about the Vanderbilt family

as the last post ended my family was looking forward to a week long camping trip.
(continued from the last post)

Five days earlier…

We arrived in Salt Lake City mid afternoon. We had left Puerto Rico that morning, and were not looking forward to the four-hour ride to Moab ahead. After collecting our luggage, and browsing around the airport shops for a bit, we piled into a grey Escalade rental. At this point I suggested food. You’ll find that the two skinny people in our group are always the most hungry. Go figure.

The group decided not to go into Salt Lake and add more time onto the trip. We would stop somewhere along the way. We caught rush hour, and were stuck on the freeway for a while, before we saw any food exits. Finally, we saw a sign for a Chilli’s and some Italian restaurant called Ottavio’s. We chose the latter, but only because we couldn’t find the Chilli’s.

Inside the restaurant, when we asked for a table the waiter asked for a name.

“Izquierdo.” Said my mother.
“Izq… what???” Says the host
“Um… just José” She answered back

After that we decided we needed to figure out how we wanted to be called for the remainder of the trip. It would make things simpler, and we wouldn’t have people butchering our last name for the remainder of the trip. My mom’s older sister suggested we use Vanderbilt as our last name for the duration of the trip. Everyone seemed okay with it, so it was decided. I was a little concerned at the beginning, but decided it would be hilarious.

We spent the whole of the trip referring to ourselves as the Vanderbilt’s. It was hilarious. We would go to public places, and just start saying things like “We Vanderbilt’s, blah, blah, blah.” Or “as Vanderbilt’s we should act like blah, blah, blah.”

Towards the end of the trip, my mother asked me what the big deal was with that last name. I found out the reason no one had questioned the name was because, most of them had never heard of the Vanderbilt’s. Those of us who had, thought it was really funny, that they had chosen this name unknowingly.

It didn’t matter, though. We couldn’t have picked a more appropriate name for us during a camping trip. We did many unVanderbilty things that week. Then again, I’m sure there were another many things we did that made us seem like true Vanderbilt’s.