I'm guessing that just about everyone on the planet earth has read the book (or seen the movie) "Grapes of Wrath" by John Steinbeck.

It was one of the great stories of all time and based on real life. What Steinbeck wouldn't have known to write about was the water moccasin snake that lolligagged around the spring where we had to go to get our water not far from where we lived ... in a tent in Pensacola.

We must have looked a lot like the Joads (of Grapes of Wrath) when we left Florida and eventually landed for a short time in Aberdeen, Idaho before continuing to Washington.

I don't think we had any of our possessions strapped to the hood of our '29 Essex (I'm pretty sure it was an Essex) nor do I remember anything loaded on top but the inside was chock full of everything we owned and including (along with our parents) the five kids who were our family at the time.

The trip back was eventful. We drove off leaving my oldest sibling, Priscilla (she must have been eight or nine at the time), in a gas station somewhere in Texas.

We were 20 minutes down the highway before someone counted noses and found one was missing. We returned lickety-split to find a very distraught little girl thinking she had been abandoned.

I was thrown out of the car (also in Texas) in my attempt, at a little over four years old, to properly close a rattling rear door (it was one of those that opened from the front to the back) and bounced a few times on the gravel road. When I came to in my mother's arms, I was reported as saying, "It's a good thing you caught me."

Again in Texas, we ran over a rattlesnake that was fully as long as the highway was wide. We all felt the thumpity bump as we passed over its thick body.

At our next potty stop, I refused to get out for fear the snake was still lurking under the car and would jump out and bite me. I still fear snakes.

I'll never forget driving over, what was then a plank bridge, the Royal Gorge in Colorado.

I looked down through the planks to what appeared to be miles below, scurried back into the car and stayed there. To this day, I have a dread of heights.

It seems that my life has always revolved around cars. I was run over by one in Tillamook, Oregon when I was 18 months old. I was a bit mashed but survived in order to write for the Beacon.  Ain't the Beacon readers lucky?

Cars? Yeah. I spent the better part of 40 years in the car rental business but that's another story including high speed repossessions and court cases.

Expect I'll tell it later.