On the Road Again 2015 # 10

It is not possible to hitchhike from the east side of Golden to the west side. There is just too much traffic and nowhere to stand. While Golden is, at least along the highway, not a particularly large town, it is a long walk between the east and west sides. I was therefore delighted when a young man stopped and offered me a ride to the other end of town. He had a few minutes to kill and just wanted to help. He drove me to a gas station where I did buy water and then to the corner to look for my next ride. While I appreciate all of the rides that I receive, the generosity of this young person was quite energizing. Whenever I hear the older generations complain about how we are all going to hell in a hand basket  - I think of the many young people who I have met in my travels and in the classroom. I am constantly reassured by their capacity to care and to be aware of the world around them.

The only bad part of getting this drive was that I didn't have the chance to buy any food. I had only had the one egg muffin in the past two day, I wasn't hungry but I was aware that it would be a good idea to eat something. None-the-less, now that I was at the edge of town, I stuck out my thumb. It was getting late and a bit dark and storming looking.  Either I would get a ride within the next hour or so, or I would spend the night in Golden. It had been a good day and either possibility was just fine with me. Fortunately, I once again got lucky and within a few minutes a van stopped and offered me a ride to Kelwona.

This driver was friendly, perhaps too much so. He was either very bright, bombastic and assertive, or he was well read from the internet, opinionated and somewhat of a verbal bully. I could never quite figure out which. We, of course, talked about everything under the sun.  Or at least he talked about them, with me interjecting the odd comment when he stopped for a breath. It was an interesting ride. He had warned me when I got in his van that he had lots of stories to tell and he did. It had been a long day. I was glad to have someone to take the lead in both the topics and the conversation.  On occasion it was frustrating to figure out what was true and what was fiction. For example he never mentioned his education until the last hour or so of our ride together. He then told me that he had a BA, a MA and a MBA.  Not impossible but he interjected those set of facts without any context. He also was quite proud of his IQ scores (which were above "normal" but not by that much)

My driver had a number of occupations, most of them to do with the tourist industry. I was not clear as to what it all entailed but at least one of the jobs involved selling advertising space in a tourist magazine (I think), another had something to do with ecotourism. However he earned his living, he lived fairly close to some financial ledge where he was always in danger of falling off.

We had not been driving very long when it started to rain. Very shortly afterwards a rather extraordinary thunder and lightening show was put on for the drivers heading west through the mountains. It was spectacular! Going through the passes, there were times when the lightening started from high up in the sky and ran its jagged edges right to the ground.  I was glad that I was not driving. In fact there were times that it was raining so hard - that cowards like me would have stopped on the side of the road and waited for a break in the rain.

My driver was going to Kelowna - one of my least favourite cities in BC. It is very hot, busy (the highway passes through downtown) and I have always had hard time hitchhiking out of it. I could have gotten out halfway to Kelowna and headed towards Kamloops, but by the time we reached that intersection, it was dark. The last thing I wanted was to sleep on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. I would deal with how to get out of Kelowna the next morning. My driver assured me that he knew of a great hitchhiking spot. I think I had heard that line before. I did not believe him.

One of the things that got my driver most excited was the fact that I could drive. Twice during our 4-5 hour trip he asked me to drive so that he could rest his eyes. He may have been the worst backseat driver I have ever had the misfortune to be with. I could do nothing right. He was particularly concerned with me driving too close to the shoulder. While I do have that tendency, I don't think he sat very often in the passenger seat and therefore didn't realize that his perspective of where the car was, was different than mine. At one point he actually grabbed the wheel and turned it. I was furious. I suggested that I would be glad to get out and let him be on his way. We had this brief shouting match that I suppose in hindsight was a bit silly, but we were both tired, it was late and for the driver - it was his only vehicle - he needed it for work and had no money to buy another one.

Thankfully we were not far from his house when the argument happened. We switched positions and within a short time we were at his house. Earlier in the evening he had stopped for some beer and the original plan was that we would arrive at his house, have a beer to celebrate our arrival and then I would set up my bivy sack in his front yard. By the time we got there, it was after 11:00, I was really tired and elected to go to sleep. I was not being a very good guest but I was too tired to care and was far past entertaining him.

His brother lived with him and before we were home for more than ten minutes, they had a huge row. Something about the plants not being watered. I crawled into my sleeping bag and was asleep within minutes.