Hi, I'm Bugsy

Hometown Invasion Tour, 5 years later

October 11th, 2011

Recently my my friend Charles (and a host from my trip) asked me a few questions looking back on my Hometown Invasion Tour. It’s been just over five years since I hit the road and a day doesn’t go by where I don’t think about it. Something as small as having my iTunes on shuffle where a song will come on that someone gave me during my trip, or one of the songs from my top 20 played list will come on. They all bring something to the front of my memory, a moment, a feeling, often of one of the several hundred people I met.

It’s very common for me to relive little moments. I regularly find myself going through the archive of photos to see where I was five years ago to the given day, every day was a truly new adventure between September 8, 2006 and September 17, 2007.

For example, five years ago today I was in Minot, North Dakota. It was perfect timing to be in Minot. I attended the Norsk Hostfest, North America’s largest Scandinavian festival. I was 23 years old in a crowd with an average age much closer 70. It was the sixth state of the 50-state road trip and hardly a month into a 12 month adventure.

A Little Background

I wouldn’t meet Charles until my stop in Maryland (the 32nd state). Before knocking on the door of my hosts homes I rarely knew much more about them than perhaps how old they were, what they did for work, or how they heard about my trip. Charles, a fellow MSU alum, heard about the trip through one of the many MSU media outlets. He was no different, I knew very little about him before knocking on the door to stay there for a few days.

I remember getting close to Potomac, MD to meet my new host. I got off the highway and was driving down River Road where I was seeing the biggest houses I had ever seen. I started to get excited thinking, “Where on earth am I staying tonight?” I arrived at Charles’ house, and quite the house it was. But by comparison it was a dollhouse to some of the other houses in town. The owner of Six Flags was around the corner, Eunice Kennedy Shriver lived on the other side of town, Michael Jordan had a house there during his time with the Washington Wizards.

My stop at Charles’ is one I’ve told over and over again in the years since. I was completed fascinated. Out of all my hosts it was this one that maybe contrasted the most with my background growing up. None of that mattered, Charles became an incredible friend. He inspired new thoughts, provided quality conversation, and has been a role model in addition to a friend.

I’ve seen Charles twice since the trip. I hope it was as meaningful to him as it was me.

The Highs and Lows

“What moments from the Hometown Invasion Tour stand out the most for you? I’m asking about the highs, but also the lows.”

There weren’t many highs as high as the day I left. On the morning September 8, 2006 I left my hometown in Baraga. My Jeep was the cleanest it would be for the entire trip. A news station came to cover the story and we had a small group of close friends over to wish me safe travels as I headed to Milwaukee for my first stop. It was a cold, damp and drizzly morning, but it felt like one of the sunniest days of my life. There was this amazing sense of accomplishment, I couldn’t stop thinking, “I’m doing it! I’m actually starting this 50-state journey!” I remember driving and shaking the steering wheel out of excitement, turning the music up high, rolling down the window and singing at the top of my lungs while driving. Looking back to this moment I’m always reminded of this quote…

“I find I’m so excited, I can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head. I think it’s the excitement only a free man can feel, a free man at the start of a long journey whose conclusion is uncertain.” — Red, in Shawshank Redemption

Exactly one year later, September 8, 2007, I returned to Michigan. For the first time I actually had people driving with me, my good friendsAmanda and Kevin. I don’t think they will ever know the emotions I was experiencing. They probably thought I was pretty crazy. I had never been so excited in my life. As we approached the Michigan boarder and back to East Lansing where the idea was born.

In between there were many other highs (a few of them listed below) and a few lows.

The lowest point of the trip came in Louisiana. Louisiana was my 25th state, I was halfway through! On the night I arrived it was St. Patrick’s Day and Michigan State was playing in the NCAA Tournament. I was excited to get to Baton Rouge and celebrate. Turns out my host ditched me. All of a sudden she wasn’t returning phone calls, and wasn’t at her apartment when I arrived. Her roommate shooed me away having no idea who I was and seemed to have no interest in my story or trip. It took me four hotels to find a room available.

This week in the middle of the trip I was completely exhausted. I hadn’t seen a familiar face or place in months. I had been on the road for months and just wanted to be home. I never wanted to give up, it was never a thought. I told my parents I wouldn’t return to Michigan until I saw all other 49 states. And so was the case. Fortunately I was able to see my parents not long after this stop in Tennessee where I had a few days of R&R.

A Friend Everywhere I Go

“Which people that you met in the tour are still in your life today?”

No different from high school or college, it seems that as the years go by there are fewer and fewer people I’m regularly in touch with. As we all go through life there are so many changes, and I think it’s something that naturally happens. I wish I were able to see them all and talk to them regularly. Each year there are a handful of hosts that still send me a Christmas card. Sometimes my phone will ring and it’s a former host and my face lights up in excitement.

There have been very few hosts I’ve seen since my trip. My friends from Boise, hosts in Plano, Charles and Jon in Potomac, Karen in Pittsburgh. A few others, but the list is quite small.

Quite frankly Facebook is a blessing. For the sole purpose of keeping in touch with hosts from my trip Facebook has been incredibly helpful. It allows me to keep up with their lives, see what they’re doing, and at least congratulate them as they go through new adventures in life as well. Of course I’m thrilled anytime I see a familiar name who ‘likes’ my status. It’s just enough to make me smile and bring a few more memories to the front of my mind.

There is one thing I feel is odd. At times I’m doubtful my hosts have as much sentiment towards me as I do them. My entire year was something special. It’s a year of life fully lived with new experiences. Each host is meaningful to me in different ways. But for them, I’m not sure it’s the same? For some hosts they had to go to work in the morning while I was out exploring, they were still living their routines for the most part. For me each week was part of a life changing year, where a single week (usually closer to three days for each host) for them may not have been that much out of the ordinary. If they took me around town for example, they were already seeing places they had seen many times before.

My hosts made big impacts on my life. I remember being with Charles exploring a small tall in Virginia when we ran into one of his friends. Charles apologized later after his friend cynically asked, “What’s in it for these hosts?” In short all I wish is that I was able to make at least a small but positive impact in their life, they certainly made a large one in mine, and I’m grateful for it.

It’s a great feeling to believe that I have a friend in every state in the country. I’m hopeful that I could show up in any state and find an old host that is still willing to have me for a night or two.

Hindsight

“If you could plan and do it all over again, what would you do differently, if anything?”

Hindsight is 20/20. That’s true. Looking back it’s easy to see what I could have done better. I could have experienced more, documented more thoroughly, met more people, taken more photos. But during the trip I think I did a pretty darn good job of making my dream come true and living each day to the fullest. I also learned that truly living each day to the fullest is difficult and exhausting.

I learned a lot about what I would do differently if I do it again. A lot of it has to do with balance. It was very difficult to balance planning and documenting the trip versus just living and enjoying the trip. Additionally, there were a few moments on the trip where I feel a little regret. One example is in Hammond, Montana. On my last full day there we finished up work on the ranch a little early. Lester and Reneta were heading to a square dance in town, but Carsten was feeling a little sick and decided to stay home. Rather than going out I stayed back with Carsten and watched the MSU vs. Ohio State football game. I still kick myself over it, feeling I should have gone to the square dance. It’s one more experience that would be completely new since I’ve never been to a square dance.

My ambitions were very quite large when I left. I wanted to document substantially more than I did. Little did I know how much time and commitment that was going to take. But overall there is very little I would change.

Here’s something fun… One thing I wish I knew in advance was how popular Rice the Squirrel was going to be. He became a mascot of the trip and people loved him. Photographing him in every state was something that came up last minute, it was just something small I was going to do on the side. Turns out it became a big part of the trip. It was something I never expected, but if I ever do another trip I’m better suited to anticipate these things.

Oh, How the Web Has Changed

“Have there been any technological developments/advancements since 2006 that would have changed the way you did and shared the tour?”

It is mind boggling how much has changed on the web since 2006. In hindsight it is easy to think of hundreds of things I could have done better with the website. But I’m also much more knowledgeable about web development than I was five years ago. I’m capable of things I never knew I would be. There were so many things I was doing wrong! The site was built in tables! C’mon really Bugsy, tables? Shame.

When I left on my trip Twitter existed, but was known to very few people. Facebook was around but not the tool it is today. There were no Facebook pages, and promoting and sharing links wasn’t nearly as effective. And there was no like button. Oh, and MySpace was still popular.

I remember getting a message from my friend John in December. He was telling me about this site called Twitter and how it was going to be big one day. I signed up for an account, checked it out, and basically was like, “I don’t have time for this”. I’m still considered an early adopter of Twitter, and he may be the only person I know who signed up before me.

If I left on another trip today I would be much better equipped. Imagine what I could do with Foursquare? Has there been anyone to check into a location in all 50 states yet on Foursquare? The integrations with geo tagging? If I only had an iPhone, but that didn’t come out until January 2007. And wireless was much more scarce five years.

Big Fish Stories

In the last five years there are a number of stories I’ve told countless times. Some of the most common stories include my close call with carbon monoxide, an unexpected murder, my stop in Las Vegas, a surprise in New York City, the MSU Hockey National Championship, and meeting Jake Burton.

As each year passes and the more I’ve told them, the more each story seems to become a big fish tale. Turns out my favorite movie is Big Fish. In the movie the father tells all of these stories his son who never believed them but in the end the son finds out they were all true (just a little exaggerated, you know, big fish stories).

I never doubted that people believed my stories. But even I had become far removed from them. I had told them so many times without being able to relive them or reminisce about them with the people that were there. Sometimes I feel they aren’t valid.

I had a special moment this Spring. Five of us from the Traction staff took a road trip to Minneapolis, not far from White Bear Lake where the carbon monoxide scare happend, one of the biggest fish stories. I told the story to the Traction crew on the drive up, no different than the many others I’ve told. But on Saturday morning my host Mark was able to join Jon and I for breakfast. Without me mentioning it, Mark brought up the day he claims I saved his families life and told it to Jon nearly word for word as I told Jon a day before. It was validated! Jon was there to hear it, someone finally heard this story through someone else’s mouth other than mine. I thought, “It’s true, this story is true!”

Difficult to Relate

Stories, stories, stories. I actually feel a little guilt when I start talking about my trip, because I can’t shut up once I do and I hope my friends don’t get sick of me talking about it. When I talk about it something changes in my heart.

I lived the trip entirely on my own (ok, yes there was Rice too). At most I shared seven days out of a full year with a few select people. I can share those memories with them. But the trip as a whole was just me. It was only me driving for hours, only me who got ditched by hosts, surprised by my family in NYC, fell in love, or met my idols.

At times I feel I don’t talk about it as much as I could (or even should for my own good) because I find it difficult to express these feelings and emotions I lived when nobody else was there.

But believe me, if anyone ever wants to listen and hear some stories, I’ll talk for hours one state at a time.

In Summary

Charles asked me to write this a while ago and I should write more about these memories. I knew it would take a perfect moment and a good chunk of time to get it all out. It brings a flood of emotions and a ton of smiles thinking just how incredible it all was. Part of telling these stories over and over again and writing more down as I remember is because I fear ever losing these memories. They’re some of the best I have.

There is no doubt it changed and shaped my life forever. Reminiscing about the trip leaves a satisfying feeling. I set this really lofty goal for myself while having no idea what I was doing and there were plenty of doubters. It has opened a lot of doors, but the most important door is the one that helped me realize what I can achieve and what it takes to get there.

I’ve been playing some of my favorite songs from the trip to bring some of those emotions back to life while writing this. As I close this out I’m playing “My Way” by Frank Sinatra. Because in the end, I did it my way.

I have a love affair with Detroit

February 7th, 2011

This affair I have with Detroit, it’s almost like some of the girls I have fallen in love with at first sight; girls that were edgier than me, girls that made me nervous or intimidated, especially after having just a kiss with them, wondering what it’d be like to have more. You’ve never met anyone else like this girl, girls like this.

I’m always left wondering what it’d be like to have more of Detroit. I want it.

Growing up in the Upper Peninsula, Detroit was a long ways away. From Baraga to Campus Martius Park is 531 miles. The Upper Peninsula is disconnected from Detroit in a lot of ways, culture, industry, weather, accents, diversity, you name it. I knew little about the city other than their sports teams. When I attended Michigan State I never found my way to Metro Detroit more than a handful of times. My experience of downtown Detroit was one Red Wings game and going to the Auto Show twice.

And then after school I went on a 50-state tour across the country and saw most of the 20 most populous cities in the country, yet I still hadn’t spent much time in Detroit.

Eventually I met this guy named Charlie who would become a good friend. Because of him I had my first kiss with Detroit. It was a tease, I wanted more. This place was different, different than places I had seen before. Different than all of those cities I visited.

As I moved to Lansing I was further teased with the aroma of Detroit. I met more and more people from Detroit and somehow became connected in this city I knew so little of. I started seeing their passion, their tenacity, and all the things they believed in. Their attitudes were similar to mine. They saw potential.

Ever since having that first kiss of Detroit I’ve wanted more. The more I learn about Detroit the more it has somehow become a part of me, even from afar. I’ll leave it to people like D Blair who can explain it far better than I can. Or perhaps Johnny Knoxville’s trip to detroit. And Lemonade Detroit.

I’ve lived in Michigan my whole life, and it took far too long for me to get to know this backbone of Michigan.

…

This was supposed to be a blog post about my favorite Super Bowl commercial. But I guess it explains why it’s my favorite Super Bowl commercial.

I’m a sentimental guy and my friend Amanda reminds me how serious I can be. So maybe it all goes without saying that the Chrysler “Imported From Detroit” was my favorite commercial.

The funny commercials were great, but they were just entertainment. During the Super Bowl comedy is a dime a dozen. It takes a lot more tenacity to run a commercial (not to mention a rare 2 minute spot) that’s serious, moving, and isn’t there to simply entertain. Turns out Detroit is a city that knows a lot about Tenacity.

But I’m biased, I have a love affair with Detroit. So I’ll let the ad speak for itself…

Imported From Detroit

My advice to college students

September 15th, 2010

I’m not sure if hindsight is always 20-20 like some people say, but it sure is most of the time. There’s a lot of things I wish I knew earlier in college. Some of the biggest lessons I faced came during my last year at Michigan State University and were things I could have taken advantage of in my first year.

And you know what? People were telling me to do those very things. Sure I listened, but I didn’t act. The difference didn’t occur until I started acting.

Through things like Lansing Breakfast Club, Ignite Lansing, and social media I’ve been able to connect with a lot of college students and it has been a blast. I’ve met a countless number who impress me. My jaw drops at some of the things they’re up to and the new opportunities they have. I’ve really enjoyed getting to know them whether it’s a student asking me how I got sponsorship from Jeep, someone who needs to learn WordPress, or interns at the office.

During and after the Hometown Invasion Tour I’ve had a number of speaking engagements to college classes. These were some of the things I found myself repeating, and the more I thought about it some of the things I wish I had done earlier or more of while in school.

Here are some snippets of my advice…

Ask (a lot) more questions
For starters, my grade point average probably woud have been higher if I asked more questions (I’m lookin’ at you economics and accounting). In addition, I’ve since learned that asking the right questions is an invaluable lesson. Asking the right question can often lead to a lot more than giving the right answer. As a subset of this, be curious! When I started asking more questions my senior year I got more involved, more engaged, it lead to better relationships with my classmates and professors and as some small pointers it makes class more enjoyable and even helps class go by faster! I was one of the quietest kids in class… until my senior year. Quite frankly I didn’t find my confidence in the classroom until my senior year.

Be yourself
The confidence I gained in the classroom took a long time. When I finally found it it was because I was being just myself. I remember having to give a presentation in my Advertising Law & Ethics class the very next class after our professor cussed out the entire class for people putting full blocks of text and reading them word for word in their PowerPoint presentations (big no no!). As I joke I told my friends I was going to open up my presentation with that, since I was on deck after this epic cussing out of the class. The plan was to start with a massive block of text and say, “Let me start by reading this…” and then change to the next slide after a few seconds that said “J/K”. They dared me to do it. So I did. It was either going to go terribly wrong or terribly well.

My friend Suzy was sitting in front as I started her eyes widened and she started shaking her head gently, gesturing to me that I don’t do it. The room fell silent in one of those “Oh s**t, this guy is stupid” type moods. As I moved to the “J/K” slide there was a small moment of silence as if everyone was waiting on the professor to react to see if it was ok to laugh. As soon as he bursted out laughing the entire room erupted in laughter (except for the guy in the back who said under his breath that I was a pansy for wearing a pink shirt). It was a turning point. You’ll never find the confidence if you don’t just be yourself.

Get to know your professors
This is one of the best examples (and one of the easiest ones not taken advantage of) as it’s preached from the first day of student orientation. Introduce yourself to each one of them the first week of class. This will go a long, long ways. You won’t get to know them all, some won’t care about who you are, some will come off as pissy, some you won’t be able to understand. But over the course of your schooling you’ll find a number of them willing to bend over backwards for you. You won’t know who they are unless you get to know them. I didn’t start to really get to know my professors until I was a senior. I wish I had done it earlier. It was all because of my professors that I landed sponsorship from Jeep. All I had to do was talk to them about it. Not to mention made some of the most generous donations towards my 50-state tour.

Befriend people of other backgrounds
I’ll never forget my freshman year when I went skateboarding with a guy from Japan and a guy from NYC who grew up in Grenada. There I was a Yooper having never known anyone from either of those places. Whether it’s race, religion, education background, socioeconomic background, hobbies, or someone who grew up on the opposite side of the country, college is by far one of the best opportunities in the world to meet an incredible array of diverse people. The guy from Grenada, his name is Devon, we’ve been friends since my freshman year, 9 years ago now. He has continually provided me a different perspective that I would have otherwise never had. Not to mention he’s the coolest guy ever, and I wish I could have half the style he has.

Do something far out of your comfort zone
I hated public speaking. I was shy. I couldn’t work up the guts to ask a question in class most of the time. Yet, for some reason, I signed up to be a speaker at the regional AAF competition. I had a long script that needed to be memorized and had never done anything remotely close to it in my life. And you know what? I actually screwed up royally, completely skipping over a chunk of my script and throwing the rest of our presenters off. Was it the reason we didn’t win or get an honorable mention? Probably not, but it sure felt like it. The entire experience propelled my confidence forward, despite my blunder. Did the blunder matter? Well it was sure worth it all. It’s college, it’s a learning experience and you’re going to make mistakes, there are going to be failures. Feed on it, don’t shy away from it. Which leads me to…

Practice public speaking
I’m not a professional public speaker, but I’m comfortable with it, I enjoy it and I’ve learned to thrive on it. This wasn’t always the case as I mentioned above. And if opportunities interest you, public speaking is an excellent way to find them. Maybe you think you don’t have a career where you’ll ever have to speak in front of a large group of people. That doesn’t matter. It’s a skill that will transform your career. It doesn’t matter if it’s a lecture hall full of 1,000 people or a small conference room with six people. The same principles apply.

Be your own PR agency
You are the only person that has complete control over your public image. Make good of it. Unless you’re looking to be a shock jock DJ like Howard Stern delete the scandalous photos on your Facebook profile. As much as I hope to see “personal brand” on the next banished words list, it’s a term that matters. If you want to represent politics, comedy, or the latest fashion trends you have the opportunity to let that be part of your image. You don’t have to be uber professional about everything (I actually find it tacky). There is plenty of room to show your quirky side, it’ll help your personality shine through if you do. Like I said, be yourself, and take control of your image and how the rest of us see you.

Use Twitter
I feel that Twitter is one of the most underutilized tools available to them. However there are people doing it right. When I see recent grads who are graduating with a couple thousand followers on Twitter they are a heck of a lot farther ahead than I was. Yes, you can have fun with it, I post ridiculous stuff all the time. But it’s one of the biggest resources available. It was with a simple tweet to NPR that landed me an interview with NPR about my Upper Peninsula blog. I wasn’t just following celebrities and businesses, but was staying current with my hobbies and subjects that matter to me. It has also lead to an incredible network of people who support my projects, are early adopters, and who are influencers. These are people that have been willing to support my projects or have a coffee and introduce me to a new person.

Start a project of your own
There are people who go through the motions and do a great job at it. Students who get 4.0 because that’s what they were told to do, and who joined a dozen student orgs because it looks good on paper. Whoop-dee-doo, there is plenty of room for sheep in the world. Start something of your own. The earlier, the better. Be a doer. Start a blog, start a small business, create a new club, start a non-profit, anything. Take any of your hobbies and make something out of it. If you like writing and quilting, I’m sure there is an excellent opportunity for a quilting blog. If you’re name is Lance, I’m sure you could easily find other Lances to start a movement to petition the cities of Lansing and East Lansing to change their names to Lancing and East Lancing. The projects I have started for myself have done more for me than I can possibly say. Once you create one project, the next ones get easier and easier.

Go after the job you want or create it
Guess what, I don’t have a resume. And I hate formal job interviews so I don’t do them. I don’t believe in them. It all started in that same Advertising class mentioned above. Our professor Bill said it long before Gary Vaynerchuk said it. Our professor encouraged us to research our dream job and employer get on the phone and call the director of marketing, VP of sales, or even the president of the company. Why? Just as Gary Vaynerchuk says people are becoming incredibly more accessible. Also, they’re going to take note of your initiative. Oh, and the intangibles are invaluable.

Take advantage of your youth
When I was fresh out of college and asking Jeep for a free vehicle to use for the year, it was the initiative I took that most impressed them. I remember one of them saying, “You put all this together by yourself? Press release, sponsorship proposal, graphics, web site, blog entries?” I did. I was 23 and fresh out of college. Now I’m 27, not that much older. But I assure you the earlier you take the initiative the better. The appeal of a 23-year old fresh out of college taking a solo 50-state tour across the country is a lot more appealing than a 27-year old doing it. Imagine if an 18 year old was planning to. The more you can do at a young age, the more you’ll continue to succeed throughout your life.

Ignore all of the above
At the end of the day this has worked for me. College is a time to forge your own path. There are a million ways to get from NYC to LA, find the one that suits you.

It can be a lonely road

August 28th, 2010

Tonight I had a new revelation about my 50-state tour across the country. Coincidentally, it was three years ago today that I made it to Alaska, the one remaining state I had never been to. Despite being thee years since finishing the trip I still continue to learn things from it. Often, I’ll comes across something in life where I draw back from my experience on the trip or I’m presented a situation that allows me to look back at the trip in a different perspective. I doubt it will stop anytime soon.

I found myself listening to this fantastic song titled “Home” by Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros. The song starts with the lyrics “Alabama, Arkansas…” which got me thinking about my stops in each of the states, but especially Alabama where I got to know a few college students at the University of Alabama Birmingham.

Particularly I got to thinking about one person, who I saw in Virginia as well. Later during the trip I learned from a mutual friend that one of his best friends was shot and murdered while he was talking to her on the phone. It’s a story of how close I felt I had become to people on the trip despite knowing them for just a few days. Having known him just a short time I still felt this connection with him and wanted to be there for him.

Now for that new revelation I mentioned. In retrospect it feels that the connections I made with people weren’t always mutual, or at least not the depth of them. I got to thinking though, these people I met, they were all I had during the year. My friends and family I didn’t get to see. If I was longing for some sort of deep connection or intimacy I had to find it with someone I had known for only a few days.

However, I came into the life they were already living, they still had their friends and family to connect with and didn’t need me in a way I needed them.

People have often asked if it was lonely on the road for a year. I suppose the answer is yes, but not in the traditional sense. For starters, about the only time I was actually alone was when I was driving, and I looked forward to that. That was my time to reflect and relax. What made it lonely was that I was never in the same place for longer than a few days. I would start to build a relationship (sometimes a best friend and even a few romances) knowing that I had to leave shortly, not knowing when or if I’d see most of them again.

But I was still a human being, I needed some sort of connection and intimacy. I wanted to find that with hosts no matter how short it was. And if I hadn’t found it the trip may have been a whole lot lonelier, and a whole lot less rewarding.

Three years later, to recap Maya Angelou, I may have forgot what some of my hosts said or what we did, but I still haven’t forgotten how they made me feel.

I’ll never fully know what all of my hosts thought about this stranger that came and crashed at their home for a few days or what kind of connection they felt. But I’ll never forget the connections I felt with them, they were my life for that year, they were my friends and family. When something happened to one of them, I felt it too.

The rock that hit our car

May 24th, 2010

Part I

On May 8th, my mom and I headed to Battle Creek to visit Grandma Sailor. My mom was driving her Ford Taurus and I was riding shotgun and we were just heading out of Lansing heading west on I-496.

Just before driving under Grand Ave. I noticed three teenagers underneath the overpass and thinking they shouldn’t be there and wondering what the punks were up to. They must have been 12 or 13.

Just as I noticed them there was a tremendous bang and clunking noise.

My mom didn’t see the kids, but told me she saw something come flying out of the air out of nowhere, and said it was a large rock the size of her hand. I didn’t see it, but I knew the kids must have thrown it. If we weren’t on the freeway I was ready to have my mom stop and ready to chase them down.

The rock fell just in front of the car and bounced up underneath the car. It sounded terrible I thought surely something must be broken, but everything appeared fine.

My mom was confused to where it came from, having not seen the kids. I called 911 immediately and reported them to the police and we drove on.

I was seriously bothered by it having heard terrible stories of a**holes throwing things over overpasses before and hitting cars, and we were lucky it didn’t go through the windshield.

My frustration passed and I didn’t think about it. A couple days later my mom drove back home to Baraga.

Part II

Last week I was walking downtown Lansing with some friends and we were right next to I-496 and one bridge away from where this whole thing happened. So I told Khalid and some others about the rock that hit our car.

I noticed I missed a phone call while I was telling this story and it was my mom who had been trying to get a hold of me for a couple days, saying she had an amazing story.

I got my mom on the phone and she said that she had just brought her Taurus to the shop to get the brakes checked out. When my dad went to pick up the car he noticed a big rock sitting on the service counter and proceeded to ask the service manager what the rock was all about.

The service managed responded “We found this rock lodged under your car.”

The rock that the kids through bounced off the pavement, up under my mom’s car, breaking the inside of the grill, and sat in the same spot for another 600+ miles of driving.

When the whole incident happened I was wondering if my mom was exaggerating the size of the rock, saying it was the size of her fist. Then she sent me the photos of my dad holding the very rock that hit us (below).

We were indeed lucky the rock didn’t go through our windshield. My mom decided she would keep it.

It was sure strange that she happened to tell me all of this when it was the only time I’d ever walked down there, and I had just told my friends about the story.

Illustration

Here’s an illustration showing the Google Streetview of our location and the rock that was found inside the car at the garage.

Click the graphic below for a larger version.