THROWBACK THURSDAY - MIGRATION

On July 1st of 1972 Judy and I, her three offspring and two cats left Indianapolis, Indiana to move to Phoenix, Arizona.

I drove a Chevrolet van towing a 16-foot U-Haul trailer.

I was followed by son Scott and daughters Gayle and Caryn in Scott's converted 1950 Dodge school bus.

(Scott had painted all the interior metal surfaces black and white; had secured an old burgundy stage curtain discarded from some school which Judy made into coverings for his dining area benches and he'd also put some bright red flocked carpeting on the floor and up some walls.  I called it The Rolling Bordello.)

Our first stop, for a lunch break, was somewhere in Illinois.

We were younger and thinner and had more hair back then and it wasn't gray.

We camped out on that trek, Judy and I sleeping in a tent; the kids occupying the bus.

Everywhere we stopped, rain fell.

The locals told us it was the first rain in many a day, week or month, so we began calling ourselves The Rainmakers.

We spent the penultimate night in cool temperatures, camped under tall pine trees at 7,000 feet in Flagstaff, Arizona.

The trip nearly over we treated ourselves to a dinner out at a nearby steakhouse.

The next day we somehow lost each other for a worrisome hour.

The first misadventure of the trip.

However we reconnected and finally got to Phoenix.

It is July 7th.

We are exhausted and it's 103 degrees.

But just before sunset it began to rain and all the locals ran outside to stand elatedly in what they tell us is the first downpour in three months.

The Rainmakers have arrived.