March 22, 2006
Road Trip

Road trips. Love ‘em.  Last week Jan and I, attempting to duplicate the Ramones mid-seventies hit and be “out there havin’ fun, in the warm California sun,” drove to the Left Coast. 

But as glorious as it is catching rays, missing fairways and jogging the Coachella Valley desert, it’s the going and coming that makes the week.  Being on the road and behind the wheel really is a trip. 

My first “long hours behind the wheel” sojourn came driving a VW from Sioux Falls to Lake Tahoe with only twenty-five bucks and a Sinclair credit card in my wallet.   Ever try and sleep in the back seat of a bug?  There’s all of about three feet of seat available for snoozing.  Even for people only five seven, comfort isn’t an option but motels weren’t in this traveler’s budget. Besides, being young and flexible meant it only took four, maybe five, years before the neck pain vanished. 

That two thousand mile Tahoe trip took all of 5 days. Why?  Well I wanted to break up, in person, with the girl friend.  She had a summer job at Harrah’s Casino.  Once l made it to Stateline, Nevada breaking up seemed really dumb. To me. Not her. Something about remaining friends while seeing other people. Eventually that chapter in life had a happy ending.  It only took four years but not only did I smooth talk the lady out of ending the relationship but also convinced her to be my wife. 

But that road trip west gave birth to a love of rolling down the Interstate that has been a part of my DNA ever since.  The towns on that journey, Murdo, Presho, Wall, Hot Springs, Lusk, Rawlins, Elko and Lovelock are as fresh in my memory as if the drive had been in ‘06, not ‘60.  

Last weeks voyage was equally familiar to anyone ever heading west from Happy Valley.  The gas station in Richfield housing a Wendy’s, (or is it the other way around), the Bloomington last fill-up before West Coast gas prices and a super cheap night’s sleep in Primm.  And driving I-15 flooded the mind with memories, years ago playing the alphabet game with the daughters while crossing the California desert and determined to be at the letter W before reaching Zzyzx road outside Baker, Barstow and its super sized train station McDonalds, the high desert’s Roy Rogers museum followed by “I’ll pay a dollar to the first person who can see the ocean” but when the Pacific was visible through the windshield all three blondes were sound asleep. 

On a road trip, life’s intrusion’s are under the control of driver and passengers. The outside world is kept at bay if the radio’s off. Conversation needn’t be hurried, there’s hundreds of miles to get it all said plus equally long distances available for silence. Wherever one motors around the bend is a reminder of yesterday.  One moment it’s I-80 east of Lincoln and flash, you’re checking out the Midwestern corn crop as did grandparents decades ago, outside Lawrence on I-70 the question comes up whatever happened to Stuckey’s and their free almond toffee with every eight gallon fill-up, and speaking of missing what caused the road side rhyming of Burma-Shave to disappear? 

Aah the road trip.  Not for this wayfarer is the airport, security checks, middle seats and lost luggage a better way.  The best travel venue is four lanes wide with hours to go.