Our Adventure in Newburgh, New York

My family and I had started driving from our home north of Pittsburgh,PA to our annual vacation destination of Maine. My wife’s entire family lives there. She’s the youngest of six children. We have seventeen nieces and nephews, so our three sons, who were ten, eight and five were very excited to be on the road.

About 2:00 am, I was starting to get really tired and asked my wife to take over driving. We were just outside of Newburgh, NY.

She said “Lean the seat back, relax and catch a few hours of sleep.”

I had just closed my eyes when my wife screamed. A large piece of cement, which looked like a parking curb was lying in the middle of our lane. We hit the curb at 70 mph, landed with a thud and while my wife was trying to regain control, almost hit a station wagon full of people who also hit the cement and were getting out to change their flat tire.

We realized about a quarter mile down the road that we had also gotten a flat. Pitch black, middle of nowhere with a wife and three small children in the van. My wife decides to call 911, As she’s talking to the operator, a shirtless man about 6’4″ with wild hair and wilder eyes came out of the trees. He was drunk and mumbling about being kicked out of the fair and wanting his money back. When he heard my wife say she was on the phone with 911, he yelled “I’m not going back to jail!” and disappeared back into the woods.

Luckily a man pulled up, assessed the situation and went home to get his floor jack. He helped change the tire in no time flat.

For all I know, the mountain man is still wandering around the woods, still angry about the fair.


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