34 and Counting

When I was a young thing, many moons ago, we went on a trip to Cape Cod. It was July and the Americans were all a twitter about the up coming presidential elections. The front runner was a senator called John Kennedy and his opponent was Richard Nixon. Tricky Dicky he was called. Nobody had a name for Kennedy as nobody knew who he was. Well off we trundled deep into the Boston States, our trailer hitched behind us. We had had a fabulous ride down the brand new 401, Anne and I in said trailer, watching in thrilled horror as all the cuboard doors flew open and dishes and food came crashing down. We expected death at any moment and waved frantically to the back of our parents heads in the car ahead. Finally we were seen and Dad pulled over. We wondered off to pick daisies while the parental units had fits over the mess. While the little trailer stood by the side of the road an OPP policeman pulled up and checked the thing over. When he found out Anne and I had been rattling about in it while it was being towed, he had a fit. That was the end of that for the rest of the trip.
It was books and crayons until the next pit stop. We ended up in Boston on a stinking hot July day, then slowly made our way to a campsite on the seashore. It was near a Howard Johnson's Hotel and that became my introduction to fried clams, lobster rolls and Ho Jo's 34 flavours of ice cream. Pops was nothing if not competitive so right then the push was on to have a go at each flavour, no favourites allowed. We ate stuff that looked vile and tasted worse but we were undeterred. I don't think we missed a HoJo on the Eastern Seaboard from Boston up to Maine to New Hampshire then through Vermont. We tried them all. I loved the fried clams and adored the lobster rolls but there was always that ice cream cone lurking. I don't know if I tried them all. I can't remember and the others of our little band are in no positon to remember either. I do remember ploughing through something called Rocky Road and encountering peanuts. I haven't touched it since.
And Kennedy won we were happy to see, as he was so much cuter than old Tricky Dicky who seemed to sweat a lot. This is important when you are thirteen. That's all, a bit of history with a personal touch.