Travel Days
Traveling is harder than I thought it would be. Granted we are trying to get back home in 3 weeks because we did not realize how long it takes in an RV and our nanny who is with us needs to be back sooner than we need to be. So, we are hurrying along to get back. The travel days are outnumbering the adventure days at this point and it is a weary making affair. In some ways I am excited to be back ‘home’ and in others I wish we were not going back at all. In recovery it is often said ‘there is no geographic cure’ which is true for alcoholism as well as spiritual or existential ailments. I will say though, that the adventure of a new day, a new city is a cure for some things. The energy of a new place is more brilliant than one that is worn and nostalgic. We went through Austin on our way back so I could see my mom and dad. I have not seen my dad in a year. Though I am always happy to be with him, the city itself carries so much of the past that it is hard not to get lost in yesteryear. When I drive around my hometown and go to all the places, I find myself pointing out to my husband, ‘oh, this is where I partied a few times, and down there, there used to be the best thrift store and I befriended the owner’ etc.… All remnants of my past life there. And while it is sort of fun at the time for my mind, it is sort of comforting, the aftertaste is something of sadness or longing. Like remembering a long-lost friend, joy, and a little chaser of grief that you do not know each other anymore the way you used to.
I have written before that I am no fan of nostalgia. It is partly why I love minimalism so much. I do not like to get stuck with any idea or dogma. Even if the dogma is inherently pointing toward something good. As soon as I find myself forming a habit with something, I usually let it go. Yoga, Buddhism, Therapy, a certain style of clothing and so on. There are only a few things I have really stuck with, thankfully recovery being the main one. Running does not seem to be going anywhere (thank God), and I hate the gym, so I guess that’s good for my fitness. I really like things in their simplest, natural state. I do not like all the extra. Extra buildings, extra t-shirts, extra pens, extra options, ad infinitum. I feel the most content when I have just enough, I have silence, I have nature, and I have my family. Jason and I went running in the mountains in Arizona in the middle of nowhere and the silence on the cold side of the mountain was something I had not experienced in probably 20 years. I cried. I cried because it was so beautiful, so peaceful, everything was exactly as it should be. Undisturbed. I feel so compelled to nature that I know I would not like to live in a large city again. I love to visit. But it is too disturbed. There are too many extras. When I was little, I loved country music (still do) and a lot of it was me daydreaming about living on a ranch somewhere, with a simpler life, perchance picking a guitar. But in all seriousness, I crave a simple life and always have.
We have been living in the RV now for a couple weeks. I vacillate between wishing we had gotten a bigger one and thinking that we made the right choice in keeping it smaller. I went from a 12-foot bed (two kings side by side, we co-sleep with our baby and toddler) to a twin. That was a little too small, so I have been sleeping on the fold out couch which is a full size. Both the baby and I were miserable on that tiny bed. We like to sleep like we are scaling a mountain, one leg up and one arm under the pillow, so the twin bed turned into a battle-royale of finding comfortable placement for elbows and knees. My mom also sleeps this way, so it must be genetic. Jason thinks I am crazy, and that might be true, but if it is, send me to the asylum…
Today we head to New Orleans and we will visit some friends and have promised our toddler to go to a park. There is a lot of amazing looking vegan restaurants in the Big Easy and I am so excited. I am excited for all the new sights, tastes, and adventure the day will hold. We will stay two nights and then probably find a place in the hills in Alabama or the FL panhandle before getting home. It will be nice, but also, I am already plotting our adventure to the Keys to get out of this cold weather for a while. When Jason and I first moved to FL I wanted to go to they Keys. We have been a few times, but now with a house on wheels, I think we may need to stay a month. Cannot wait. Amen and Happy Trails.