Truck'n

The Great American Road Trip! It's an American thing to happily get into a car and happily charge forth into the unknown. Maybe there is something distinctly Gypsy in our blood that makes us itch for the road. Having taken more then a few road trips in my life, I can say there are long periods of unpleasant followed by brief periods of pretty great, followed by longer periods of boredom. None the less, I feel more connected to those places I spent so many hours trecking over. I feel more connected to the long stretch of road between Albuquerque and Portales New Mexico then I do to any street in San Francisco. It's an odd tradition. Often my mind turns toward "The Grapes of Wrath" and their long trip to California. The trip is so full of hope and anticipation, regret and fear, sorrow and anxiety, but it is also this part of the book that I think most American's connect to be cause it is this part that in our history we all share. So many of our stories start with "When my ancestors came here..." it is a journey story. They escape, they are captured, they are brought, they are released, they search for freedom, they come for work, they all have hopes of a better life. Maybe better than what they had, maybe just better than the journey itself. But it is that journey that American's just can't get over. Then, once here it wasn't enough. Out West, out beyond. It wasn't just a need to settle, it was a need to not settle. To move, to find, to forge, to plant, and then to move on. A restless country with itchy feet we now circle it in our cars and planes and try to recapture that hope that journey that trek.

Or maybe we just want to get from one place to another and we have a personal vehicle we can do it in. Matt and I will be under taking a journey of our own this summer.

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And why not? We have family all along the way, and it's a good part of the country I've never seen before, as well as parts of the country I hold dear to my heart.

Do you have suggestions of things we should see along they way? Worlds biggest such and such? Prettiest little house you ever did see? Best catfish in the country? Let me know. We're taking about a week to see it all. It should be fun...well. It will be moments of fun intermingled with sheer boredom but you get the idea.

Comments

Unknown said…
Okay, so this is an old post of yours and I probably should keep better tabs on my friends, but if you guys decide to come up to ABQ on your trip instead of El Paso you two are more than welcome to stay with me. Also, Laura lives in Dallas and is all married now. You could stop in and see her new house.
Unknown said…
Okay, so this is an old post of yours and I probably should keep better tabs on my friends, but if you guys decide to come up to ABQ on your trip instead of El Paso you two are more than welcome to stay with me. Also, Laura lives in Dallas and is all married now. You could stop in and see her new house.

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