Welcome To Rayne Droppings!

The Complete Life Of Hunter Rayne Uriarte
FOUND ONLY AT RAYNE DROPPINGS

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Rocky Mountains? Hi!

The first trip I took to Colorado, I remember as being a fun trip to Reno. And a miracle.

I think I had been to Colorado with my parents when I was little, but who can recall that? However, I did drive through Colorado when I was just out of college near the closing of a cross-country trip to visit a friend of mine who was graduating from Brown University. So my buddy Raf and I crammed into my junkie car (yeah, it sounded like a good idea at the time, I mean he is only like 6 foot 4 and really picky about everything...) and we drove three thousand miles to Rhode Island, via Florida. And I returned home, alone, via the Rockies.

Now this has nothing to do with Raf, though he is a notoriously awful travel companion - think Pig Pen who has to mooch everything - I just simply wanted to see different parts of the country and so he returned with another group of people. I, however, almost did not return, which brings me back to my story.

Nearly at the end of my trip, feeling the haze one might when on a "trip" from the hundreds of miles of oceanic nothingness that is space between Utah and Reno, my car died. Now I had previously broken down in Wyoming, something about a fan belt, but I grabbed a bucket of water, not wanting to wait the week it would take to get the part, and headed west. Like the great pioneers of yore, off I wandered towards the sunset, nothing but open sky and a dirty windshield in front of me. I made all the way to Elco (Elk? oh?) Nevada and plop, plop fizz fizz went the fan belt thing.

So there I was stuck on the side of the road. In Elco, a one exit town and I had just passed the exit. I could hear the tumble weeds and carrion birds. With no prospects, I was stuck, until a miracle pulled up. By "miracle" I mean a convict with a trailer who towed me to Reno. Some dude who was on his way to jail swung by with a trailer he needed because he had to tow his car out of impound before they locked him up. This guy was as you imagine, tatoos, tight jeans, big boots, rolled up arm sleeves and a dog named "Stoli". As is the vodka. Into his car I went. The same car he used to ram into people during a fight. Dents still in the hood. He was on his way to jail and if I had died 10 minutes later I never would have met him. And he was the nicest guy I ever met. Thus,... miracle. A little like the miracle at the end of the Mel Brooks' "History of the World" minus the cute girl and white horse...but a miracle none-the-less.

The ultimate spin on the Wheel of Fortune it turns out. He dropped me off at the Hyatt after dropping my car off at the dealership. He even bought me dinner and refused any payment I offered him. I gambled and won I guess.

But now my memory will be of a different miracle. Hunter, Heather and I enjoyed a wonderful trip to Colorado visiting his god-mommy and her family. They graciously put us up in their beautiful home and let Hunter play with all of their toys. We went to Casa Bonita of South Park fame - who knew it was a real place?- and we even went to a Rockies game where we marveled at the spot Bonds hit a legendary home-run above the purple mile high line.

My highlight, of course, will not be our visitation of the Moots factory, (where Heather let me by something fun) though I did bow and kneel before the appropriate places upon entrance, nor will it be our trip to Steamboat Springs in general, where we thoroughly enjoyed the outdoors and the beautiful little mountain town. Fun, but not quite the fun of learning about Rayne Droplet's early life in Colorado... the pizza places, the snooping, all of it.

No, of course the highlight is that now Heather and I have our own miracle to share together on our first family trip to Colorado.