On the Road - 2011

 While this blog and the others to follow will be written mainly in the present tense, the actual events have occurred two or three weeks in the past.

Traveling up to Subury with the pack in the trunk and listening to Jack Kerouac's "On the Road"  I could not help but want to park the car on the side of road, stick out my thumb and start the journey right there and then. I didn't of course - it would have been absurd - but I wanted to.  It had taken me a long time to get to this point and I was impatient to get going.

True to my usual way of arranging my life,  the last few days before leaving had been hectic - there always seems to be a few lose ends to tie up, people to visit and an apartment to clean. As always there was a sense that I had forgotten to do something.

Part of my sense of either occurring or impending chaos was related to my summer plans. It was potentially going to be a very busy summer. There was a Gathering in Washington State that I really wanted to go to, a smaller regional Gathering in the northern end of Vancouver Island and my son's wedding in mid-August. Of course there were friends to visit and I hoped enough time to do nothing on Salt Spring Island. 

I got to Sudbury for supper on Thursday. As I parked the car in the driveway I realized once again that perhaps for the 10th summer that I would from now on be dependant upon other people to drive me - whether they be bus drivers, train engineers or travellers along the highway. I would have no control over any of those people - I would be, for the next 10 weeks, totally dependant upon other people. It was both a scary and a liberating feeling.