ybsmaR belaC
Jul 25, 2017 · 2 min read

In terms of a lack of a buffer or, in a fashion, a narrative perspective. For instance, when I compare my solo trips to those with a group of friends, or the ones with just myself and my buddy with his 67' Fleetwood(land barge, yes, if I recall correctly, it is the second longest production car in history, the first being a limo model by Cadillac in the same time period), I’m struck by how on the solo trips the only interpretation of what I encountered that I recall was mine alone. Where as, with the group travel, other perspectives were voiced, in a way dulling the experience.

I’ll elaborate a bit with two quick examples.

Back when I was in High School I was on the chess team and we went, as a team, to the State competition. That was an epic deal, with us eight players and one coach blasting down the highway in a big white van.

We stayed down in Springfield, I believe was where it was, for a few days for the competition and holy cow were there a lot of people there. Plus the unfamiliar roads, buildings, terrain, etc. it was rather intense for a kid in High School. But what kept it tamed down, was that we were also surrounded by the intimate familiar, IE. each other. When we snuck out of the hotel room in the middle of the night(ground floor, window) and wandered around the city, the existence of each other snuffed a bit of the sharpness of the reality of what we were doing.

A few years after that, my buddy who later bought the 67' Fleetwood discovered that there was an immediate opening in the school that he was slotted to go to and he had to take off weeks earlier then he had expected. Without time to drive his car with his stuff down to there. So, he flew down and shortly there after I did him the favor of driving his little two door beater pulling a loaded U-Haul trailer down from the Chicago area to — — Orlando!

The difference between “We have a problem” and “I have a problem” became a bit more stark when I noticed a bit of something fly by the window one day during the journey. Later, at a gas station or somewhere, I noticed that an almost dinner plate sized chunk of the tread had flown off of one of the trailer’s tires, exposing the fabric underneath. That was at about the halfway point of the journey and this was pre-cellphone days. The trailer made it fine, even if my duct tape patch flew off the first time I hit 30 mph, as I was leaving a rest area alongside the interstate, with a cop just 50 yards away from me, lurking in the parking lot. Things like that feel a bit more immediate when one is alone, without that buffer of having someone else in the situation with you.

Ditto for experiencing profound vistas, when one is alone the absorption of it is unfiltered and untainted by the views of someone else, for better or worse.

    ybsmaR belaC

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