80s

I went through a couple more photo albums today. These were from the 1980-82 era. A lot of visiting family on three coasts: northeast, south, and northwest. Not many saveable photos; just scanned about five. There were a couple visits to national parks, one that I thought I had visited and one that I don’t remember visiting.

After visiting Carlsbad Caverns, I wondered just how many of our national parks I had visited. I came up with 18 of the 63, with 3 being questionable. The Everglades was a question until the second photo album from Florida vacations, where there were 20 or so bad photos of swamps and an alligator under the title card reading Everglades. The one park I didn’t remember was Mt. Rainier in Washington State. Must have been on a visit to big brother Jim’s place. So as it stands, it’s nineteen, with two of them being questionable, but I’m almost positive about Acadia in Maine.

The Gateway Arch in St. Louis is iffy. I know I never went up in it, but I’m kinda sure there is a photo I took of the Arch. I do remember St. Louis is where our practically new 1974 Honda Accord’s clutch went out. It was towed to the local Honda dealer, and after hearing our story, they stuck us in next, and we were back on the road in a couple of hours.

But the surprise find was one of my mother. It was taken by a Polaroid camera, and I never owned one. She’s sitting in a booth in the Meadowlands cutting up a cake. Was it her birthday? Was it her last day working at the restaurant? I’m not sure this would be in the early 80s and how did I get it?