Paolo and I just returned from a trip up north. We drove up the California 1 starting in Santa Monica, through Big Sur all the way to the Golden Gate Bridge. Please make a note to look at Paolo’s pictures, although I’m not sure they do the trip justice. We’ll all have to go back there one day and camp in the redwoods together. Big Sur is truly something to behold, and San Francisco is heaven on earth, with dim sum and hippies and weirdos and fog. The air is rich with the smells of weed smoke and ocean, and there are big bay windows on every pastel townhouse.
That drive was just a warmup for the massive one looming on the horizon. In one week we leave California to return to Washington, DC, where both Paolo and I are starting internships.
Road trips going from west to east don’t seem quite as romantic as the other way around. Manifest Destiny stretched east to west. You’ll never read a coming-of-age tale about a group of friends from Los Angeles dropping out of high school, packing up the car and zooming off for Washington, DC to find desk jobs in publishing. All of Sal Paradise’s enthusiasm for being on the road evaporated once he had to return to New York (to which I say, quit being such a little bitch).
But even though we’re not jetting off to destinations unknown, I still feel a sense of adventure in coming home. It might have something to do with our itinerary – Las Vegas and the Grand Canyon, a ten-hour jaunt through wastelands of west Texas, Nashville and Louisville and Cincinnati and Athens. As cynical as you all know I am, there is undeniable romance in crossing the Mississippi in my fully-loaded Prius, the man I love at my side and the Lord of the Rings audiobook on full blast. When I did it in June, I got a little weepy.
But all schmaltz aside (sort of), I think my pervading adventuring spirit has more to with what I’m coming home to – friends, family, a new job, beers… It may not be the brave new world of California, but to me, those things are certainly not the end of an adventure, but the start of a new one.
that was beautiful risa! getting me all riled up for an adventure and wistfully teary-eyed at the same time. i can’t wait to see you guys, but take your time coming home and savor all the beautiful things that many people overlook. in my experience, adding an extra fifteen minutes to your trip on the scenic route is well worth it, as opposed to counting the endless exits on some bland and uninspired turnpike. but i’m sure you knew that. love you guys both very much.
I really did enjoy this post. Risa. Good luck to you both back out east.
you are totally the sentimental dad ryan (diego)