NYC in a 30 foot RV, or My Road Trip to Therapy

A few years ago, we bought a RV. We renovated the inside like all the cool kids on YouTube, packed up the kids (we had six at the time), and headed off on the road trip of our dreams.

One day as we drove along a highway in our giant west-coast RV, a policeman flashed his lights from the lane next to us. I rolled down the RV window, squinting against the blast of dry September air from the hot concrete. “Hey youse,” yelled the cop. “Better turn off right now, ‘cause the bridge ahead’s gonna pull the top off yer rig!”

Rerouting, said Siri. Take the next exit towards upper Manhattan. The 30 foot, 1996 Fleetwood Rambler containing Adam, myself, and our six children, rumbled off the highway onto the streets of New York City like a hippopotamus diving into a drinking straw.

We found New York City in the grips of a disaster rivaling the burning of London. The rule of law had crumbled. Everyone rushed west except those rushing east and a few brave souls racing north and south. Traffic lights blinked red and yellow, and for all I know, blue, and beneath them the frenzied populace honked and swore and sped on their way. A policeman stood at an intersection staring at a man running a red light, chewing a bagel, obviously frozen in shock.

Siri never faltered. Turn left. We turned left. My heart stopped. The average width of a one-way road in Manhattan is ten feet. An average RV is nine and a half feet. All well and good, except that in the emergency many of the New Yorkers had abandoned their cars in the road, the better to dash around on foot.

Then Adam began to exhibit symptoms. First it was a tendency to hunch over the steering wheel. “It hurts,” he muttered as the RV cleared another vehicle by an easy two centimeters. “Gotta make it stop.”

“Now honey,” said I, releasing his arm, “The thing to do–”

Adam saw a gap in the stampede and gunned it. “Dat the way youse gonna play it?” he muttered, shifting gears.

I gaped. It wasn’t just that our RV was an automatic, it was the almost perfect Brooklyn accent coming from my Oregonian husband.

The toddler realized that she hadn’t had a snack in the last five minutes. Not being shy, she spoke right up. She woke the baby, who also wasn’t shy. Both of them began to offer opinions of New York, the snack shortage, and the human condition. They had lots of opinions. 

We wove through traffic like cheese through a grater. Coats dove out of their closet in the back and seeped across the floor. The scent of hot dogs and gasoline wafted in through the open window. A vehicle ahead saw us coming and turned to hit us straight on. 

The screaming intensified.

The screaming intensified.

“Quiet down, sweetie,” said Adam. “I got this—road hawg!”

Unable to look, I lurched to the back of the RV and started throwing goldfish crackers at the kids. Central Park flew by the window and overpasses crowded in above us. People lay strewn all over the sidewalks. Was this what they were all running from? A plague, God help us?

“We’re almost out!” called Adam. “Siri found a bridge!—Hey, yooz all whack! Stop buggin’—C’mon up sweetie!”

The RV bounced around a corner and climbed an onramp. Fresher air! Open-ish vistas stretching over ten feet in one direction! We were on our way! “Freedom,” yelled a child from the back, ducking a goldfish.

On we rushed! Continue straight, said Siri. Was there a note of encouragement in her voice?

“Siri’s wylin’,” muttered Adam. “Lookit.” A sign read Low Clearance ahead, Passenger Vehicles Only.

We nosed the RV into an exit lane, ignoring the bleeps and blats from the crowding pack. Nearby vehicles even joined in with a few honks. We landed back in the stream of traffic like a diver executing a perfect belly flop. Broadway flashed past. Siri was on a new scent; another bridge, another chance at freedom.

This time the sign was posted on the bottom of the onramp. Low Clearance Ahead. “The City’s got me mad schvitzing,” said Adam, peeling our thirty-foot behemoth back into traffic.

“Look, mom,” said the seven-year-old, nose pressed to the window. “It’s another RV!” It was. Abandoned in the meridian under an overpass, graffiti scrawled on its sides, broken windows gaping. “What happened to them?” he asked. “Will it happen to us?”

I didn’t answer. I didn’t know.

We saw Wall Street. We passed Central Park a few more times. The goldfish crackers gave out, leaving me twitching empty hands whenever a child yelled. A cabinet in the kitchenette burst open, scattering paper bowls like little flying saucers.

My handsome, levelheaded husband crouched behind the steering wheel, a mad grin on his face. “Ah ha!” he cried, “Ha ha!” He ground the gas to the floor and the pans in the cupboards rattled as we spun out onto the road behind a Fedex truck. “See that?” he said, “that’s our ticket outta here. He can’t stay here forever, and wherever he fits, we fit. Just gotta follow him close.”

Some hunt for sport, some for food. We hunted the FedEx truck for our very sanity. When he stopped, we stopped. Where he went, we went. And when he drove onto an overpass marked “passenger vehicles only,” we followed.

The “Passenger Vehicles Only” sign was followed by “Low Clearance.”

On we went, hearts pounding.

Next came a sign with a pictograph of a truck slashed with a red line. On we hurtled. The bridge was near. “Is that the sky?” whimpered a child. “I thought I just dreamed it.”

On we rolled onto the bridge itself, shooting toward the low clearance that never came, driving out of New York City behind a FedEx truck.

We found a park on the New Jersey side and pulled to a stop beside a patch of actual grass, turned off the RV and sat hand in hand, soaking up the relative peace of an RV with six children.

I turned to Adam. “Honey,” said I, “What does mad schvitzing mean?”

He frowned. “Schvitzing? I have no idea. Where did you hear that?”