Some things never change. I hate being the one making the decisions. You know how when you are with a group of people and no one can decide whether to order the fish or the steak and you are STARVING and just want food of any sort so you have to be the one to say, " For God sake order the steak and get this dinner on the table!". . . that is what makes me nuts. Some people just can not make a decision to save their soul.
Every day we wake up and are faced with a hundred decisions starting with "Should I get up or just lie here in the bed for another hour or two?" Then there is the decision of what to wear for the day, what to have for breakfast, when to leave the house to get the maximum amount of things done that are on the "to do" list for the day. It goes on all day long ! Most of the time the decisions are not earth shattering and will not alter the universe but some times the decisions put so much pressure on one person that it causes us to drink.
For the past 50 years I have been put in the position of being the decision maker. As a mom it is a natural role to play. No problem there, my decisions only altered the lives of my three children. But no pressure ! The decisions that make me nuts are the "travel" decisions. For what ever reason the men in my life seem incapable of making spur of the moment decisions. They are great at making plans for a three thousand mile trip but when it comes to the decision to pull into THIS gas station or the NEXT gas station they are totally incapable of making a decision. We will be barreling down the road at 65 miles an hour and the man will suddenly ask, "DO I TURN HERE?". And there we have it . . . the decision is mine . . . turn or not too turn, that is the question. And the answer to that question is going to affect the next 3 hours of the journey because if I make the wrong decision we are off the beaten path and lost for eternity. (Or at least that is how I feel).
Today we took a tour into the Denali National Park. It was "interesting and unique" to say the least, And I made the decision to take this particular tour. Yesterday as we came into the park we stopped at the "bus depot" for all tours of the park. Because D has his Oxygen it is usually my job to jump out of the RV and go into the buildings to take care of business. The biggest decisions I make usually involve the size of the cup of coffee, what blend of coffee and what flavor creamer to put into the coffee. Some times when things get really tense I have to decide whether to purchase donuts or sticky buns to go with the coffee. BUT yesterday I had to make a BIG decision . . . what tour to take in the National Park. The scenario is ALWAYS the same, we discuss what we want to do as we're driving down the road, (good plan), We pull into the parking lot and as I am climbing out of the RV the man starts giving me two thousand other things to remember when I get into the building. NEVER FAILS! ALWAYS HAPPENS ! But now I'm used to this so I just put my ears on silent mode and keep moving. Once in the building the pressure is now getting intense. Will I make a good decision, will I make the "right" choice? Yesterdays decision was based on the length of the tour because we have to factor in the battery life on the oxygen machine. So I chose the 4 hour tour into the park titled "history" and something of Denali National Park. The very young girl assured me we would be traveling into the park and see lots of animals. NOT ! We got on the "tour" bus which is just a school bus painted a non discript color so it blends into the landscape. (As if the moose and other creatures can't tell there is a freaking BUS full of tourists stopped to gawk.) We leave the bus terminal and amble off into the park for 26 miles with 3 stops along the way. The three stops are basically "potty" stops and there is NOTHING outstanding at any of these places. Stop number one was a gravel path into the woods to a small log cabin that is used by the dog sled teams in the winter. There was a man stationed there to tell us about how the cabin came to be at this particular spot and that was that. The path had been made to circle around back to the parking area where the bus waited. We saw white spruce trees and lichen. You can only imagine how EXCITING this stop was. (D was smart and opted to remain in the bus where at least it was warm.) The next stop was even more exciting because we had a real live Athabaskan native girl stand on a little pile of dirt and give us a quick history lesson about her people. She was a sweet girl but it was so damn cold all I could think about was getting back to the bus. (there were also potty's at this stop.) Once back in the bus we journeyed another 10 miles or so until we came to a turn around where we headed back down the mountain only to stop once again for a potty break at a third turn off. (Nothing at all to see at this one.)
The "tour" took four and a half hours and all the wild life we saw consisted of 5 moose and a fox. The tour guide/bus driver was a young woman who, although very knowledgeable, NEVER stopped talking and pointing out trees and holes in the ground made by glaciers. By the time we got back to the bus depot I was ready to shoot myself. D never left the bus and although he never questioned the validity of this tour we both knew that this was NOT one of my better decisions.
But then again, that's what life is all about . . . never knowing where a decision will take you but being flexible enough to go with what ever you get and make the best of it. My decisions after that trip today were to return to the RV, make a nice strong rum and coke, warm up a hot dog and write this blog before I fall sound asleep for the night and hopefully block this whole day from my memory. Tomorrow is another day of our journey and I'm sure I'll be challenged with a whole bunch of new decisions that I will hopefully have more success with than today.
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