The original plan was New Zealand. Christopher has wanted to
go there since he was Little C ( a childhood nickname given by MamaCath that occassionaly still slips out)
I’m sure he was mesmerized
by surf culture, towering green mountains and beaches for days on which to
beach bum it. I also hear they have a real thirst for adventure there: I
distinctly remember a near death moment in the small third-world Caribbean
island of Dominica while scaling down the side of a cliff dozens of stories
above a black sand beach and our trusty tour-guide relating our terror-trek to
a walk in the park for a New Zealander Kiwi. Good God, that level of thrill junkie is nothing
this uncoordinated lanky lady wants any part of.
I mostly wanted New Zealand for what are sure to be some of
the globe’s most hilariously loud, out-spoken natural comedians. Because while
beautiful beaches do me quite nice, there’s nothing I love like a good laugh.
Anyways. We didn’t go to New Zealand. But with what (at the
time) seemed like good reasoning. Shortly after returning home from our nine
months living as a workaholic beach bum and a proper beach bum in St. Thomas,
we both came to the realization we wanted to try our hand at becoming real
people. Real live people. Chris hates when I say that. And it’s true. Like what
we were doing or anyone is doing isn’t “real”. But I’ll assume you know what I
mean when I say that- because society tells us so.
And so, Chris went on to get his Realtors license (woo-hoo!)
and I went on to be thoroughly confused by what I want out of this life and
what I have to contribute. But with New Zealand travel plans put on hold, we
couldn’t entirely betray our lust for wander. And so- the great road trip of
2012 began fruition.
All summer long we told envious friends in cubicles of our
plan to head west on a month long road trip. The general route of the trip was
always known- cut across to Seattle and work our way down the Washington,
Oregon, California coast until we’d cut across through Arizona and New Mexico
to Austin, Texas and then head homeward. But that was it. Not another minute of
time went into planning any sort of travel arrangement or sight-seeing or
tourist traps or whatever else it is that responsible travelers Google for months
before a trip.
Nah. We knew the magic of a truly righteous trip lied in the
unknowing and the unfolding of the road in cognition with the universe’s
mysterious ways.
So I told Iron Horse Hotel I had brighter plans in my
horizon and off we went.
Our rental car was perfect. It was shiny gray and brand new
with an enormous trunk and backseat to fill all the needed supplies for a month
on the road in various climates and various sleeping amenities. All packed up,
last minute as usual- Chris throwing his clothes into a laundry hamper and me
grabbing about 14 books “just in case”.
(Note to past-self: this is a very fast-paced month-long road trip, not
a summer Up North on the lake. You have no time to read. And when you do- your
brain’s too exhausted to make words out of letters. Leave the bookshelf intact
at home)
“Okay here we go! Yeehaww! The great adventure begins!!!” I
shouted excitedly as Chris’s driving cheerleader.
We weren’t on the highway more than 7 minutes before Chris
realized there was no cruise control.
“What do you mean there’s no cruise control? This is 2012.
Cars parallel park themselves. They can maintain one selected speed if told to
do so.”
Or so we thought. First stop on the roadie? Back to Hertz to
trade in our car for the only one left in our price range- a Nissan Vera with a
teeny tiny almost non-existent trunk. This only added to our
hoarder/homeless/come rob us vibe but we put our adventure smiles back on and
started off once more. (After grabbing several more books from Half Priced
Books conveniently located across the street from the rental office)
Our first destination was Missoula, MT, a 22 hour trek where
we were sure to find chilled-out mountain men and craft beer to charge us up
for the trip West.
I began reading my new Brian Andres book. Gahd I’ve loved Brian
Andres since my first browse in a gift shop where his beautiful, whimsical
poems and illustrations are in print form. Here I found a whole book of his
work?! The only omen I needed. I appreciate his writing for its simplicity,
allowing the reader to draw its deeper meanings and conclusions.
“Saving up
a bag full of
peak moments
she’s going to have
someday if she can
ever get away
from all the
same old stuff
that’s holding
her back
a bag full of
peak moments
she’s going to have
someday if she can
ever get away
from all the
same old stuff
that’s holding
her back
Well guess how
It’s going”
-Brian Andres
This one specifically hit a chord as I was thankful I was
not the girl in the poem. Or maybe I was- but I was making sure to cash in
those moments. Not storing them under my bed or in the back of my closet or
wherever special things like moments are stored. But spending them madly, like
a filthy rich 30 year old virgin with a stopwatch and a death wish in a
stripclub for the first time.
Or something like that.
“Ouu those stinky feet”, I said snapping back to reality and
rolling down the window thinking about the next 19 hours of road ahead.
“If you’re gonna love me, you
gotta love all of me”, he said with a smile. And I agreed, sticking my head out
the window.
What really christened our road trip was our first night
stopping exhausted and heavy-lidded at 3 a.m. in a South Dakotan rest stop.
Unfortunate for Christopher, he had previously decided to shmoka the ganj and
so while he was experiencing paranoid hallucinations of the character from
Scream behind every bathroom stall, I was soberly envisioning the trucker
behind his cabin curtain sharpening his machete and the man and his Rottweiler
in the camper sharing a meal of human kidneys and fried earlobes.
We managed to live through the chilly night and arrived in
Hippytown USA Thursday afternoon. Missoula is a small college town located in a
deep valley creating a thick fog across the city as we entered. Nothing makes
me want a local craft beer like some thick fog.
But first we needed to search for Chris’s infamous thrift
store where he scored a killer shirt once circa 2007. Here’s the thing about
thrift shops though- they always have new old junk that people don’t want. So…after
about two hours of hopping around and sifting through denim blouses and floral
button-downed calf-length skirts, we decided it was time for that beer.
We headed to Kettlehouse Alehouse, famous for their
stoner-friendly brews like Old Bongwater and Hemptober Spliff Ale. The place
was packed with thick throngs of flannel no doubt planning their next fishing
trip.
The bartender gave us a punch card explaining we could only
drink a maximum of three beers in the Alehouse per visit according to a Missoula
law. We aren’t in Wisconsin anymore, Toto.
We met a dude from West Virginia who told us about killing a
coyote and was currently deciding what to do with its carcass and I never felt
the estrogen sucked from my body more intensely. I also informed him that my
dog was half coyote, and it’s actually pronounced coy-yo-tay and he probably
killed her mom.
Welp, better be hitting the ole dusty trail then. And off to
Seattle.