Begin at the beginning...

I always say that in my next life, I want to be a six foot tall redhead with big boobs. To that, I have to add that I'll be a long distance trucker. I totally get the lure of driving on roads that seem to be endless. I started this trip with two objectives: thinking and driving. Thinking about the situation I was heading into, and driving with one eye on the road, the other on the landscape. I wasn't disappointed with either undertaking. California is familiar to me; the landscape is no surprise, and I was mostly thrilled to view it from my rear view mirror. But to see this little gem...this rang my bells!


As I made my way across the US of A, I was so amazed at how the topography changed so radically as I pushed forward. Arizona was hot as hell for the most part (average 110 degrees), but the landscape was so different...so lunar...that I didn't mind. The sky goes on forever.



And speaking of lunar...remember this from 3rd grade science class?
I couldn't help myself and had to make the detour up the road to nowhere!

The folks I encountered were very friendly, and I discovered that you're liable to see anything on the road in AZ. This was my favorite, as was the car directly in front of it.

I also had the funniest encounter with a Native American guy at a rest stop; where I had a Sherman Alexie moment. Sherman Alexie is a Spokane/Coeur d'Alene Indian writer, and one of my favorite writers. The musical musings of two of his recurrent characters, Victor Joseph and Thomas Builds-The-Fire, are always wandering around in my head. But I digress...this guy was hitting on me at a rest stop, and he kept saying things like "you look nice"...and I hope I don't offend you, but you look nice."

I kept thinking, of course I look nice. I'm clean. I'm well dressed. Isn't that why you do those things? Then I remembered, long after I'd driven away: that's the way an Indian man tells a woman that he thinks she's hot. Simple and understated, right?

Anyway...tomorrow: New Mexico, my spiritual home.

Sissy Takes a Road Trip...For Reals!

Getting in the car and taking off in no particular direction is one of my favorite things to do. When I'm stressed, I drive. It's not unusual for me to find myself on the Riverside Freeway (heading to God knows where) at 2am, because I'm so freaked out/stressed out by life that I just have to soothe myself with the sound of the rubber meeting the road.

The past month or so has been enough to make a black woman want to take off her earrings and throw down with God. Job stress and craziness...money stress and craziness...and then I get the phone call that my mother is not well. At that point, I figured that one more thing added to the pile wouldn't break me; little did I know that her illness would be the thing to facilitate the road trip of my fantasies.

Miss Lillian (as she is known) is 88 years old, more than a little unstable - now with the added dimension of dementia. She has a myriad of age related health issues that have all decided to manifest at once. Independent well past the point of stubbornness, she has insisted on living alone; but that's come to an end, and her greatest fear - loss of autonomy - has been realized. Hence, her steadfast denial of the cancer they just happened to find while trying to manage her other matters.

Our relationship...well there isn't one...but personally, I think that since your parents were present at the beginning of your life; you should be there at the end of theirs. So it was off to Johnson City, TN for me. In fact, I've just arrived; and since sitting in a car for hours isn't conducive to my creative process, I've decided to give you the details once the wheels have stopped turning in my head. For now, I can take comfort in the fact that I'm on familiar ground...and that makes me happy.



It really does.