We Started at the Piggly Wiggly
After that we had no idea where we would go (Part I)
“A journey, after all, neither begins in the instant we set out nor ends when we have reached our doorstep once again. It starts much earlier and is really never over because the film of memory continues running on inside of us long after we have come to a physical standstill.” Ryszard Kapuściński (Polish writer and journalist)
We started from the parking lot of the Piggly Wiggly grocery store near our house — had to stock the cooler! With the cooler stashed behind the seats, camping gear and clothing packed in behind that, stuff that didn’t fit tied to the roof, we were ready to go.
“Ok,” I said to my girlfriend, “Where to?” We had decided not to decide where to go until the car was packed, the motor was running, and we were ready to hit the road. As the ancient Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu said, “A good traveler has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving.”
“I’ve never been to New Orleans,” she said. “Let’s go there.”
The decision to do this — get in the car, head west, and come back home in time for me to get back to my teaching job — was a spur of the moment, made on the last day of school. I had the time, the West always seemed like the freedom to me, and I thought, “If not now, when?” Lynn —…
