This morning I found myself waking up to the same three feelings I've been waking up to for the past 89 or so days: the feeling of being tired, the feeling of being late, and the feeling of being in the wrong state. Don't get me wrong, I love to travel. I love hoping on a plane or behind the wheel and going off on some adventure into the wild blue yonder, if only because this country has so much to offer, in its lonesome highways stretching through the night, and that home is somewhere down the road if you make the turns just right.
There's another emotion there, though. Something past the express knowledge of traveling and all that conjures to the mind. It's the profound and undeniable sense of leaving. Taking to the road, getting into high gear and getting the sweet living hell out of dodge. I've been working in Connecticut but driving back down to Maryland every couple weeks or so, and I have to say I've fallen in love with the U.S. Highway system at nighttime. A couple weeks ago on a trip back from UMD I took I-95, but I got on the interstate at a comfortable 9:45 pm, which meant something incredible: one of the busiest sections of asphalt I've ever seen in my life was blissfully empty. I was able to cruise along without much to hinder or halt me all along the Jersey Turnpike, across the George Washington Bridge, and all the way past Bridgeport.
My long trips on the road have found me listening to Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, and the like. There's something there in their music that embodies the spirit of adventure that can be found along the chains of headlights and brake lights that tie this wide world together. As I drove across Pennsylvania to get to my familiar haunts, the sun set over Allentown and the long straight roads of the Keystone State welcomed me with open arms and a clear left lane.
There's another emotion there, though. Something past the express knowledge of traveling and all that conjures to the mind. It's the profound and undeniable sense of leaving. Taking to the road, getting into high gear and getting the sweet living hell out of dodge. I've been working in Connecticut but driving back down to Maryland every couple weeks or so, and I have to say I've fallen in love with the U.S. Highway system at nighttime. A couple weeks ago on a trip back from UMD I took I-95, but I got on the interstate at a comfortable 9:45 pm, which meant something incredible: one of the busiest sections of asphalt I've ever seen in my life was blissfully empty. I was able to cruise along without much to hinder or halt me all along the Jersey Turnpike, across the George Washington Bridge, and all the way past Bridgeport.
My long trips on the road have found me listening to Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, and the like. There's something there in their music that embodies the spirit of adventure that can be found along the chains of headlights and brake lights that tie this wide world together. As I drove across Pennsylvania to get to my familiar haunts, the sun set over Allentown and the long straight roads of the Keystone State welcomed me with open arms and a clear left lane.
