Drive, part 6- the last

Day Four on the Road was barely even mentionable.  For goodness sake I didn’t even leave til noon.  And then I had to stop at Chick Fil A.  I have been wanting Chick Fil A for MONTHS and I was not passing it by (the closes Chick Fil A to my apartment in Colorado is two hours away).  But I only had to get to Lebanon, Tennessee, but a hop, skip, a jump and three and a half hours away.  I did stop for a nap at a rest stop, which was when I realized that it was the first time in this whole production that I was sleepy on the road.  That’s unusual for me, I usually am sleepy a LOT when I’m driving.  Maybe it was the fear of plummeting to a fiery death, but I hadn’t had any trouble with drowsiness til that day.  Anyway. We all had a lovely nap and arrived in Lebanon around 4:30.  I stayed there two nights, saw some friends, drank yummy Wallaby Darns at Outback, and was finally ready to approach the finish line.

I should say that, had my trip been a week later, I would not have even made it to Lebanon.  The flooding closed down I-40 and has wreaked havoc in Nashville.  I am grateful that I was able to avoid consequences of the flood and my thoughts are with those who could not.

Day Five arrived and for the last time I corralled the two fat cats into their carrier, coaxed Max into the back seat, and took off for my final destination.  It was mostly a familiar drive, one I made from Memphis many times to visit my parents when they lived in Asheville.  Much of the drive went by in a blur of familiar and unrecognized, old and new (and one more trip to Chick Fil A).  And then I was here.

I’ve been here just over a week now (at the time of writing, not publishing), and this is the first time I’ve put my hands on the keyboard to do what I came here to do.  As if the weight of the decision to come here made actually approaching the task too difficult.  Or too important and therefore dangerous.  Or too real, and actually trying would make me vulnerable to failure.  But it’s always possible it was just laziness.

And I know I lived in it for 32 years, but people I must have blocked out the memory like a woman who inexplicably agrees to give birth a second time.  It’s HOT here. And humid.  My hair is freaking out about my choice of location, let me tell you. It’s much bigger, wavier (nearly curly), and stays cleaner longer.

I’ve gotten a job doing contract work so I can pay my bills, feed my pets, keep beer in the fridge and highlights in my hair.  Work was definitely be easier to come by here, and I will likely be able to take a bite out of my debt and bank some savings.

So.  As predicted, the drive did change my life.  But I suspect it will be a while before we know how, and to what end.

Drive, part 5

I thought if I could touch this place or feel it 

This brokenness inside me might start healing 

Out here it’s like I’m someone else 

I thought that maybe I could find myself… 

If I can walk around I swear I’ll leave 

Won’t take nothin but a memory 

From the house that built me  

-Miranda Lambert, “The House That Built Me”  

Day Three I awoke still tired but excited.  It was Memphis Day.  I hadn’t been home since I left three years ago, and I couldn’t wait.  I cranked up my playlist of Memphis-related tunes and hit the road again.

I also should confess that during the course of these three days I serially and spree-ly murdered ELEVENTY MILLION bugs with my windshield.  I got on Interstate 40 and I drove.  I would not be deterred. The interstate in eastern Oklahoma looks like the interstate in Tennessee… things were starting to look familiar. I was in Arkansas soon, and of course Arkansas is just right there across the river from Memphis, so it was like I was almost home, but then it takes like five hours to get across Arkansas, but I didn’t care because I was going home, and pretty soon it was Little Rock and I must have been flying, because I swear to God before I even knew it I was in West Memphis, and then there it was! The bridge. And the skyline.  And I was home.  It was home.

The very first thing I noticed was that Memphis has a lot of trees.  It’s not just Memphis, at all, because I notice it here in Charlotte too, but Memphis is where it hit me.  Colorado has trees, but it’s just not the same as big giant trees with their branches reaching out across the street to each other making a giant canopy under which you drive.  And everything was crazy green—I had left winter behind and found summer in a matter of days.

I drove past my last house and wished I could pull into the driveway and retake it.  I drove through my favorite neighborhoods, and the University, and the old gas station my friend and I used to call “the Cute Guy BP” because so many cuties worked there.  It’s a Shell now, and I did not find myself attracted to any of the employees.  By five o’clock I was pulling into my friend’s driveway—my earliest arrival of my three day journey.

Over the next three days I visited some of my favorite restaurants, listened to live music on Beale Street, ate a foot long corn dog, met a man who has driven a cab in Memphis for sixty years, was served breakfast by the same server that waited on us fifteen years ago on hungover college mornings, hugged lots of old friends, and laughed my ass off at old and new memories.  Some of which is a topic for its own essay, and much of which should not be published in a public forum.

Drive, part 4

From May 2010... 

Day Two arrived and I had rallied.  This would be the day.  Lots of flat, straight roads to be driven this day.  No fear of careening off a cliff to a firey death.

And by God if I didn’t get exactly what I wanted.  Highway 84 took me from I-25 to I-40, and it was perfection.  Straight for miles and miles.  An occasional passing pickup, but mostly I was out there alone.  It was, dare I say it, transformative and peaceful.  No major self-discovery in that forty mile stretch or anything, but I certainly felt renewed.

Until I hit I-40, and was forced to stop for gas at the most expensive gas station from here to Tarnation.  Or at least from here to Colorado.  And the spell was broken.  But I was hopeful.

As I headed toward Texas, I wasconsidering Route 66.  Lots of cool roadside stuff there, right?  Cheesy Americana was just what I needed.  I gave it a shot.
What I found were sad, boarded up businesses, slow speed limits, and lots of stop lights.  Although the lady that worked the drive through at McDonald’s was super nice and called me “Sweetie” when she handed me my Diet Coke.  Route 66 slowed me down and depressed me, but there were some things like the Cadillac Ranch that I wanted to see on the other side of Amarillo.

Determined to see something, ANYTHING, that could be called a roadside attraction I instead became one.  Before I even got to Amarillo, while changing lanes my rear passenger side tire blew out.  Fortunately I had no trouble pulling off onto the shoulder, and I thanked God repeatedly this happened in Texas with lovely cell phone service and no cliff from which to plummet.  Also fortunately, and thanks to an icy issue from two weeks prior, I had just joined AAA.  My GPS quite handily gave me my exact location to share with the AAA operator and the tire-changing man was on his way.

Also fortunately, for all of us, my spare tire is on the back of my car, and was not buried under everything I own.  I waited about an hour from blow out to the arrival of Randy, who changed my tire and told me how to get to a tire retailer.  I thanked him and was on my way again.


I didn’t want to buy a new tire.  My spare tire is a real tire, not a donut, and I didn’t want to spend the time and money to get a new tire.  I really really didn’t.  I texted my sister and asked if I really had to.  She said she didn’t know but thought I probably should.  I texted my roommate and asked her.  She wasn’t sure, but thought it would be a good idea.  I texted my best male friend and asked him.  Yes, he said. You need a new tire.  Dammit.

Fine.  I found the Discount Tire, bought one new tire and hung out in the waiting area for 45 minutes while they took care of things.  In amazement I listened to the Southern accents around me.  They sounded so strange and at the same time so familiar, like déjà vu, but not.  Foreign and, at the same time, like home.  I had that feeling a lot once I got to Memphis, but this was the first time I experienced it.  Max and the kitties hung out in the car without interest while the tires were changed, the air pressure checked, yada yada yada.  And finally, FINALLY!  We were on the road again.

Again.

Thanks be, the rest of Day Two was entirely uneventful.  But, instead of a six o’clock arrival at my hotel with plenty of time to relax, it was nine.  And when I got to the door of the room with the loaded down luggage cart, including cats, I could not locate the room key (found it today in my car.  Sorry LaQuinta).  Max and I had to go down the elevator (he was less than pleased), back to the front desk, request a second key, then back up the elevator (he peed a little I think) where I had left the cats (and all my stuff) on the luggage cart outside the room (nobody was gonna steal two twenty pound cats).

Continued...

Drive, part 3

My time in Colorado has toughened me to mountain driving. I’ve done Vail Pass and been forced to take Tennessee Pass in scary weather when the interstate was closed.  I’ve driven Independence Pass multiple times and don’t even get slightly anxious anymore. But Red Mountain Pass kicked my ass for some reason.  The heavily loaded car, the animal cargo, the lack of other cars on the road, nonexistent cell phone signal… any and all contributed to making me one giant stress ball incapable of fully enjoying the views.

When I finally got down on the other side I felt a huge weight off my shoulders, and disappointment.  It wasn’t supposed to be stressful!  It was supposed to be transformative and peaceful, dammit!
I kept going. I stopped for gas.  I passed through Durango.  Before I knew it I was in New Mexico.  I was sad as I crossed the state line and said goodbye to Colorado.  I plan to be back in the fall, but something felt final about that moment.  And not in a transformative peaceful way, either.

Much of the first part of my New Mexico drive was filled with stop lights and low speed limits.  This was not magical.  There was some beautiful scenery, but I was barely able to enjoy the magic because I was done of it.  I had wanted to stay off of interstates some (not that I had an option from Durango to Santa Fe), for solitude and more interesting scenery; I had found neither, really.  By the time I was on major highway I just wanted to be done.  I was done.  My eight hour drive was closer to ten at that point, and my shoulders were still up by my ears from the near-death drive over the pass.

Santa Fe, I have to say, was lovely.  I arrived as the sun was setting, and the pear trees were blooming there (they were not yet in Colorado, where it was still winter, and they have already passed in North Carolina, summer is here- Santa Fe was my Spring), and the breeze was perfect.  I loaded the cat carrier on a luggage cart (the carrier is more than 40 pounds, as each cat is at least 20), lured Max into the elevator (he hates elevators, but also refuses those outdoor stairs that are like grates), ordered a pizza, and got as much sleep as I could despite Merlin’s frequent meowing and Max’s bed-hogging.

Santa Fe, by the way, at 7000 feet, is the highest state capital in the country. Just some trivia for you.

Continued...