These coming few months I am going to follow John Steinbeck, Herman Melville, Chris McCandless, Bringham Young, Lewis & Clark, Johnny Apple Seed, David Bowie, John Ross, the Lilies of the Field's Homer Smith and all the rest. This blog will serve as a waylog, a testament to my journey across this great continent. This was one of the things I was debating whether to write out. I've decided I'm not only going to write it out, I'll film some of it too.
One of the things that I've been failing to do is document my travel well. That's going to change, and I'm going to share the proof of it here.
The first of the month my lease in Vermont ended. I packed all my stuff I had in that apartment into my car and drove south. The first week of June I spent with my brother Rich and sister JD on Long Island, playing checkers (her very first game no less) with Izzy and celebrating Sam's third birthday. When I got to Florida, I stuffed almost all my stuff back into the 11' by 11' garage sized rented storage space that I've kept most of my possessions during these last four or five years of nomadism, and then spent a few days visiting with my parents last week.
Then, I hit the open road. Just me and Emma. When I bought her, I made sure to take a tape measure to the rear with the backseats down. She's a very svelte station wagon, dubbed a "sportwagen" by VW, and has 67 cubic feet of storage space back there. With the shotgun seat all the way forward there's well over six and half feet of room for me (at 6' 2") to stretch all the way out and sleep in.
Which I do every night. Crack all the very tinted windows an inch or so, open the panoramic sunroof all the way and close its screen all the way forward (usually there's no rain expected, I check the forecast before bed) and open the back hatch, leaving it slightly open, resting on my rubber imitation croc sandals. I have a rechargeable battery powered fan with two batteries that I charge off my car's circuit (cigarette lighter y-jacks on the car's two cigarette lighter outlets power my GPS and let me recharge all my phone and other batteries simultaneously).. I can also recharge my laptop and run any other appliance because there's a normal 120 V 60 Hz household plug on the back of the center front seat arm rest..
I find far dark corners in Walmart parking lots or along a dead-end road in a state forest or other such cozy places where the cops and other annoying types will leave me alone for eight hours, to get some rest.
I've been sleeping in my shorts with two pillows atop my sleeping bag, inflatable pad and two warm throw blankets. Gallon of water and back scratcher close at hand, fan suspended from the roof handle by the door, blowing air at my head all night long. Battery lasts until just after dawn, which acts as a nice wake up mechanism. Fan cuts out and I start to sweat, a nice sauna effect that tells me it's time to get up.
I get online at least once a day at McDonald's or Starbuck's. Can I say once again for the record how much I love the remodeled Micky D's by the way? I hit them for a grilled chicken Asian salad and wild berry or pineapple mango smoothie for dinner, or a bacon egg and cheese bagel and large sugar free iced coffee for breakfast every day. Even Starbuck's is getting better, in that they don't seem to be over- roasting their beans to the point of mildly unpleasant bitterness anymore.. Huge props to both chains for the free WiFi, anyway.
This is how I've been living this last week. I was initially uncertain if I was going to take to the road for long, but it has been bliss. Every day's been another release, another small revelation. This, without much effort: I've merely been mucking about the Orlando area, going to the local state parks, and exploring the city. I've been trying to swim every day, and discover all the beaches and natural first magnitude springs around here. I'm trying to scout as much as I can so that when everyone's visiting Florida we know where to go. There's more than the theme parks to be had, and I'm beginning to gain much more respect for this place. I'm beginning to really like it here.
No absolute clear idea where to go or what to do, though, so I've decided just to live my way forward and let the road take me wherever it will. I do have a series of ideas of things I want to see - Burning Man, Civil War and Revolutionary battlefields, Branson, Catholic and Orthodox churches, temples of any denomination, good independent movie theaters, any sort of park, good bars and honkytonks, natural swimmable springs, classic diners, Mormon pageants, stuff like that. But the methodology of actually encountering these things (the rhythm and art of arriving, which is not as simple as just driving wherever there happens to be - one must know how to encounter such places, know how to meet the people who come with them well.. ) is something I need to grow into.
I just need to relax, I think. I want to fall back in love with this country. It's been a rough decade, and she and I have been having issues. It's time to spend some time with her again, have a second honeymoon and recapture that magic we used to have.
So I'm just going to plunge in, and let whatever happens come. I've decided not to push or plan too much, and let the moment unfold and carry me where it wants. This is my favorite way of traveling, and always brings good things with it.
I was initially going to go canoeing in Maine next month, to do the most epic trip possible, but decided that because no one has the time or interest to come with me on short (two month it was) notice, that I'll postpone that.
I've also been thinking the last couple years about making a pilgrimage to venerate Our Lady of Guadalupe in Ciudad Mexico, but that too has been elusive, in that the troubles in Mexico and the other circumstances of my life have been persistently mitigating against it.
I've been wanting to see her though for a while, ever since I abortively began my pilgrimage by bus from Obregon but ended up waylaid by illness in a cheap hotel room in Mazatlan puking my brains out in 1996. That disaster was due to my own foolishness (another story that I may tell soon, if the words come to my fingers) and I've been wandering afield ever since. Time maybe to pick up that path, again.
I'll receive whatever comes, as I've said. We'll see.
These last few days I've seen three movies: Super 8 (second time, IMAX theatre), Cave of Forgotten Dreams, and Tree of Life. These three films actually have quite a bit in common in my mind, and I am going to review all three of them seperately on the blog this coming week, as I get time to do it.
[Aside: Orlando has a decent movie theatre scene, which I love. I saw the Tree of Life here, one of a half dozen things that I've experienced this last week that has radically changed my feelings (which had been very negative - I'd only seen Orlando as a great swathe of strip malls orbiting the theme parks) for the better. Not a bad town, Orlando. ]
One further thing:
It's very interesting: but last summer I couldn't stand the heat here, and when I lived in Gainesville a few years back I felt the humidity ferociously. This summer though, that's all gone. Either Florida has become gentle, or else I am become acclimated and tough. For her blows now are become as caresses..
The weather is not bothering me at all, and that is marvelous. I've gotten this great tan, and the heat and sun are intoxicant.
Something's fundamentally changed. Circle come full round.
Ultreya, Suseya, then. Let's see where this takes me.
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