Driving Ms. Marjorie

In the summer of 2006, I took my wife's mother Marjorie on a week-long car trip that tested the nerves of everyone in the car. The journey became part of family legend, and would never be repeated: Marjorie Beare died in October of 2007 after a household fall. This is the story of our drive from Halifax to Toronto, via New York City.

***** ***** *****

Marjorie Beare and I have more than two decades of history behind us: There have been lobster suppers, family reunions, Thanksgivings, funerals and more than a few personality clashes -- including the Great Battle of 1983, which began as a disagreement over my wife's bridal bouquet but soon mushroomed into a months-long family stand-off.

As mothers-in-law go, Marjorie has had her moments. Yet it was my idea to include her in a grand adventure: A six-day road trip this past August that would take us from Halifax to Toronto via New York City, with stops wherever we pleased.

Peter Cheney drove from Halifax to Toronto via New York City with his wife, fourteen year old son... and his mother-in-law. Click here for a photo gallery of the tour

I invited Marjorie in a moment of effusive emotion. As usual, my wife, Marian, and I had spent our summer vacation at Marjorie's home in Halifax. Marjorie was 80 now, but was still up for a good time. (A year earlier, Marian had taken her out to sing karaoke into the wee hours.) But Marjorie's second husband had died two years earlier, and she was spending a lot of time sitting in her La-Z-Boy. Her arthritis seemed to be getting the upper hand. So I thought she could use a little adventure.

Predictably, my plan raised questions about my mental health. My brother-in-law, David, burst into laughter when he learned that I had invited his mom along for nearly a week on the road. "Are you nuts?" he asked.

Marian, who would be riding shotgun, was happy that I cared so much about Marjorie, but echoed David's view.

The trip involved some obvious points of potential friction. Marjorie's back-seat companion would be my son, Willie, 14, whose tastes run to Dave Chappelle and Kanye West. Marjorie was more Fred Astaire and Frank Sinatra.

Then there was the matter of luggage. Marjorie tends to travel with at least three large, hard-sided suitcases, like a passenger on a 19th-century Cunard liner. I informed her that each of us would be limited to a single, soft-sided duffel bag. "We're driving a Honda Accord," I reminded her. "Not a Greyhound."

She spent the evening before our departure editing down her belongings. The next morning, she was the first one up, ready for the drive to Yarmouth, on the southern tip of Nova Scotia, where we were booked on the high-speed ferry that would take us to Maine.

I calculated the trip time using my GPS unit, which said we would need just over three hours. Marjorie was certain it would take 4½. "That's how long it always took," she insisted. "Ask anyone."

Marjorie's old-fashioned knowledge was pitted against my little black box. (The box was right, and we arrived at the ferry within three minutes of the time it had predicted.) I resisted the urge to say, "Told you so," but she still looked ticked off. "You were speeding," she said.

The first signs of real tension in the back seat emerged as we drove along the Maine coast. Willie wanted the windows open. Marjorie wanted them shut. They were soon engaged in a running battle reminiscent of the days when my brother and I scrapped in the back of my father's 1963 Mercury. "Down!" said Willie, pressing the window button. "Up!" retorted Marjorie, adding, "You're ruining my hair."

The conflict didn't come as a surprise. Willie is a hockey player whose hair is styled by his helmet, his pillow and the unruly forces of nature. Marjorie's coif is decidedly old-school: She sees her hairdresser every week, and has never washed her own hair or immersed her head while swimming. If there is a cloud in the sky, or a breath of wind, she dons a plastic hood.

As the back-seat battle escalated, Marian shot me a stiletto glance. I rolled up the windows and turned off the master control switch. Willie stuck in his earphones and cranked up his iPod.

Things got better. We drove through Boston and had a great seafood lunch at Anthony's Pier 4, a waterfront restaurant with walls covered with signed celebrity photos. (Marjorie picked up the tab.) As we headed south, the sky was a perfect blue, and the road was clear. What could be better? As we neared New York City, Marjorie was in a state of high excitement, recalling a time more than 50 years ago when she and her first husband (Marian's dad) had spent three weeks in Manhattan after he was invited to audition with an opera company.

Her sense of the city seemed rooted in the 1950s. She announced that a friend in Halifax had asked her to pick up a special nightdress at Macy's -- a gauze model that was available, she insisted, only at this particular store. Marian and I rolled our eyes. "You think they still have the same one?" I asked. "You really want to spend your time in New York buying something you can get at Wal-Mart in Halifax?"

Use The Globe and Mail's auto search function to compare specs and features, and check out the top new car searches of the month

The next day, mother and daughter headed to Macy's on Broadway. Three hours later, they were back -- with no nightdress. The Macy's clerks had never heard of the gauze number. "The place has gone downhill," Marjorie fumed.

We went out for dinner at Keen's, an amazing steak joint that had once been a smoking club (the ceiling was covered with thousands of pipes hanging on hooks). We ribbed Marjorie about the failed nightdress mission. She laughed.

My family's Manhattan routine -- we've been there four times -- is based on long treks that take us from SoHo to the Upper West Side. But Marjorie's arthritis ruled that out. Her walks were limited to about a block. So we hailed a cab and spent three hours touring the West Side. Marjorie seemed happy enough. Marian and I got out in SoHo so we could get a walk in on the way back to the Red Roof Inn, leaving Willie and Marjorie to finish the last stretch by themselves (and sticking Marjorie with the fare, which was about $35 by the time we made our exit).

"Will they be all right?" Marian asked.

"Who knows?" I replied.

We soon learned that the rest of the ride had been less than convivial. Details were sketchy, but when we got back to the hotel Willie and Marjorie sat in grim silence, like a couple sitting on opposite sides of a divorce lawyer's table.

The next day, we headed east through Pennsylvania. The landscape reminded me of The Deer Hunter, one of my favourite movies -- there were rolling green hills, failed mining towns and down-at-the-heels farm-implement dealers.

Peter Cheney drove from Halifax to Toronto via New York City with his wife, fourteen year old son... and his mother-in-law. Click here for a photo gallery of the tour

"I want to buy a dress," Marjorie suddenly announced.

Marian turned in amazement. "A dress?"

We had just spent two days in Manhattan, one of the world's great retail and fashion capitals. But only now, as we drove through rural Pennsylvania, did she announce her intention of acquiring a dress.

"Isn't that like Neil Armstrong deciding he wants some moon rocks after he lands back on Earth?" I asked incredulously.

"I don't want moon rocks," Marjorie replied. "I want a dress."

Marian suggested that Toronto would be a better place to go dress shopping. "The prices are too high there," Marjorie countered.

That night, Willie and I cruised the Internet in our hotel room, looking for Dress Barn outlets along our route to Toronto. But nothing came up. The dress hunt was starting to remind me of the Couch Disaster of 1983 (it was a rough year), when Marjorie asked my brother-in-law David and I to move a used sofa bed into her basement.

We measured the sofa and the stairway, then told her the couch wouldn't fit. The numbers meant nothing to Marjorie. "Just try," she had told us. I was still in the phase where I was trying to impress Marian with my compliancy. And so we had tried -- an effort that ended with the sofa wedged in the stairwell, forcing us to spend two days disassembling and rebuilding the wall to complete the job.

As Pennsylvania ended and western New York State began, we still hadn't found a dress. We made a brief stop in Elmira, N.Y., where I used to fly gliders, and was hoping to squeeze in a flight. But the clouds were low, and Marjorie didn't look thrilled at the prospect of waiting around on a mountaintop launch site. So we hit the road, keeping our eyes peeled for a dress store. The few that appeared seemed to specialize in sizes 24 and up.

By Day 5, the situation in the back seat reminded me of the Gaza Strip. Willie was sick of having the windows rolled up, and had taken to provoking Marjorie by playing gangsta-rap videos on his laptop computer. Then he started pushing his pillow over to her side, in an obvious test of her back-seat sovereignty. Marian, who always plays peacemaker, looked stressed. I daydreamed about winning the lottery and buying a limo with a glass wall between the front and the back.

Use The Globe and Mail's auto search function to compare specs and features, and check out the top new car searches of the month

The test of nerves continued on Day 6. The GPS showed that we could make it to Toronto in about seven hours if we didn't take any breaks, but Marjorie was hinting that she wanted to make a stop in Tonawanda, on the outskirts of Buffalo, because a friend she spent the winters with in Florida lived there. To the rest of us, this visit had all the appeal of a vacation in a dentist's waiting room. "You see her all winter," I said. "I'm not stopping in Tonawanda." Marjorie shot me yet another nasty look.

We arrived in Toronto late that night, dazed after our final sprint. Willie and I carried Marjorie's luggage upstairs.

The next morning, Marjorie was up bright and early, sitting in the living room and waiting for a coffee. The road was behind us now, and I had to admit she had been a good sport. Which was true to form: When I served as master of ceremonies for her second wedding -- at age 76, she married Jack Bone, a man she had a crush on in grade school -- I roasted her mercilessly. But she had taken it like a champ. And when I showed up at her house with my ultralight plane in a trailer, she invited her friends to come over and have a look. The six-day drive had simply added to our history.

When I brought her a coffee, she was reading a bodice-ripper romance novel. She put it down and smiled.

"Peter," she said, "that was a great trip. Thank you."

Peter Cheney drove from Halifax to Toronto via New York City with his wife, fourteen year old son... and his mother-in-law. Click here for a photo gallery of the tour

Peter Cheney's top road-trip tips

Bring a large package of wet wipes -- they come in handy for back-seat meals, spilled sunscreen, the list goes on.
Stop at lakes and rivers to cool off -- physically and emotionally -- and use a plastic bin to store wet swimming gear until you can hang it up.
Pack shampoo and bathroom supplies in waterproof kayaking bags.
Take scenic routes instead of major highways -- Highway 2 through Maine is one of my favourites.
Bring a laptop computer or portable DVD player that can screen movies (and don't forget the power adapter and earphones).
Use a GPS -- the kids will never ask "are we there yet," because the distance is there for all to see.
Pack a small cooler with water and juice, plus apples and seedless grapes for snacks.
Bring at least one cheap pillow per person.
Bring a pocket-sized digital camera so you can capture memories (like the time we saw a store called Dick's Country Oasis: 500 Guitars and 1,000 Guns).

Marjorie Beare's top road-trip tips

Stop every hour and walk around so your joints don't stiffen up.
Pack medicine and make-up in a separate bag that you can reach easily.
To avoid worry on the road, make sure your house is in order before you leave -- fridge cleaned out, stove off, doors locked.
Use your credit card so you don't have to carry a lot of cash.
Pack your patience

WHERE TO EAT AND DRINK

Anthony's Pier 4: 140 Northern Blvd., Boston; 617-482-6262; www.pier4.com/anthonys.cfm.

Keen's Steakhouse: 77 West 36th St., New York; 212-947-3636; www.keens.com.

WHERE TO STAY

Red Roof Inn: 6 West 32nd St., New York: 212-643-7100; redroof.com.

WHERE TO SHOP

Macy's: 151 W. 34th St., New York; 212-695-4400; www.macys.com.

MORE INFORMATION

Nova Scotia: www.novascotia.com

Maine: www.visitmaine.com

New York City: www.nycvisit.com

New York State: www.iloveny.com