HOMEWARD BOUND

I was quite a bit farther North, and civilization was a little more evident here than during my recent eastbound journey through the same states. Well, civilization was present, but I can't say for sure if it was accounted for. I recall events and brief experiences that seemed kind of skewed; virginity is a virtue, and "Bluegrass Tadpoles" apparently grow into the tastiest frogs.  I know these things to be unequivocal truths, because the billboards along the way said so, and billboards never lie

Coming through some little place--I don't remember where--I stopped at a mini-mart/general store for some reason. Inside, I found that I could pick up a club sandwich in the deli section, my favorite beverage in the adjacent cooler, and a one-kilowatt inverter over in the next aisle. That's "one-stop shopping" at its best.

I traveled almost due West through Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. Cruising into Winslow, Arizona, the Eagles song “Take it Easy” started playing on one of the rare FM stations I was able to find. I was floored. “Gawd” I thought; could anything be more appropriate? (You know the stanza of the song; “Standing on a corner in Winslow Arizona, such a fine sight to see…it’s a girl, my Lord in a flatbed Ford slowing down to take a look at me”). I briefly considered the possibility of actually standing on a corner there just to see how accurate the Eagles were.

From there on out, it was a typical, albeit long drive home. I made marathon dashes back across Arizona, then California. I went through Owens Valley along the Eastern Sierra Nevada, up through my old college stomping grounds in Northern California, then through the Oregon and Washington forests to the rainy Pacific Northwest. It was a lot of driving, and after I pulled down my gravel driveway back home, My head told my body that my fanny was unequivocally tired of the Jeep for awhile.

I had a blast.

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