 mph, we had two options: ignore the wobble and go 75, or go 60 the rest of the trip. Susan shocked us all by presenting a secret, third option: take Leviathan in.

Two hours and one realignment later and we were back on the road. It was smooth sailing–unless we went over 60. Slowly, we wobbled our way to Montgomery. So slowly that we arrived well-past bedtime and in the pouring rain. Thankfully, the parking lot was full on account of the Walmart trucker’s competition being held that week, so I got some extra steps in, lugging six-people’s luggage and a pack-n-play through the rain. 

The next morning, we spent the little time we had left in a bookstore, because if there’s one thing our capsizing bookshelves need, it’s more books. NewSouth Bookstore, a quaint but historic shop, is located one block from where Rosa Parks boarded the bus for her historic ride, and its collection of historic, regional, and diverse books reflects the values of its place. 

Twenty minutes into our browsing, Margot appeared at my side with a ruby red slipper. “I won a ticket,” she said. 

“That’s a shoe. Wait, does that belong to Dorothy?” 

“Uh-huh. You have to take a picture of it so I can get my ticket.” 

Some back and forth later, and it turns out the Alabama Shakespeare Festival is running a contest. If you find Dorothy’s slipper, you can win a ticket. How did Margot learn all this?

“From the store lady.”

“And did you tell her where we’re from?”

“Uh-huh.”

“That we’re from Kansas?”

“Yeah, so?” she asked, not seeing in the least how strange a coincidence this would be. 

Because we are short-sighted thrill-seekers, Susan and I decided to cram four capitals into four days. Montgomery got only a cursory photograph, then we were off to see the wizard. Sorry, Atlanta. We were off to see Atlanta. 

My friend Nathan has lived in Atlanta on-and-off for almost as long as I’ve known him. Charlie in particular was excited to see his godfather–and Margot to see her god uncle. (She doesn’t quite understand godparents yet.) Due to Leviathan’s wobble and Atlanta traffic, however, we arrived much later than I’d hoped. We met him not at the aquarium or children’s museum but at the Cathedral of Christ the King for mass. 

Susan hates cathedrals for a variety of reasons: The music is never the best, the crowd never feels like a local parish, or the building is too ostentatious to feel cozy. Luckily, that Saturday was a music-less mass held especially for architectural tourists. 

We did find time after mass to grab some dinner and then swing by “the toy store,” which is what we’ll henceforth call Nathan’s house. Though he has two kids to our four, he has far outgunned us when it comes to toys. His boys don’t even know how good they have it. When it was time to leave, I plucked a crying Lucy out of an RC Bronco while Susan pried an indoor toddler bike out of Margot’s clutches. We drove away, sad and overstimulated, and twenty minutes later were posing in front of the golden-domed Capitol in still more rain. 

“Are we going inside?” Margot asked and glanced sleepily at the brilliant exterior. 

“No. It’s closed.”

She sighed, then climbed resignedly back into her car seat. It was, after all, our third Capitol building in less than two days. 

The next day, we left Georgia and ventured into the Appalachian Mountains for real. As a child, I can still remember being overwhelmed by the enormity of those mountains on trips to Tennessee and North Carolina. My own children, however, have been visiting the Rockies since they were fetuses. 

“Mountain!” I shouted every few miles. 

“Where?” Charlie would ask, looking up from his Nintendo Switch. “Behind that hill?”

“No, that’s a mountain!” I’d exclaim. 

Then we’d do it all over again a few miles later. 

As we left and took one final scenic view of Chickamauga Lake, I reflected on how strange names are in the south. It has to do, of course, with their Indian tribes being different from our sensibly named one. While Kansas and Wichita and Ninnescah roll off the tongue, the south has weird names like Chattahoochee and Ocheesee. Every time we passed over a bridge, I made sure to announce to the family what body of water we were traversing, and then we would all try to read the sign. (If you know how to pronounce “Apalachicola,” drop me a line, because we are still trying to sound that one out.) 

Google Maps helped. Some years ago, I set mine to a woman’s voice with a South African accent, which Susan is only mildly threatened by. Mostly, she makes city and state names sound exotic, but occasionally the effect is hilarious, such as when we visit the Kansas City area: “Now entering Oh-La-Thee.” We had a similar experience when leaving Tallahassee and had to turn right on “Choky-Bi-Nay-Nay” (Chowkinbin Nene). I’m not sure if that’s the right pronunciation, but my children are still saying it as the punchline to every joke. 

Google Maps took us through the winding roads of Tennessee all the way to Nashville, and no one got sick in the car! 

When we finally piled out of the minivan, dusk was settling over the long, sloping meadow beside our rented cabin. Fireflies lit up the darkening sky, and in the distance, we saw a deer poke its majestic head out of the tree line. One by one, we all sat or crouched down to get a better view, awed by this moment of pure natural beauty, by the relief of making it to our next destination, by the–“What’s that noise?” Behind us, a child was filling up their nausea bag–and it wasn’t with appreciation of nature.

I wish I had more to say about Nashville, but we spent most of the time vehicle-less while Leviathan got repairs, leaving us only an afternoon and morning for sightseeing. We fit in the final Capitol building of the trip and visited a bookstore we’ve been following on social media for a few years now. 

Parnassus Books is owned by Ann Patchett, one of Susan’s current favorite authors. As I loaded our books onto the counter, the saleswoman smiled, then her eyes boggled out of her head, and as she worked her way to the very bottom of our leaning tower of fiction, she laughed aloud. Who were these people with their feral children buying up half the store? I wanted to explain how far we’d traveled, how few bookstores we had back in our native land, how much we both wanted to support Ann Patchett. Instead, I smiled vacantly and handed her my credit card, already gasping for breath after three weeks on the road. 

“I suppose you’ll want a bag?” she asked. 

As we drove out of Nashville, our troubles felt firmly behind us. “What if we didn’t stop in Missouri?” Susan suggested.

“Drive straight through?” I asked. 

She calculated the times and added in stops for gas, stretches, and meals. “We should get home around two in the morning. We’ll be able to see the strawberry moon!” 

That convinced me. We would fill up, lock in, and make our way through Kansas in one fell swoop. After all, it was our impatience, not the children’s, that kept us from making good time. 

Then the check-engine light came on. 

“It’s probably nothing,” I said, as the traction control disengaged. 

“Do we need that?” Susan asked.

“Not really. Not if it isn’t…” I trailed off as I realized Leviathan was losing speed. I tried to engage the cruise control again, but it was a no-go. 

A helpful mechanic in Paducah, Kentucky, told me he could fit me in next Tuesday. “Would that work?” 

“I certainly hope I’m not still in Kentucky on Tuesday!” 

The same held for every mechanic we spoke to.

The fine people at Autozone ran a diagnostic, providing several possible codes. Then the final mechanic told me what to look for and, feeling at least like we had a game plan, we set off for Springfield, Missouri.

Even though there were plenty of hotels and mechanics along the route, I nevertheless drove with greater intention than I have since high school. I monitored our speed, the engine’s temperature, the road, the side mirrors, the rear-view mirror, then started all over again. Just after we crossed into Missouri, I filled up again, and when we got back on the road, every warning light disappeared. 

“The internet said it might just be the gas cap not being screwed on all the way,” Susan said once I gave her the good news. 

Magic. 

That night, we slept in Springfield, happy to have a functional Leviathan, a healthy family, and a bed for everyone–even if they weren’t our beds.

The next morning, I challenged the children to find Kansas items, just as we had searched for Florida items on the way down. Instead of boat trailers and Spanish moss, we now scoured the horizon for hay bales and Herefords, wheatfields and sky so wide open you could see 360 degrees without trying. 

When we finally crossed the Kansas line, I was so excited I could’ve jumped out of my seat. Traveling is beautiful, but I can tell you one thing for free: for this Kansas boy, there’s no place like home. 

Much like swimming out as far as you can into the ocean, traveling is an act of faith. Regardless of what flag is up that day, you don’t know exactly what you’ll encounter. Even with mechanics and hotels, Airbnbs and Google Maps, we were still blindsided by the occasional change in traffic patterns or the unavoidable car trouble. But we made it through together. 

In the end, I don’t think Graham PenningTon got the answer right about why we travel, at least not for us. While we certainly gained insight and adaptability from this year’s trip, we also gained something surprising: greater togetherness as a family. After a busy school year, it was amazing to spend three weeks crammed into different spaces with these weirdos–the one I married and the four we are currently shaping in our own images. Even hearing Lucy wail everytime we ran out of milk brought us closer, because we were in it together. Even breaking up fights between Margot and Charlie was a chance to grow, because we were helping them through their conflict (albeit the fifteenth of that day). 

I was recently trying to explain this to a coworker, who stopped by to pay for some books, when Bonnie meowed and leapt from the couch. “Oh, she really sounds like a cat.” 

Pleased, my eldest noiselessly pounced from the couch and, on all fours, approached my coworker, rubbing head, then neck and back, against her leg. 

Is this normal? my colleague’s perplexed expression seemed to ask.

“They’re very strange,” I said with a shrug. “But they’re ours.”