A Trip of a Lifetime - Gerald & Harriet Pebbler

Gerald and Harriette met in algebra class at Coachella Valley Union High School. On their first date, he treated her to a movie and a root beer float. After high school, Harriett moved to Santa Barbara to attend college.

"He called her and said, 'If you don't come home and marry me, I'm going to move to Florida and you will never see me again,'

Harriette called his bluff and told him, "If it's marriage you're looking for, then show me a ring when I come home for Thanksgiving."

Gerald did.

This year, Gerald and Harriet Peebler from Tustin are celebrating 70 years of marriage.  Gerald is 93.  Harriette is 90. Harriette wanted to put an exclamation point on their seven decades of marriage.   A few days after their anniversary, Harriette turned to Gerald with a proposal:

"We've been together 70 years," she told him. "It's time we go on a trip across the States."

Not just any trip, but driving themselves in a pre-owned, 1998 white Lincoln Town Car with 90,000 miles on it, from California to Connecticut and back – using a paper road map to navigate their way through visits with old war buddies, relatives and friends.

Gerald didn't blink. "Let's go."

And they did.

 

They settled into their old Lincoln Town Car and pulled away  — their belongings in the trunk and a huge country's worth of road ahead of them.

As I read about their road trip, I realized that this couple, Gerald and Harriette, were passing down wisdom without even realizing it.  Their road trip so parallels their take on life, that it just jumped out at me and said "Take a lesson, Bob!  Cuz right now, you're travelling on a rocky road at night with the headlights off."

"A road trip across the country is like your trip through life!"

Your trip in life:

- Pack lightly - don't overplan or overthink things

- Keep your route simple

- See things.  Really SEE them and take it all in.

- Make memories

- Any number of things can happen that you didn't plan.  An accident, flat tire, speeding ticket.  Don't take it out on the ones who are with you.  Lean on them.   Harold and Harriette lost their first-born child, Chris, 22, in 1969 in Vietnam — two weeks before he was scheduled to return from the war and get married.

- Let good weather follow you - (don't dig up hurtful things from the past)

- When traffic gets too congested, take the off ramp.

- Never lose touch with your family

- Keep in touch with old friends

- Gerald says it best...Enjoy the trip, before you get too old to drive.

Thanks to the OC Register for this amazing story.