Summer Road Trip (08.03.22)

One of the signature aspects of the pandemic for me has been a profound sense of confinement, which may be why I’ve found such pleasure this summer in modest solo road trips. The Midwest world is beautiful, even though driving solo at 65 mph allows only brief impactful glimpses. Then the beauty is behind you, and you are moving on. On!

US 31, what we used to call a divided highway, runs south in the state of Indiana, bisected by crossroads large and small. It is immensely and entirely flat. Still, after a long constriction, one’s eyes are fresh to everything. Here are quick mental snapshots I caught from behind the wheel, driving alone straight down the center of the country.

A sighting of a freight train in the distance, headed east, with thirteen tankers, and three graffiti-covered boxcars, incongruously urban. No caboose. And the long Doppler howl of its whistle as it crossed the highway.

Local radio stations with crop reports, funeral announcements, and ads for very small businesses read by earnest thespian-oriented employees.

Empty perimeters of shade trees, geometrically square, likely former farmyards. Perhaps a peony near where the door once stood, and a windbreak to the north and west. Plains winter winds are fierce.

Long-legged farm equipment towering over the young rows, meant to leave room for the crops to grow tall.

An old roadside cemetery with the highway so close that headstones were leaning over the ditch. One hopes the cemetery occupants are on the other side of the stones.

A home-painted road sign. “Shuffleboards! New. Used. Custom. Installation.” I didn’t know you could buy shuffleboards on the secondary market, or have them customized, and/or have them installed.

A car, not at all new, passing me fast with a bumper sticker for the Daystrom Institute (for Advanced Robotics, of course.) A kindred spirit! Make it so!

One glimpse of a small unmoving gray pony leaning against a fence and nearby, a Bigfoot silhouette in a vast empty field of young hay, apparently approaching the human habitation at the top of the slope.

And of course the high and constant blue sky curving from horizon to horizon.

We are small, are we not, with our busy-ness and our concerns? What have you seen this summer that bears witness to the beauty and wonder we can find in this difficult world?

Photo by Carmine Savarese | Unsplash