I Woke Up 185 by M.P. Arsent
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I turned up my aces and he turned up his kings. We both had full houses alright, but mine was the higher. The guy looked at me and back at the cards.
"Well played young man."
"Thank you sir."
I racked up my chips and went to the cashier to trade them in for money.
"I don't think I'll be playing cards with you anytime soon love."
"I got lucky Karl, but this damn near pays for the honeymoon. Now let's get some supper."
We moved to the dining room where we had steaks for supper. Surprsingly they weren't as good as we got at Riskins. We were soon back to our room and found that they lit the Falls at night and it was beautiful.
Tonight went very much like the night before and it was late by the time we woke up. We showered and dressed for the day and made our way down to the dining room for a late breakfast.
Breakfast consumed we headed out to walk about the Canadian side of the Falls. It was all very "touristy" with all kinds of attractions and shops. We did stop by the Ripleys museum and then made our way down to the road that parralled the Falls and the river.
We visited the numerous gift shops, where yes, I did find some pins to add to my collection. We moved along the road and found the entrance to the Maid of the Mist. Something I wasn't about to miss. We got our rain ponchos and took the elevator down to the river level. We had to wait a bit as the boat was in the middle of a trip.
Karl and I made our way to the front of the boat once we were permitted on and we donned our ponchos. Before we knew it we were much closer to those tons off water coming over the falls than I thought I ever would be. I looked at the rocks at the bottom of the falls and wondered how in hell anyone had ever survived going over the falls in a barrel, or anything else for that matter.
On the way back to the dock, there was a story related by the Captain of the boat that a kid once had fallen out of a boat and gone over the Falls with nothing but a life preserver, and lived to tell about it. The Maid was the one to actually fish him out of the water.
Once back on street level we found ourselves a "walking lunch" and then moved on down the road. The last thing we did, other than taking a load of pictures all over the walk, was to take another elevator down to the river level. We walked out and were at the base of the Horseshoe Falls with the original power plant to our left.
There was another walk way and we followed it along with just about everybody else and ended up standing behind the Horseshoe Falls looking out, not that there was anything to see but tons of cascading water. When we got back to the original observation platform I got several pictures of the Maid as she was right there close to the falls.
By now it was late in the afternoon and we made our way back to the hotel to kick back for a bit. We mutally decided not to go back to the Casino as we didn't want to push our luck. We relaxed by the pool for the remainder of the afternoon and then went to supper. Tonight I had chicken cordon bleu and it was very good. Karl had gone with another steak.
We found that there was a Hard Rock Cafe not too far from the hotel and headed over there for a couple of hours before we ended up crashing for the night. Again the Falls were nicely lit and tonight there were fireworks to boot.
The next morning we walked ourselves over the border back to the American side of the Falls. Rather than the busy "touristy" Canadian side, the American side was a national park area. I think I liked the American side just for that simple fact alone.
There was more information available on this side of the Falls and we stopped and read every bit of it. We walked out to and explored Goat island and made our way back onto the main land, so to speak. We found there was actually a spot where Canada is south of the United States. We took a small bridge out and over the Falls and finally we decided to take the Cave of the Four Winds tour. Because the tour ended up on wooden platforms alongside of the Rainbow Falls, we needed special equipment to go down there. The ponchos were obvious, however we needed special slippers so that we wouldn't slide all over the place.
So it was another elevator down to the river level. The actual caves had collapsed many years ago. It was a walk along the river on the wooden platforms, which we were told had to be taken up every winter and then rebuilt in the spring as the ice build up along the river shifted the underlying rocks. We finally got to the Falls and were actually close enough to be able to stick our hands into the edge of the Falls.
Once we were back up to park level we reclaimed our shoes and whatnot and them grabbed a bit of lunch. We made our way to the observation tower and got some great picturs in all directions. Soon enough we made our way back across the Rainbow Bridge back into Canada.
Again the rest of the afternoon was spent by the pool. Dinner was had and we crashed kind of early.
We were up early this morning and got ourselves packed and ready to move out once again. Breakfast had we got the car and headed back into the States. I knew where we were headed but had kept it as a bit of a surprise for Karl.
When we finally pulled into a large theme park Karls eyes kind of lit up. We had reservations here, but we were way to early to check in. We did advise the front desk that we had arrived so they wouldn't give our room away. The park was right adjacent to the lodgings so we headed in. There were coasters galore and we hit every one of them. Several water attractions got our attention later in the day as they got us wet and cooled off a little. Lunch was had at one of the many places about the grounds and we gave ourselves time for lunch to settle before it was right back to the rides. Once again I loaded up with pins for all of the major rides. We had finally had enough and headed back to the lodgings and got to our room. We weren't really ready for dinner yet so we donned our bathng suits and hit the indoor water park here. We splashed around for about an hour or so before we headed back to the room and got changed for supper. Once we had eaten it was back to the room to crash for the night.
Now, I had more than one reason for choosing to stop here. First it was something that we both enjoyed. Secondly it put us only about an hour from where my bothers adopted parents were. I waited until just a bit before checkout time and finally made the call.
"Hello?"
"Mr Svenson, My name is Dennis Sawyer. I believe you've been expecting my call?"
"Indeed young man. I take it you are in our area and wish to meet with my wife and I?"
"If it is not too much of an imposition, yes please."
"Very well young man. Will this afternoon about 4 pm give you enough time to get here?"
"Plenty of time sir. I'm recently married. May I bring my husband with me?"
There was a few moments of silence at the other end of the line.
"Yes...... that will be acceptable as this may well influence both your lives if you are indeed Thomas' brother."
"Thank you sir. We shall see you at 4. I have the address."
"Very well Mr Sawyer."
I hung up.
"How did he sound lover?"
"Like he still isn't sure he wants to do this. I have a feeling the wife might well be pressuring him."
"This is going to be a long day and I'm betting a real short visit with them."
"It might well be love but it is a link in the chain to hopefully finding my brother."
"And what do you expect to happen if you do find him love?"
"Truthfully, I haven't thought that far out. I'd hope to hell that he would let us be a part of his life to some extent. That alone may well take some time to get together. It's one of those things we'll have to play by ear I suppose."
"I'm glad to hear you saying we lover. You know I'll be right beside you all of the way right?"
"Of course I do...husband."
At which point Karl came over and took me in his arms and planted one hell of a kiss on me.
Once I extricated myself from that kiss, which admittedly I wasn't in a hurry to do, I picked up my suitcase.
"We better get out of here before they charge us for an extra day."
It only took us about an hour to get to the town where the Svensons lived. We found a little place and had a long liesurely lunch,which still left us a couple of hours to kill before our appointment.
We investigated a few historical markers around the town square. Every minute I was getting more nervous over the whole thing. What if the Svensons weren't convinced that I was Thomas' brother? Even if they were convinced what could they do to help me find him? They hadn't been able to and I am sure they tried. If this all ended up being a dead end where did I go from here? The only thing I could think of was launching some kind of internet crusade,which was sure to bring out all of the crazies.
Karl must have sensed that I was getting more nervous by the minute.
"Deep breaths lover. You can perform intricate gymnastics moves before hundreds of people without breaking a sweat this should be easy."
"You may not see me sweat from the stands lover, but rest assured that I do everytime I set foot on a mat. We'll get through this."
It was finally late enough in the afternoon that we could head for the Svensons house. The GPS made it easy enough to find and we pulled up in front of the house. We got out of the car and Karl came around and took my hand.
"We can do this love."
"Yes we can."
We walked up to the front door and rang the bell.
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The kid in the life preserver story was related to me as told in the late summer of 1969. I'm sure it has well faded into history at this point.