A Utah Family Travel Writer's Adventures with Altitude
Some people look worse as they grow older.
I would like to think I have improved with age.
**Photo courtesy of my father who obviously thinks the 80s were funny. As you can see, there is nothing humorous about them.
Last weekend, we had the pleasure of hosting one of my dearest friends from France. I taught her during my LDS mission and we formed a bond like I have never had before. She was 16 and I was 22. We have seen each other a few times since those memorable days in Europe but not as Married Women With Children.
The Canuck Clan fell in love with Isa and her sociable and charming husband, Christopher. At one point after church, he was gabbing away with his cute French accent to an adoring throng of people when Isabelle had an epiphany: “Oh my gosh, Amber. I MARRIED YOU.”
Except those people at church? They do not adore nor throng around me.
Isabelle brought us a year supply of European chocolate (because Mormons are all about having our year supply) and Christopher teased me incessantly about their wedding. Miss that one? Yeah. So did I.
It is The Ultimate in Amber Murphy Travel Screw-ups. I was single and working as a publicist in Salt Lake City when Isa announced she had met The One and they would be married in the Swiss Temple September of 1999. There was absolutely no question in my mind that I would attend and I planned to do a trip around Eastern Europe following the wedding. My family freaked out about my solo travel plans so my Aunt Sue volunteered to come with me. I love Aunt Sue but she is a lot like me and her life’s mantra is, “Things are never 100%, Amber. Never 100.”
And things were not 100.
In France, church ordinances are not recognized so all marriages are first performed civilly, followed by the church ceremony. Since they had to travel to Switzerland for the religious ceremony, Isabelle planned the civil ceremony and party the night before and they would leave for their honeymoon immediately after going to the Swiss temple the next day.
The French know how to do weddings. The party was a blast and the multiple-course meal and dancing lasted late into the night. I ate, danced and flirted with cute French men. One of these French men–Renaud–stayed at Isa’s house that night, which is coincidentally where we were as well.
Adoring and romantic Renaud would later parade me all over Paris like a French poodle and follow me back to the United States in a rather intense fling.
But that is a story for another day. And really, do I want my children to read all about it here?
All that needs to be said is I stayed up all night talking to Renaud. When the wedding party left that morning at 7 a.m., I waved them off, saying I would get just a wee bit of sleep and Sue and I would then just drive ourselves to the temple.
But here’s the deal: I didn’t know how to get there. Even with our directions, we got horribly lost. After blindly wandering around for hours, we were mere minutes away from the ceremony. I FREAKED OUT and rear-ended someone.
In the end, we never found the temple and missed the wedding. You know. The ENTIRE REASON I WENT TO EUROPE IN THE FIRST PLACE.
Christopher would later tell me that every man imagines the sweet nothings his fiancee would whisper into his ear mere moments before the wedding. Isa’s sweet nothings? “WHERE’S AMBER?”
Or maybe they were more like “Sweet Wailings.”
I celebrated my birthday on Friday. In years past, I:
Now, lest you think my birthday has been all about extravagance let me assure you it has often coincidentally fallen during such occasions.
There was a respectable amount of fanfare surrounding my latest birthday. Lunch with a friend. Dinner with family. A night out with my husband Jamie while the kids slept over at Grandma’s. A couple’s massage the next morning.
What I planned was very different from what I got: LICE.
Jamie and I were sitting on the couch a few hours before the festivities were to begin when he discovered a wretched little black bug in my hair, then another. He rushed to the store, consulted with the pharmacist and the rest of the day was not filled with celebrations but with disinfection and exorcisms.
We were delighted to discoverI had infected the kids as well. I could blame it on my daughter’s preschool but I think the blame falls on me: my head has been itchy since a spa treatment I received a few weeks ago.
Nice to know I have been spreading the love all this time.
If you’ve never had lice, allow me to delight you with a few sordid details. Soak your heads in lovely lice-busting shampoo. Take a fine-tooth comb and scrape those little buggers away. Repeat this process 1,000 times. Then wash everything you have touched over the last few weeks. Finally, inform your friends who will then banish you for life.
Evidently, lice is the new leprosy.
Of course, there is humor in everything. Like when Jamie was scrubbing my head as I was bent over the bathtub and he started singing “Happy Birthday.” Or when he started listing off the ten plagues I was inevitably going to acquire: “First comes lice, then boils and locusts, etc.” Fortunately, he left off the death of the firstborn.
Or the slaying of insensitive husbands.
And the highlight of my day? When they sang “Crappy Birthday” to me as I blew out the candles on my cake.
Jamie did somewhat redeem himself later that night when he returned home after doing a second run to the store for lice-busting shampoo. He sympathetically took one look at me, handed me some Girls Scout cookies and said, “COMFORT FOOD.”
There may be hope for him yet.
On Tuesday, one of my former Seminary students came by for lunch prior to leaving for BYU. Sariah was one of my favorites in the class because 1) she was always early and believe me, 6 a.m. was early enough and 2) she never missed a day. I wish I could say the same for myself.
Oh, and she did not sleep or stare at me like I was recently transplanted from another planet. Hmmm…perhaps that is why they call us illegal aliens.
During our visit, she added to my list of reasons of why she was among my favorite students: she actually listened in class. And remembered. I was shocked as she relayed experiences I had shared a few years back. Ones I had safely locked away in my vault called Oh, the Insanity. And so thank you, Sariah for reopening that….
It was my junior year at BYU. Well, my first of three junior years if you’re really counting. I had just been accepted into the broadcast journalism program and had the illustrious job of Grunt around KBYU’s newsroom.
I worked the teleprompter and did important jobs such as inform the snotty anchor if she had lipstick on her teeth. Because most anchors are snotty, with the exception of Jed Boal and Ron Burgundy. The first of whom I actually dated; the second I only wish I had.
One day, the newscast got preempted. To kill time, one of the cameramen asked Tony (a fellow Grunt) and I if we wanted a lesson. Tony started behind the camera and I trotted over to the news desk, intending to give the best fake newscast imaginable.
I’m not sure when things started getting out of hand. Was it when I did my muscle poses at the weather board? Or when the cameraman taught Tony how to frame a shot by zooming in and out on my chest as I hammed it up by shaking ‘em like I was in a mariachi band?
I was in the midst of my finale when a voice screeched out from the control room. A voice that still resonates today:
“CUT THE CAMERA! WE’VE BEEN ON THE AIR THE WHOLE TIME!”
Turns out, the newscast had not been preempted after all and had gone live at the top of the hour. For fifteen long minutes, my muscles and cha chas were splayed across the airwaves for all 14 ultra-conservative KBYU viewers to see.
My face heats up just thinking about it but my debut was undoubtedly legendary. After all, it was probably the only program to ever receive a PG-13 rating on that station. Or maybe more like an ‘R’…..
As many of you know, it’s been a rough few weeks. OK, months. But I was finally feeling better and the outlook was bright.
Until we decided to chance the unthinkable last weekend: The Family Roadtrip. It had all the makings for an amazing getaway. Jamie scored us a million-dollar lakeside cabin in the mountains.
A cabin that has Tim “The Toolman” Taylor as a neighbor. A cabin where celebrities have stayed and left their mark. OK, maybe the janitor on Scrubs ain’t exactly A-list but work with me here. At least the place was extra clean.
We invited Grandma and Grandpa along (a.k.a. babysitters extraordinaire). We would hike through the verdant fall foliage, play with their numerous kayaks and water toys, and explore the quaint mountain hamlet.
And then It happened. My life. That same Amber Murphy life that plagued my travel-writing days. With allllll those unfortunate events that made my readers tune in regularly to find out what else could possibly go wrong this time.
Jamie couldn’t get off work until later so Linda and I decided to make the two-hour drive earlier in the day. That way, the kids could nap during the drive and we’d have plenty of time to get settled. Brilliant, right? Yeah, if they’d actually slept.
Undaunted, we still made great time and arrived at the cabin. We unloaded the kids and luggage and made the long trek down the steep ramp to the cabin. As we stood at the doorway, I did a victory dance over how magnificent it all was: the gorgeous cabin, the shimmering water, the fragrance of fall.
And then I tried the key. The same key I thought belonged to the cabin. The same key that turned out to be one of two keys that Hunky Hubby had received from the owner. Unbeknownst to me. I later found out I had in my possession the garbage key. How utterly convenient. While the house key sat on our kitchen counter, two hours away.
And so It began. My life.
(To be continued. When I have the strength to relive it all….)
I'm a Canadian-born mom of two, former Denver Post columnist, family travel writer, editor of MileHighMamas.com and 9News contributor. Expert on all things Utah, Denver, family and travel. Lover of laughter and life. Happily married to a man obsessed with growing The Great Pumpkin. Learn More