Monday Memories

When I was a child, I thought it was normal to experience many adventures. It is, right? I was always hanging out with boys (of course I had my share of girlfriends to play dolls with, too) and getting myself into all sorts of trouble. For instance....We used to "requisition" items from around our neighborhood... such as: Big Wheels, hand trucks, scraps of carpet, small bar-b-q grills, pets (when possible), etc. We would put the handle of the hand truck into one of the big wheel holes and have our very own "camper trailer" to see the world in. Life was a beautiful thing indeed!One day while I was "traveling along in my automobile," I decided it would be fun to camp a little further away from home than I usually did. I was driving along, top down, the wind was in my face. It was truly the best trip I'd ever taken. I was approaching Decker Lake "recreational area" when to my horror I noticed something very large looming on the horizon. From my vantage point (very low to the ground) I couldn't quite make out exactly what I was seeing, I did, however, realize it was something very large and was kicking up an awful lot of dust. As it got closer, I decided I may want to exit at the next available ramp. Unfortunately I was out of luck, I couldn't find an exit fast enough. Before I knew it I was staring down (ok, perhaps I was staring up... really, really up) at a very large beast. It was HUGE!! It was the biggest thing I'd ever seen. It was green. It was ugly. It was scary. It was...a belly dumper truck and it buried me in a cloud of dust so thick I could hardly breathe. I had pulled over to let it go by and to briefly rest and "re-group" after having survived such a traumatizing experience. Believe it or not, there was an exit just a few yards further, which I promptly used to turn around and return to safer roadways.

So where had I been traveling on my journey? Turns out I was in the construction zone of the new I-215 Highway in West Valley, Ut. I was probably 9 at the time and looking back now, I can only imagine what the driver of that rig must have been thinking as he was coming up on this little kid out there riding a big wheel. "Where the he#* are that kids parents?" That's what I would have been thinking too. Fortunately for me all I got out of it was lots of dust mixed in with tons of fear. I never went traveling that way again. Imagine that. I guess I did learn at least one lesson in my youth.