In the Journey

It truly is In the journey, just as Martin Sexton says so eloquently in his song. "We gotta dig deep down inside and hold on". To our strength, our minds, our sanity. I didn't know how much strength and power I would need to get through the last 9 days, but now that I've been through the experience, I can honestly say I've been through the journey. And it sucked.

DAY 1
We awoke around 6 Tuesday morning, got all of our stuff in the car (after spending three days at home in Illinois visiting the folks and friends). Gave Maddy her tranquilizers and we got in the car. We hopped on I-280 around into Iowa, and it was a straight shot from Davenport into Omaha, Nebraska. It rained and sprinkled the majority of the time throughout Iowa and into Nebraska, but nothing we couldn't handle. We averaged close to 70 MPH, which is pretty good considering driving the moving van while towing the one car.


Ever driven through Nebraska? I do not recommend it. It is flat and, well, flat. And boring. And really flat. With nothing to look at. For 454 miles. Enough said.
The first day was okay, considering the Hyundai doesn't have cruise control OR a CD player. I listened to a lot of NPR.
Maddy, despite being on doggie downers, kept thinking she was missing something. So the poor thing was so sedated, her eyes drooping like crazy and skin hanging off her face, yet she stood the entire day with her head on my shoulder looking out the windows.
We arrived in Cheyenne, Wyoming around 8pm. We checked into our room at the Motel 6 and ordered chinese food. We fell into bed, exhausted, after a shower.

DAY 1 Stats-
Hours in the car- 14
States driven through- Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming
Number of times I heard the word "Jesus" or "Scripture" on the radio- 456,738,927,345

DAY 2- Day in Hell
We left Cheyenne around 6:30am and stopped in Laramie for gas and breakfast. Driving through Laramie, I thought about Matthew Shephard, the young gay student attending U of W who was brutally beaten and murdered. Moises Kaufman and the Tectonic Theatre Company beautifully wrote and produced The Laramie Project, a play about the beating and death of Matthew. It was hard not to think about him while passing through.
We crossed over into Utah after lunchtime. Utah was probably the state we spent the shortest amount of time in, and was the most beautiful. We drove through many mountain ranges from Wyoming to California, and near Salt Lake was the prettiest. Although after you get past Salt Lake City, you have the Bonneville Salt Flats to contend with. For miles upon endless miles of flat, hot Earth that looks like snow. After about 90 miles of salt, we finally reached the Nevada border. My dear husband miscalculated the mileage from the Nevada state line to our stop that evening in Winnemucca. He thought 178 miles. It turned out to be 250 miles, which added another hour and a half to our travel time. Needless to say, I was a little pissed off, not to mention exhausted beyond all belief. To kill time, I called Keith, talked to Lesley on the phone, texted just about everyone I knew. We arrived (finally!) in Winnemucca, Nevada at 8:30 pm. We again checked into our Motel 6 room, got a bucket of KFC and fell to sleep.

DAY 2 stats-
Hours in the car- 15!!!
States driven through- Wyoming, Utah, Nevada
Fun fact- Winnemucca is most famous for it's still-in-operation whorehouse

DAY 3- Holy Crap, is this trip ever going to end?
Awoke again at 6am and got ourselves in the car. By this time, we were completely exhausted. Maddy would no longer take her "Stummies", which is code word for Doggie Downers. She would smell that peanut butter on bread and know instantly that it would make her sleepy. My digestive system was so wound up from eating fast food and having blood sugar spikes for the past three days. And Rob would often throw a tantrum if something didn't go his way. The car smelled like dog piss, human stink and fried food. We were ready to just f#%$ng get there already. About 20 miles outside of Reno, B called to check in and said "Jesus, you sound exhausted"... and it was only 8:30 in the morning.
We crossed over into Calfornia a little after 10am! Yahoo!!! The drive up through Lake Tahoe was so beautiful- exactly how I had remembered it the last time I had driven through, some 12 years ago with my Dad and family on a summer vacation. We made it just north of Sacramento around 1 that afternoon. And boy was it hot. The California desert is hot and ugly. We hopped on the 5 and made our way north to the 20, which would take us on our last road, 101, north to Eureka.
The 20 was this little mountain road, winding and curvy around Clearlake, CA. After about 10 minutes of driving this pass, I thought I was going to yak. But it took us about 2 hours to get through to 101, and this when I almost lost my mind. Knowing we only had about 162 miles left of the journey, I really started to freak out. I felt as if I was having a nervous breakdown, anxiety attack, whatever you want to call it. It was bad. And no one told us that 101 is ALSO a mountain road, winding its way this way and that for about 70 miles. It was fun for about 20 minutes, driving through the redwoods and seeing nature in all it's glory. Yet I was as tired as I've ever been. Tired of being in the car. Tired of stinking. Tired of Maddy drueling on my shoulder. I didn't care anymore. I started to get depressed, like I was driving on the road to nowhere. I look back now and realize it was lack of fluids and exhaustion.
We finally arrived in Eureka around 6:30pm. I cried. It was that good.

DAY 3 stats-
Hours in car- 12
States driven through- Nevada and California
Number of times I almost barfed- 10

We are unpacked. There is food in the fridge. And the weather is gorgeous. We've been lucky to have four days of sunshine and cool weather. We went to the beach Saturday night and gave Maddy her first experience with the ocean, which was hysterical, by the way. Watching her discover the waves trying to chase her was priceless.

Yes, I'm homesick. For Cincinnati. I miss you guys a lot. I miss the idea of you. It's a whole different world out here. The neighbor really does sit on his porch and smoke for the whole world to see. I've never seen so many people with dreadlocks in my life. But everyone is an artist of some type or another. We have a crazy old dude who lives down the street. Our neighbor Amy warned us about him. Amy is a weaver who has a dog named Sally. Sally doesn't like Maddy too much... yet. Anyway, crazy old artist dude down the street has a giant ceramic head in his front yard. Along with a giant ceramic tree. I'm trying to get Maddy to pee on the creepy head. Hasn't happened yet.

Please call or email me. I'm desperate for a friendly voice!

Pictures to come soon. I keep trying but blogger won't let me post any. Maybe it's just my computer.

Love ya!