it's no secret that i travel to the other side of the earth, pick a little town, and then never leave it--at least not until i'm ready to leave it forever. people think of me as a traveler but i know the truth: i travel huge distances to stay still. i stay until claustraphobia sets in, until i think i'm going crazy, until i'm literally itching to get out.
why do i do it? i love motion. bus window down, elbow crooked on the sill, dust and sun in my face, glimpses into lives i'm never going to live. i love to travel. today i followed my friend jess up the long slope of highway leading into the mountains, my little motorbike not quite a match for hers, driving straight on into the 1pm sun, the best kind of sun burn just waiting to happen. how do you accelerate up a mountain? hit it in fourth and hope it'll carry you through? start slow and try to build something? some mix of the two? we chugged and struggled and crested hills and coasted into valleys and smelled things growing and smelled diesel and moved and moved and moved.
i kept thinking about the california coast, route 1 to san francisco. last spring, just before i moved to thailand, kai and i rented a tiny, red car and stopped in every place that looked half-worth stopping. that exposed stretch of ocean, those awesome drops, such a wild breaking off point of the earth, the biggest edge i've seen and stuck to. in every little town i thought, i could live here. or maybe here. but the beauty was that i didn't.
there's nothing like driving in the mountains. the warm-cool patterns of sun spots and shadows--warmer and cooler because we're so high up--and the promise of a million things we don't know yet. i hate to be stuck but wonder if it's the escaping that makes this part so good.
why do i do it? i love motion. bus window down, elbow crooked on the sill, dust and sun in my face, glimpses into lives i'm never going to live. i love to travel. today i followed my friend jess up the long slope of highway leading into the mountains, my little motorbike not quite a match for hers, driving straight on into the 1pm sun, the best kind of sun burn just waiting to happen. how do you accelerate up a mountain? hit it in fourth and hope it'll carry you through? start slow and try to build something? some mix of the two? we chugged and struggled and crested hills and coasted into valleys and smelled things growing and smelled diesel and moved and moved and moved.
i kept thinking about the california coast, route 1 to san francisco. last spring, just before i moved to thailand, kai and i rented a tiny, red car and stopped in every place that looked half-worth stopping. that exposed stretch of ocean, those awesome drops, such a wild breaking off point of the earth, the biggest edge i've seen and stuck to. in every little town i thought, i could live here. or maybe here. but the beauty was that i didn't.
there's nothing like driving in the mountains. the warm-cool patterns of sun spots and shadows--warmer and cooler because we're so high up--and the promise of a million things we don't know yet. i hate to be stuck but wonder if it's the escaping that makes this part so good.
