They Pave the Way

Teardrop Trail Log: March 24, 2016

We’ve never named our car or teardrop. Prior to working with our friends on the Tiny House, it didn’t seem like much of an issue. They name all their vehicles however (the tiny house has been named Pandora — for all the reasons you can imagine) and it suddenly seemed like a good idea to christen ours as well. Trouble is, our vehicles do not have troublesome or quirky characteristics to help suggest a name.

So now we’re on this epic trip to Big Bend National Park in Texas. We stayed last night in the Seminole Canyon State Park (look for other posts on that) and today we continued to Big Bend. We’ve noticed on other trips that the teardrop generates interest, and by now we’ve come to expect a visitor or two inquiring how we like it, how much did it cost, can we see inside, etc, and have learned our teardrop is the best way to meet our campground neighbors. Last night was no different. One of our neighbors struck up a conversation around the teardrop, and suddenly we had two new good friends. Jim (good name, that) and his wife Suzanne are from Indiana, and he’s a wildlife photographer. Specifically, he is interested in moths and calls himself “The Moth Man.” They were going into Langtry, Texas last night to try for some specific moths that are native to the area.
Today, we stopped in Langtry ourselves — the home of Judge Roy Bean, the The Law West of the Pecos. Interesting place, but while we were touring the adjoining cactus garden (amazing!), I had a conversation with another guest who was interested in our teardrop. He was from Minnisota, and had noticed my Case/IH hat. Another pleasant encounter with a total stranger.

Later today, when we stopped for gas in Sanderson, Texas, we were approached by yet another curious person. Ed and his wife split their time between Sanderson and Rochester, New York, and wanted to know all the standard stuff about teardrops. Of course Marilyn spent 17 years living there, so we were off and running with a new friend.

While driving away from Uncle’s (the station in Sanderson), Marilyn commented on what a good ambassador our teardrop was — and we realized he’d been named. Shortly after, I realized that the Mazda has been such a good and reliably comfortable car on our trips — and not without her own bit of flash — that she was a real lady.

So now we have names for them both: The Lady and the Ambassador.