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Recently, I was on a trip in Upstate NY with my son. We were forced to take a detour, and wouldn’t you know it- there were no signs to tell you how to get back on the main road. My GPS was also failing me, and wanted me to turn about and take the closed off road. It was raining, and I was starting to run late for a tour- this was getting aggravating.
My five year old was pretty happy in the backseat, telling me about the things he was seeing out the window. I have to admit that I was not really listening, but was trying to figure out where I was and how to get where I wanted to be. I pulled over, and yanked out my giant map, and pondered. As I put it back down in anger, I noticed something- There was a beautiful church ahead of me. I had been looking for a country church to photograph, and there it was, out in the middle of nowhere. And? It stopped raining. I took it as a sign that I should just go with it. And that is what we did.
As we ambled onward, we found a roadside pumpkin patch that had the gourds in all shapes and sizes, and my son had a great time choosing orange gifts for everyone at home (that boy loves a good pumpkin). As I dropped payment into the money box, he started jumping up and down and yelling that he had “found baby Spookley”. For those of you who don’t know about this fellow, he is a square pumpkin that all of the other pumpkins made fun of in a Halloween DVD of the same name. He looked in patches in several states, for 2 years, convinced he would find his own Spookley. But a square pumpkin? Not possible, I told him. I was wrong- he did indeed find a palm-sized square pumpkin (yes, it had rounded sides- but it was as square as it gets). For fifty cents, he had his square pumpkin and immense satisfaction.
This was turning out pretty well, and we still made our tour with 6 minutes to spare. It was a beautiful day, and we had fun at the Lazy Acres alpaca farm and with the animals. My son fed them, played with some puppies, and we left to go home. A few hours into the ride, again, we took a wrong turn- but ended up at one of the loveliest lakes I have seen in a long time. In the middle of a picturesque town, full of cute shops and “mom and pop” restaurants, we spent some time at the ice cream parlor and then took a stroll around the lake before heading home.
We enjoyed our “lost in NY State” time as much as our planned visits- leaving me to wonder if there was an art to getting lost, and just “going with it” instead of getting frustrated and cranky- or if NY State is just magic in October. Maybe a little of both.
Way to turn the day around. I would have taken it as a sign as well.
That’s a cool story Sam 🙂
And a very pretty church.
Well done 🙂
For lost, you did al’right…next time I get lost, I want it to be just like that :0)
Great post! You can certainly say getting lost is a lot of fun. I am the type of person who loves to stop here in there during a trip when I see something interesting, even if it is not originally planned. But my husband is always on a direct course and the puts friction between us. Which leave me with an idea, maybe my son and I will hit the road on a long trip without him on day soon. lol.
not a terrible idea 😉