This is the last night of my last solo road trip for a very long time. We finally found a pet-friendly room in Palestine, Texas with 230 miles to go tomorrow. I could have found one sooner if I'd stayed on Interstate 20, but I was determined to get away from the steady stream of 18-wheelers, the sun in my eyes.
An accident a couple of weeks ago changed the trajectory of the visit. Almost all plans were upended dealing with the after-effects. It was hard to leave, but it's time to get back home. I plan to spend a week recovering.
Luci and I stopped at the cemetery where my daddy was buried twenty years ago. He's So Everywhere for me, but he's not there. Even so....
Then Will called to wish me a happy birthday. I was sad about leaving Carlene. I was sad about the trip going on an unexpected series of tangents.
Will said, "Being on the road will help, Mama. It always does."
At our first stop in Alabama yesterday, I heard a conversation that tapped into my sadness. A customer in a hoodie said to a clerk, "I tell you one thing I'm proud of. I raised a good man. When I see him in the morning, I think 'I just put you to bed a baby and you woke up a man. I didn't get a chance to say good-bye to my baby.'"
I walked to the car and she followed me out. She was a small Black woman in her forties. "Oh, Mama, you so pretty!" she said to me. Me--tousled and puffy-eyed and sloppily dressed!
I thanked her for an uplifting compliment on my birthday and told her I had overheard her story about her son and was moved by it.
"Your birthday?" she said, leaning in to the car. "Can I hug you?"
So there we were in a parking lot, a young trucker hugging the haggard 74 year old with miles to go before she sleeps.
She warned me about driving. "They is a lot of crazy people on the road. If you see someone acting crazy, just hold back. Get home safe."
That cheered me for quite a few miles!
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