When: Easter weekend, 2011.
Who: The Tex Becks and dear Marler cousins
It went like this:
The plan was great. We got a call from Kristen a couple weeks ago about the possibility of helping pick up a vehicle in Texas and meeting halfway to do a vehicle exchange (trading in a big suburban for a bigger van). Not only would we have been able to save days of driving time, but also we would have gotten a chance to play in the pool with Marler kids we know and meet the Marler kids we hadn't yet met.
So on Wednesday and Thursday of last week it looked like it could possibly go down on the weekend. And sure enough, on Friday we got notice that they were on the way! Hoping to get the van that evening and start our trek before dawn Saturday morning, we fled Houston for the state capital where the van was waiting for us.
The only thing was, the van wasn't exactly waiting for us. Well, it was waiting, but also it was waiting for a pitman arm owing to the claim that the original "was showing some wear." Well, I didn't know what a pitman arm was, but I do now.
Unfortunately, a pitman arm could not be procured until Tuesday, which is tomorrow. But a few options presented themselves. None of the easy things worked. None of the other vans around had a suitable replacement. And wouldn't you know, replacing the original also didn't work--it looked like somehow the geared bolt was slipping in the geared pitman arm hole. Which I guess means that "showing some wear" must have meant that something bad was imminent OR it means they damaged the arm when they pulled it... Anyway, we were one good pitman arm short of a great van, and meanwhile the Marler nine were barreling down the interstate system towards us.
So the rest of that day was spent tinkering with solutions and waiting here and there for a welder to come and fuse the pitman arm to the steering gear. Which sucks, because the pitman arm is relatively cheap but the box is not so cheap. But time isn't cheap either, and once you've come across the country for a vehicle, you want to get it back without spending an extra three or four days waiting--and that's even provided waiting is possible, since one also has to consider getting time off from work et cetera.
Meanwhile, our meeting destination changed from Amarillo, to Lubbock, and to Abilene. That's about the time when it looked like the welder was finished, and I took the van for a spin, only to realize that it in fact, wasn't fixed. On further inspection, we saw that the welding job we thought was done in fact wasn't done. Unfortunately, the welder was gone again, and we did find out that he would come back first thing in the morning.
Well, we didn't know if the Marlers would cut their losses and go back, or press forward and try again. They decided to press forward, so we stayed in Austin another night to await their arrival and say hi in the morning.
Which we did, and what joy! We arrived at the transaction spot Saturday morning, and Steve and Kristen and the kids were all out in the van on a test drive. The welder had come, he had finished with the weld, and everything was working fine. So the last of the paperwork was completed, bags were moved from the suburban to the van, and it looked like the end of that leg of the journey.
But snap went the weld, when Steve was pulling out the van. Foiled!--we were wrong! We looked at the weld some more, and decided that it could be done better and that indeed, it would be a good fix if it were done right. This seemed to me to be the biggest deliberation, because the welder had attempted to fix it not once, but twice. Does one go for a third attempt? And if one does, is he able to trust it will do the trick? And it is all good and well to "trust" it, but the test of this trust is driving your family across the country in the vehicle.
So our Easter was also spent tinkering with solving the problem. But I wouldn't want you to think that there were Bonnie, me, our three little ones, and some mechanics with our heads under the front of a van all weekend. Nor, when the Marlers arrived, was it us Beckers, Steve and Kristen, and their seven little ones, all with our noses in the steering assembly. In order to give an accurate picture of our weekend, I have to back up and tell more of the story.
The rest of the story should include that it was our first time to Austin, Bonnie and I. And we were tickled just driving into the hills where the Marler Van awaited. The houses, constructed within the landscape and not just on it, beckoned to the Earth lovers within. Small creeks here and there and here and there beckoned to our outdoorsyness. Runners and bicyclers reminded us that some cities are livelier than others.
When we arrived at the place where the Marler van awaited, we were fairly impressed. On account of it appearing like a large compound or estate, complete with large stucco walls and a large gateway with a gate of metal blocking us from entering as well as even peeking inside. The seller let us in, where we saw his unhumble house, terraced yard, palm trees, and various projects, as well as vans. It seemed obvious his work was in stone and construction, and when we saw the short round man we thought that once upon a time, maybe he had laid some of the stone himself.
What do I mean by projects? Like the pyramid he was building in the corner of his property. The kids had a good time playing in the tunnel/cave he had formed which was to be below the pyramid's base.
Well, in addition to popping in and trying to keep things moving as well as possible, we also checked out the state capitol, whole foods, and trails and creeks nearby. And we pretty much were in love with Austin, because we could see girls with hula hoops, tourists getting drivers' training on segways, lots of bikes, lots of picnickers, lots of beards, lots of local, lots of green, and not much traffic congestion.
And when the Marlers were there, sure it was horrible and crushing about the van mishaps, but it was such a joy to meet the kiddos and see the cousins that we were all quite beside ourselves.
You will notice some Mardi Gras hooplah. We owe gratitude for the seller, who, along with taking the Marlers' suburban and some money, was gracious enough to let our families run amok on his property, while giving us some goodies, including a bag of Mardi Gras goodies magicked from somewhere within his unhumble abode.
So by and by, we got a good weld, a satisfactory fix, and at long last we bid adieu to our Marler kin and we went our opposite ways. It wasn't the best of situations for the MArlers coming all the way to Austin, but we were tickled to see them and spend some time together, and we're just really glad that they have made it back safe and sound to Casper, where they arrived with their sunburns to this:
And yes, I said sunburns. Oh, my face looked like boiled seafood, and my neck is more than a titch tender as well. It wasn't the awesome creek dip, but the waiting around that did it....
