sambecker.com/blog

It’s August in the Midwest and that can mean only one thing. Road trip! All seven Beckers have gathered together under one roof to begin their yearly journey east. The lease has expired on our SUV of choice—the unrivaled, black GMC Envoy. In its stead, we have rented a massive, white 15-passenger Chevy Express super-van. The only thing missing is the Partridge outfits. The first destination on this freedom train? Holland, MI.

We departed around three o’clock. Our route takes us through Chicago and across Indiana. We made it as far as South Haven, MI before making our first stop. There we consulted the great blue cow oracle, better known as Sherman’s Dairy Bar. Just like last year, we put together an outlandish order of ice cream flavors: keylime pie, grasshopper, root beer, peanut butter and Sherman tracks—the distant cousin to the better known moose tracks. After eating our fill, we moseyed on down to the South Haven lakefront. After tossing around the Frisbee (‘bee, hereafter), we played a rousing game of butt-ball. The goal in this sport is to throw a sixteen-inch softball as high as you can while a recipient-in-waiting prepares to “catch” it somewhere on his backside. The closer you are to a cheek, the more comfortable the transaction. Hits in the lower back tend to mount up and increase in sensitivity. We invented this ingenious game, but hope to see it grow.

Needless to say, everyone worked up a mean appetite for the New Holland Brewery. Alas, our plans were thwarted by an unforgiving “early close” policy rampant throughout all of Holland. Everyone’s kitchen closes by 9pm, no exceptions. After much searching, we gave up and drowned our sorrows in a bountiful Applebees feast in the strip mall across from our Fairfield Inn. It was a close tie with the neighboring IHOP, but we saved that for tomorrow morning!