I just posted a memory of a mishap my mom had at a state park in Ohio which got me thinking of another mishap she had at a state park in Missouri.  Mom loved the water but evidently didn’t have good luck with her bathing suits.  So here’s the story.  When I was a preteen, we went to Missouri on vacation to visit my half-sister Kim and her husband at the time.  They lived in Rolla, Missouri.  I actually went out first as Kim had come to visit us in Ohio and I went back with her a week or two before our official vacation was to be to spend extra time with Kim.

Once Mom and Dad arrived, we did a variety of activities with Kim and her husband.  One of the places we visited was Johnson Shut Ins.  As previously noted, it’s a state park in Middle Brook, Missouri (about an hour and 45 minutes from Rolla), but to hear the name you would think it’s some sort of convalescent home or something (or at least that’s the joke Mom used to tell).  Actually it’s a beautiful park with a river that flows down into a more shallow rocky brook.  It was a popular place to go innertubing, and that’s just what most of us did.  Over and over again.  However, Mom was more interested in the rocky brook and found a rock to sit on and just take in the beauty of the area. 

I don’t know how long she sat there, but I know it was for a while as we all played in the river and around the rocks.  What I do know though is that when she got up she discovered that the rock that she thought was comfortable enough to sit on/lean against had tore a hole in the bottom of her bathing suit!  Again, Mom took these embarrassing moments in stride and it became one of those stories she told over and over again.