Travelin' Light - Part I

Youth is hardly human: it can’t be, for the young never believe they will die.

”Other Voices, Other Rooms” - Truman Capote

A thin layer of fog hangs in the air, making the drive more strenuous than it should be. I realize it’s been a long time since I’ve seen the sunrise and I’m impatiently watching the color of the sky. I can tell when the sun is coming even before it lightens the air too much because the mist begins to dissipate. It retreats into low strung clouds that slither their way through what Pennsylvania calls mountains.
The sun is slowly peeking its way through, but the clouds won’t let it clear up the ambiguity of morning. My taillights have the best view, but even my eyes directed westward are warmed at the sight of the world’s rebirth.
I haven’t heard some of the songs urging me on in a couple years. After my initial surge of energy, I come down to one of the beauties of travel: the leisure to dust off cobwebbed thoughts. I idly browse through memories of friends from high school and wonder whether they’re the same people I remember before more sullen thoughts emerge.
I realized that even though traveling over break would be exciting, I was leaving people I loved, people I might not have a chance to see again until late in the spring. Break is the only time I see friends that are students elsewhere. Having beaten the shit out of each other for so long, my brother and I are best friends.
Thinking about my mom with fewer people in the house pushes tears up under my eyes, making them sore. She’s stronger since my dad left, but every day I worry that she’ll be lonely. I can only hope she won’t, and try to stuff the twinge of guilt into my gut that tells me I should be helping her at home. Though neither of us wants me hanging around the house, the thought of her alone still hurts.



I’ve made the trip to Pittsburgh probably five times in either direction, and I remember it feeling longer. This morning it’s like I’ve teleported, though the clock tells me it’s been about the usual four and a half hours. The two Dynastar skis hardly seem secure on my roof rack, but they haven’t tried to jump ship yet. Only four little clips hooked inside my Subaru’s windows keep the skis from catapulting backwards and clattering onto the concrete; or worse, impaling the trailing car with an 182 centimeter construction of wood and plastic lined with metal edges.
While I’d like to see Ashley’s parents, I’m secretly wishing her dad won’t be around. We get along well enough, but there’s something that makes me believe a father won’t be happy with his only daughter running off across the country when he’s barely had the chance to see her. I fear I won’t be warmly received.
It’s our winter break from Ithaca College and we’ve decided to drive to Colorado for some skiing, both thinking that the summoning of Kerouac’s freewheeling spirit might do us well. We’re almost through our undergraduate education and it’s become evident that all we’ve done for years is push and push for grades to pass class after class. Four years of repetitive academic motions have left me feeling penned up. So we’re veering off the cyclical track, pretending we won’t get reeled back in, like we might carom off into the West and never come back.
My fears are allayed, and it’s just Sue Williams at Ashley’s house. Dad is already at work and Ashley’s brother won’t be up for hours. Again I expect a grander exit, imagining we’ll have breakfast and Ashley will have to navigate a sad goodbye, but something seems to have gone horribly wrong with our parents’ sentiments this morning. There’s a quick exchange of holiday greetings and gifts before we’re practically pushed out the door with a cooler loaded full of drinks and sandwiches.
It doesn’t take long for Ashley to realize she’s forgotten a crucial component of travel – her curling iron. Supposing we wouldn’t have survived without it, we turn around before leaving the neighborhood. But what’s three minutes when you have twenty-six hours of driving ahead? Before we slip out of Cranberry Township and set sail on our first significant chunk of travel, I change tunes; I want something we can both enjoy. After filling the tank we’re back out on I-70, with Ohio about forty miles ahead.
Before Ashley joined me the day was a blur. I spent most of my solo leg screaming my lungs out along with songs. Later in the trip, I’d learn from a radio show that people who sing in the car are scientifically proven to fall asleep at the wheel less, making me feel very confident in my ability to remain wide eyed for hours.
Now, with a partner for conversation available, I curb the singing because Ashley would rather talk instead of listen to my cracking voice. But I’m not sure if I’m ready yet. I had settled into a solitary mode of travel, and I’m distant as we pass over our first of many rivers. They exude an infinite nature, and I fruitlessly try to imagine how these divisions on the American map were ever born into existence.
Yesterday, I wasn’t sure what to do about lift tickets for almost a month of planned skiing. The weight of not having enough money for skiing increased the more I dwelled on it. Then, halfway across Ohio, I got a call that lifted the burden of the drive. My friend Natrisha, whose condominium we were planning to stay at for much of the time, was able to arrange a heavily discounted pass. She saved me almost six hundred dollars. With the gorilla of funding erased from my mind, I think I’m finally ready for conversation.
Skiing was, after all, my reason for eating up road in the direction of Colorado. Another is certainly the sense of obligation to travel on a low budget just once before school ends and the real world of work tips off in May. Other reasons I’m still grappling with as I urge my wheels with the accelerator. I’m sure they will come to the surface, but it’s got a layer of ice still too thick to crack right now and I settle for one certainty – I can’t wait to be skiing.