Road Trip Part Two

Gentle readers, forgive me. I should never write a “Part 1” of anything without at least planning out “Part 2.” It was my full and honest intention to start the blog rolling again, to build up steam, to really get back into good writing habits, it’s really important, just like dental hygiene I always say, flossing and writing, yep, gotta do it every day, anyway where was I…

Yes. I got a cold and turned into a sniveling miserable snot factory for a week. Rockin’.

I shouldn’t complain; it had been a year and a half since my last sniffle. Colds come to us all, lower our defenses and our dignity, and reduce us to huddling under blankets making pitiful noises until the fever breaks. But that was almost two days ago for me, so let’s do this thing.

Day 2 of my drive to Nashville was sunny perfection. The novelty of driving was wearing off a little but the novelty of picking my own music had not. Once I was rolling out of Bulls Gap, I wondered how soon I would reach a more populated area. I was thinking of the miles and miles of dark, scary-thunderstorm-enshrouded dusk I’d driven through the night before, seeing only the odd gas station or scary motel. How far would I have to go to see more choices?

Did you guess “The next exit”? Because of course you’d be right. Within ten miles I found a half-dozen other clean, modern chain hotels to choose from, most of which probably would have been less expensive. Oops.

Didn’t matter! I’d had a safe, pleasant evening and a decent meal, and could ask for absolutely nothing more. I pushed on, starting to wonder about Central Time, and when I would reach it. It’s west of Knoxville, that’s what I remembered. But “west of Knoxville” describes a huge chunk of Tennessee, so I kept my eyes peeled.

My eyes kept getting distracted by Sonic signs, though. See, here’s the thing. If you live in an area where there are Sonic Drive-Ins, maybe you don’t think much of them. Maybe they are just like other fast-food places littering the landscape, like McDonald’s or Wendy’s is for me. But a few years back Sonic’s ad campaign went truly nationwide even though its restaurants weren’t; more precisely I kept seeing ads and never getting to eat there. What exotic land of treats was this?! Different fruit drinks? Ice cream desserts? TATER TOTS?!

Yes. It’s true that in the near future the greater Baltimore area will be blessed (or cursed, whatever your perspective) with Sonic Drive-Ins, and then they will fade back into the background for me. But before I left for this trip I joked about “stopping at every Sonic between here and Nashville.” I may have been kidding, but only to a point. I was definitely stopping. The breakfast bar at the Best Western left a lot to be desired, and I’d been glad I still had a banana and some trail mix with me. I got hungry pretty early, around noon, maybe 12:30.

That was before I hit Central Time, though. I checked in with the Dugans and realized how insanely early it really appeared I was eating lunch: 11:30 a.m.! Stupid time travel. Threw me right off. Didn’t know what end was up. Fortunately tater tots grounded me back in reality.

The rest of the trip was really cake. The weather stayed nice and the traffic was fine, even right through downtown Nashville. I got a wake-up call when I checked in with Mandy, though – she had to give me different directions from what Google Maps wanted to tell me because a road was closed from the flooding. Oh.

Even driving through downtown I didn’t really notice it, not from the highway, the highway was cleaned up and cleared by then of course. As I came out on the west side of town, and got closer to their neighborhood, it started showing up. Not just as something on the news, sandwiched between other disasters, but as a real thing that happened to real human beings. House upon house with piles out in front: piles of furniture, piles of insulation, piles of drywall, piles of books and toys and every little thing that goes into our homes. It’s not our lives; fortunately the people in the vast majority of those homes lost their things but not their lives. But a lot of people lost a lot, and it was a sobering end to the start of my vacation.

There were good things to see happening, though. Lots and lots of people out volunteering, cleaning up. Collections and aide stations on every other block. People coming together, fixing and rebuilding, sharing and helping. It was good to see. Good like seeing your oldest friend for the first time in a while. Good like coming home.

June 11, 2010 · Jen · No Comments
Tags: , ,  Â· Posted in: Uncategorized

Leave a Reply