The Great Midwest Trip: Broadway and Cash

Grand Hall in Union Station, St. Louis, MI

This is part four of The Great Midwest Trip, a series of advice and notes from my week-long journey.

Broadway tunes are a great soundtrack to driving.

Driving through the Midwest, we found the Broadway station on Sirius XM super engaging. They played great songs from popular musicals and also ones we’ve never heard of.  I think what draws me to these kinds of song is how immediately relatable they are. They’re sung from an actual character’s point of view in a narrative and they often have inherent conflicts or built-in mini-stories in them.

For instance, I heard “Here within These Walls” from the Sister Act musical and mind you – I’ve never been a nun or have any inclination to be one – but you understand her world view and sympathize with her. Who doesn’t want safety and order in the chaos of living in the modern world? (I bet you she didn’t have to keep up on Twitter,  Tumblr and Facebook all day.) It’s also composed perfectly with great lyrics. Definitely reminded me of an Alan Menken song which just DRAWS you in right away with its charm. (Part of the reason why Disney experienced an animation renaissance in the 90’s starting with The Little Mermaid. The music!)

And what do you know, he did compose it!

Always bring cash in small bills on trips.

I knew I forgot something. I was looking through my travel checklist and saw that I forgot to withdraw cash for the trip. I usually get a couple of 20’s just in case certain places we eat or go to don’t accept credit cards. Oh, does it pay to be prepared.

So we try to leave the parking garage in downtown St. Louis and oops, the attendant needs $16 in the green stuff. N and I have already spent the little cash he had and I only had a few bucks on me. We needed to get to Urbana-Champaign by noon for an appointment so we really couldn’t afford the delay. So, I channeled Tom Cruise’s running montage in my head as I scrambled to find the nearest ATM. Honestly, it wasn’t a particularly far run (about 3 giant city blocks) but I was pretty wiped out after. Lesson: Remember the cash!

The next post will have hippos and tornados!