Road Trip Lessons
Travel far enough, you meet yourself. —David MitchellI was a 12-year old kid living in Dayton, Ohio when I was introduced to my first road trip. It was exactly 50 years ago, but I still remember clearly the day that our Mother and Stepfather sat the four of us kids down in the living room to tell us that when school ended in a few weeks, we would be moving across the country to Oregon. The plan was to load up a U-Haul trailer, hitch it to our new Country Squire station wagon and spend most of the summer exploring the heartland of America, ultimately settling in Oregon, a place where we had lived briefly as small children and which our Mother considered to be the Shangri-la of all places. It was framed as a journey into parts unknown, a starting over—a grand adventure—and I bought in completely. I don’t remember everything about that day, but I do remember feeling gleeful and excited and talking non-stop about where we were going and what we might see along the way. On the actual day we left, my sister and I tearfully said goodbye to our little cadre of girlfriends on the sidewalk in front of our house just before driving away from our childhood neighborhood forever. I vividly recall my sadness and my feelings of loss as I hugged my best friend, Karen, goodbye while at the same time feeling this incredible excitement and curiosity about what was next—a strange blend of emotions that I have experienced on many occasions since as I have navigated change and adventure throughout my life.
And, although I was a passenger and not a driver on that particular road trip, it was truly everything a good road trip should be: riveting and exhausting, intentional and haphazard, exciting and monotonous. Not only did it alter the trajectory of my young life, but it shaped my sensibilities and my trust in the unknown. At a very young age, I understood deeply that if you were brave enough to let go of what you knew, the world held surprises that you couldn’t even imagine. Just as importantly, I learned that two things could be true at the same time: You could find someplace new and not really lose the place you left behind.
I guess that’s why I didn’t hesitate too long when I decided that New York City was exactly where I should be after graduating from college in Oregon and, of course, I took another road trip to get here. One of the things I didn’t really think about until I was here, though, was the east coast’s proximity to the world at large and once I figured that out, I began to travel in earnest. I had a few fun island vacations in Mexico and the Caribbean, but my first real trip was a month-long road trip throughout Italy and Greece and by the time I left Athens to come home to New York, I was hooked on that feeling of being someplace new—someplace where I didn’t speak the language, where they ate food that I had never heard of and where I learned that a smile was the quickest way to say hello in any language. Since then, I have been lucky enough to take dozens of trips to Europe, some for a quick week or weekend in a new city; others traipsing around for a few weeks at a time. I’ve even managed to pop down to Central and South America for a trip or two.
Lately, though, the American road trip has been calling my name. In 2008, a friend and I met in Los Angeles, hopped in a convertible and spent a week driving from Palm Springs to the Grand Canyon to Zion to Joshua Tree. We had a vague notion of an itinerary, but mostly we were winging it and although I vaguely remember our time at the national parks, what I remember most is the sublime feeling of driving through the desert one particular evening, just as the sun was setting and listening to a favorite Lucinda Williams song. Since then, I’ve taken all kinds of road trips, mostly in the west, mostly with the goal of seeing things I’ve never seen and sharing time with family and a close friend or two. Some of my most memorable trips have included a 10-day road trip with a close friend through the most remote places in Oregon; a 2-week road trip with my Mother through Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, with the goal of seeing as many beautiful places as we could and visiting family; a slow meander up the Pacific coastline from Los Angeles to Oregon; and an incredible 2-week road trip with my daughter to visit the national parks in Washington.
My favorite road trip of all, though, was the one I took in 2020 during the summer of Covid, exactly six months after my Mother passed away. A solo trip across the country to spend a week in Oregon, celebrating my Mother’s life, and then a solo trip back home to New York. 8000 miles in all, 22 states—6 glorious weeks on the road. Now, I could tell you about the incredible things I saw on this trip, how my first planned stop was in Dayton, Ohio to visit that best friend of mine, Karen, from all those years ago. Or, how my dear friend Susan met me in South Dakota to tour the Badlands and how we spent a night in a log cabin in the middle of a national park and watched the most violent and incredible electrical storm roll in. How, against my better judgement, I ended up on a gigantic horse, riding up a steep terrifying trail in the rugged mountains of Wyoming, all the while clutching a can of bear spray. And, how the breathtaking meadow of wildflowers we saw at the top of that mountain made it all completely worth it. Or, how I spent a few days at my cousin’s place near Jackson, Wyoming and she took me on an amazing all-day kayak paddle down a beautiful river in the shadow of the Grand Tetons, where we had to stop once because there was a moose in the river in front of us.
Yes, this trip was full of big amazing experiences in big amazing places, but it’s the small moments, I think which have provided me with the biggest life lessons:
Keep going. I spent the first night of this incredible road trip in a roadside motel in Pennsylvania, crying myself to sleep and wondering what in the world made me want to do this. It might have been grief or uncertainty or plain old loneliness, but it felt to me a lot like walking into a dark forest alone or jumping off a cliff. I woke up in the morning, drank my coffee and despite my sadness and uncertainty, just kept going. I don’t remember feeling that way again during my trip.
Whenever possible, choose the road less traveled. Since I had the luxury of time on this particular trip, I knew that the most interesting roads would not be the ones that ended in 0; so I said goodbye to route 80 and set my GPS to “avoid highways” and I’m so glad I did. One of my most vivid memories is driving west on a small winding road in Wisconsin early one morning. It was raining slightly, when all of the sudden the sun peaked out and right in front of me, this magical rainbow appeared. Not a soul was on the road in either direction, so I literally stopped my car in the middle of the road and looked at the sky for 5 minutes. There were so many little moments like this and just a couple of terrifying ones. One of those happened when I was traveling east from Boise and my “avoid highways” route took me way out of town via this remote and not so lovely area where there was a high security prison. Maybe because it was the summer of Covid or maybe because there was literally nothing out there, it felt eerily empty and remote. Then I realized that the road I was on was taking me toward some mountains and I felt better because the landscape was getting beautiful. And then it started getting steep, really steep, and the road I was on was now gravel and just when I started to feel truly uneasy, I lost my GPS. Well, suffice it to say, I survived, but honestly, I felt very nervous for a few hours and it reminded me of one of the pitfalls of not really knowing exactly where your route is taking you. Have I changed the way I travel? Not necessarily, but I do take care to preview my route and have a back up plan, if I think I might be in danger of losing GPS.
Slow Down. I decided to limit my driving to around 4 hours or 200 miles a day so that I could explore where-ever it was I landed. Once settled, I would find something interesting to do in the afternoon—take a hike, walk around a city, see a historical site or some odd bit of Americana, ie-Carhenge or Craters of the Moon or the Idaho Potato Museum. And then, over dinner I would look at my map and decide where I was going the next day and how I would get there. Although my trip west had a couple of planned stops with friends, my trip back east did not. In both directions, though, I was intentional about not deciding exactly where I was going until the night before and when I was driving, I mostly drove slowly and stopped whenever I felt like it. If there was a little independent store-gas station along the way, I always made a point of stopping there and this is where I got some of my best recommendations for cool things to see.
Make space for the unexpected surprise. The odd little 70s-style hotel along the banks of Lake Michigan, where I rode a bike for hours and had cheese for dessert. My last-minute detour to spend a night in Minneapolis, where I stayed in a penthouse suite at a beautiful downtown hotel (Covid hotel prices were one of the great benefits of this trip at this time) and later walked around the George Floyd Memorial. My very memorable and hours-long lunch with the wonderful ladies at Mama’s Ladas restaurant in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. My few days at a fun resort in Boise, where I caught my breath and made a new friend that I have seen on a couple of occasions since. My last minute stop to visit my half-sister, Devon, in St. Louis, who urged me to reach out to her husband’s cousin when I was in Louisville, Kentucky a few days later. I did. We had a blast and I still keep in touch with Ben and his wife. My little tiny motel in Elkins, West Virginia, where I stayed an extra night, just so I could have one more morning to watch the fog rise off the Blue Ridge Mountains.
Miss home and go anyway. I always miss my husband and my daughter when I’m traveling without them. I miss my friends and my city, my work and my church. I miss my Saturday workout routine. But, I always choose to go anyway. Yep, I’ve learned that you can love your home, your life, your spouse—and still want to take a good road trip.
