Reflections on Too Much Highway, Way Too Fast

My friend Dick Budrow would have taken a look at us, and with a quick sniff rolled out the pronouncement: "You look like a couple of vagabonds, and smell like unwashed camels."

It's no way to live--running down the road with deadlines ahead and too much pavement to cover in the time allowed. I don't know about other fulltimers, but five hours in the saddle is just way too much time behind the wheel. But to try and meet appointment deadlines in the Northwest, that's about what it's taking to make the deadline.

Drive. And drive. And drive. Make the occasional fuel stop and grumble about the high prices. Find a suitable place to drop anchor. Make a quick meal. Try and unwind. Then fall into the sheets with road weariness. I know the Israelites wandered 40 years in the wilderness; still I think Moses had them sit tight for more than just a night before moving on to the next stop.

This day to day grind causes you to miss too much. Driving so fast with the "next stop" in your sights doesn't allow enough time to smell roses, or anything else--other than yourself and the exhaust pipe of the guy ahead of you. Of the two, I'm not sure which is worse. I know I'll be kicking myself for a while over the one that happened yesterday: Driving across an empty stretch of Nevada I came upon a "deer crossing" warning sign. Sure enough, some frustrated hunter had used the sign for target practice--but he didn't just put the obligatory single shot through the deer's heart area: He roundly and precisely put shots all around the silhouette of the critter. Would have been a great addition to my "sign" photo collection. But I didn't have time to stop and shoot the sign myself.

On the return trip, I promise myself, things will be different.