Ron, my stepdad, is in his mid-eighties. He has never lived more than five miles from his childhood farmhouse. He rarely leaves Wisconsin. He had been to Madison only once in his life and that was to watch his granddaughter play in a softball game. Ron is a good guy, has been good for my mom, but is not much of a traveler.
Last Christmas Ron mentioned that he’d like to see the State Capitol Building before he died, so Manyu and I offered to treat him and my mom to a long weekend in Madison. Somewhat to my surprise, he accepted the invitation, and last weekend we made the trip.
The “big city” of Madison overwhelmed the man. He would not have been any less comfortable had I taken him to Bangkok or Kuala Lumpur. To him, the buildings were massive (they aren’t), the traffic was horrible (it isn’t), and the University of Wisconsin’s campus is too big to take in on a first visit (he is right about that). I am not sure that Ron enjoyed the weekend so much as endured it.
Still he was able to take the State Capitol off of his bucket list. We went to the Capitol, to Madison’s excellent weekend farmers’ market, and to the Terrace at Memorial Union. My daughter lives in Madison, and my mom saw got to see her granddaughter’s apartment for the first time. Clare’s boyfriend, Chase, took us to his company’s annual employee picnic. Chase works for Epic, the big health records software company, so the event was substantially more than hotdogs and lemonade. All of the Epic campus’ 30+ buildings were open for touring. Each building has its own fantasy theme, but because Ron has limited mobility, we visited only Wonderland and the Emerald City.*
One of my sisters had driven my mom and Ron to Madison, but it was my job to drive them home. I sensed Ron relax the moment we left the Madison city limits, and then he spent the next three hours recapping the trip. “I can’t believe the crowds” (only the farmers’ market was crowded). “I can’t believe all of the construction” (there was a surprising number of new apartment buildings going up). “I don’t know how people live like that” (except for the cost of housing, I consider Madison to be the most livable city in the state).
My mom had a fun weekend, and for her, any time with Clare is time well spent. As for Ron, I don’t know what to think. I thought that he would have rather stayed home, but the moment he got back to his house, I heard him on the telephone telling his friends about his grand adventure.
* I do not remember all of the other buildings I’ve seen on previous Epic visits, but Hogwarts, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Deep Space, Jules Verne, and Star Wars stand out.
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