Time and location have escaped my senses. Moment to moment, I've very little idea what day or time it is. I’ve resorted to measuring the illusion of time with places and recently read books: “Oh, that was Missouri and Schnuck’s ago”, or, “That was Writers & Lovers by Lily King ago.” And sometimes I don’t even know where I am. I woke this morning thinking, "When I open that door, what will I see? Are we facing east? West? Will I be greeted by a New Mexican sunrise peeking from behind the mountains or am I surrounded by the wet and colorful trees of Missouri?"
With those waking thoughts, it's difficult to process much of anything. I’ve no stability yet I’m on pause. We've been on the road for a little over a month and I can say with one-hundred percent confidence that it feels like we've been doing this for years. Time slows yet locations whiz by in various landscapes; people are merely passing characters, and timelines are crossed bringing forth new versions of you moment by moment.
I don't know how to respond when anyone "back home" reaches out to ask how the journey is going. It doesn't feel like a journey. I’m a ping-pong ball of my own doing; an aimless wanderer struggling to react to her own nudges. I’m just crossing into unchartered territory—a new dimension, really. Something (I don't know what yet) puIled me to this very spot. Something led me through the Northeast into Western Pennsylvania (where we stayed put for a few extra days while David was being repaired), into Ohio (where an alpaca named Obadiah spit in my face while the toothless farmhand laughed) through Indiana where my response to Terra Haute was "Terra Naupe!" Then south into Missouri where we stayed longer than planned again due to a freak storm/flood post-election (which is another sore spot. Really, America?).
There, in Missouri, we had a coming-to-Jesus moment when we decided to forego our initial plan to drive and Harvest Host through Oklahoma and northern New Mexico. We changed routes to head south through Arkansas to Texas. My goal was to avoid the Lone Star State all together; I'd already lived that timeline. I was done with it. Alas, we did not avoid Texas. We stayed a week to regroup, see our son in Austin (BTW, Austin, just what happened to you? No bueno), and establish just what the fuck we were doing with our lives.
One thing was clear: we weren't staying put in Texas. No way, no how. But what the hell were we doing? We'd sold our lake house (I, and my inner child, were still sore about that), left my elderly parents behind, moved into a hundred square foot hallway on wheels (where the furkids keep getting sick). We aren't working or really contributing to our trip in any way, we have no health insurance, and we don't want to just hemorrhage money. Talk about stupid.
There was a lot to consider before we embarked on this journey and it felt like we hadn't planned things well at all. We kept telling ourselves, and each other, that we were fine "winging it." We'd "winged" relocating several times, recent home renovations, working with a realtor, selling, and leaving my beloved New Hampshire (it became "beloved" when I felt it slipping away from me, as with most things in life). For the most part, winging it has been okay because as I've learned, the more you try to control any outcome, the less likely you are able to watch the magic of surrender happen; the less opportunities you have to practice trust.
We've controlled very little thus far, and though that has felt all right, it has been a real challenge for an INFJ like me. INFJs like structure, solitude, slow processing times, feeling our way through wanted change or unwanted calamity. When things happen too fast, we get whiplash. I'm still recovering from what I did to myself.
During this trip, adventure, journey—whatever you want to call it, there doesn't feel like an appropriate word for what we're doing because we're just living from campground to campground, really—there haven't been too many opportunities to sit down and feel much of anything. It's all white hot and nothing can be considered, much less written, when it's raw.
So, while it's still happening, it's merely something that needs to ferment. I don't even really understand anything I've done until I've done it. What's more, I can't see its value until I write about it. That's just the way writing occurs for me. Intuitively and in hindsight. So, while the jacknife stabs me over and over with the most recent upheaval (I'm talking minute to minute), it will all have to stew until it's ready to be chewed up and spit out.
Comments