The Motel Connection
My sister Karen and I have lamented many times how we regret that there are no photos of at least us kids standing by one of the old Holiday Inn signs. Those remain my happiest family memories– notably when we’d be in the family station wagon and watching the billboards for the motel location that Dad had selected that night. From there, it became who could spot the sign first. We often put in so many miles in a day that it wasn’t unusual if the sign was already lit up when we arrived at the motel.
But in those 1970s days, one didn’t have a phone to take photos and there was usually only one camera within a family. For us, it was Mom’s little Kodak and Dad’s Super 8 film camera where he filmed a lot of scenery, something I now understand given how much landscapes have changed.
We were taught to have an appreciation for the motel. I remember one time we showed up at a Holiday Inn to find out it was something like eight stories high– Dad only booked ones that were two stories– and he canceled the reservation. It was in one of the Carolinas and we landed at a one-story motel that made Mom very happy, especially given it had a claw-foot bathtub in the bathroom. I was disappointed it didn’t at least have a swimming pool.
Because Mom, Dad, and my younger sister Denise have all died, I have come to realize how much I connect with them through these memories and the motels. It’s why Greg will tell you that I’m happiest if you plant me at a motel with a swimming pool in a parking lot.
The motel in the photo is in Paso Robles, California. I just checked the photos online and it’s undergone a significant upgrade since we stayed there in 2015 (it’s never a bad thing when the carpet is replaced by some sort of wood laminate) but the pool remains the same– in the parking lot, under the sign. As it should be.
The motel, of the retro sort, fascination has been with me most of my life although it wasn’t something I talked about much. Before social media, you shared with the people in your immediate circle of life and, for me, I added these pieces to the stories I have told, many in the form of unfinished novels.
But now as I continue to trek forward, to build Chelle Summer, to write more, to share these aspects of my life and turn them into something either within my writing or Chelle Summer, I see they are also a way to continue to be connected to the family members who are no longer with me.
Or, perhaps, they are guiding me, they being the ones to make this connection happen, knowing how well I will keep the connection with them this way. And keep my hope alive.
