“Get your kicks on Route 66”
Over the last four weeks I’ve traveled about 20,000 miles and experienced multiple Americas. From commercial aircraft flying from East to West and back, the driver’ s seat of an SUV cruising along the Arizona /Mexico border through border patrol checkpoints, or the Amtrak Acela, returning to Providence for dinner with a colleague, I appreciated the diversity of our country, and developed a greater understanding of the things that both divide and unite us.
I started my new position in LA January 1, and we had already packed the apartment in Providence in early December. There was the trip to Haiti, then a flight from Milot to Port au Prince to Kennedy, and then on LA so I could be fingerprinted for my license, find a rental property, and finalize the job details. Cars and Chester still needed to get from East to West, so a long drive was in order to arrive by December 28th. Finally, I was to come back to Boston, January 6th for my health care management course. I had made arrangements to catch up with Rich Goldberg, Chief of Psych at Rhode Island Hospital and the Miriam, and now SVP for Lifespan Network Development, who is a friend and fellow graduate of the Boston program.
You truly don’t realize the grandeur of this country until you drive from one end to the other. I’ve flown enough to have recognized landmarks and cities, appreciated the circular irrigation pattern in the high plains, and reveled in watching a thunderstorm from 36,000 feet, the cloud to cloud sparks lighting the night sky. But as Rhode Island faded in the mirror, I was looking forward to the trip down 95 and across Virginia, Tennessee and the South. Finding dog friendly hotels was easier than I thought and appreciating the rise in the terrain, the change in vegetation, and the new accents and voices on the radio made for a surrogate marker of the trip’s progress. Transitioning from bumper to bumper around New York to seeing no one else for miles around in the Bayous of Louisiana, I realized that we adapt to our environment, and develop attitudes and mores that work for that region. We bemoan the dissent in Congress and the narrow mindedness of those who live in other regions than ours, yet it became perfectly apparent why those differences occur. And I can only imagine what early settlers felt as they gazed across an endless dessert, and worried about survival.
Airplanes are efficient ways to travel, but the time warp doesn’t always give you a chance to appreciate how far you’ve gone. Most airports look the same, although a few have nice amenities (the rocking chairs in Charlotte.) On a trip from JFK to LAX, a former cast member of Saturday Night live, sat down in front of me, he was clearly fatigued and appreciated that his fellow travelers left him alone. From what I could tell, this New York – LA trip was repeated on a frequency similar to many of us traveling on a regular basis from Providence to New York. In five hours, we had crossed 2500 miles and 3 time zones. It was dark when we left, and dark when we landed. Quick and yet sterile. In some ways we’ve made flying so easy that it’s lost its adventure – but that’s for another blog.
Before moving to the East Coast, my experience with trains was going from Chicago to Canton, Ohio on the Broadway Limited, when I was in college – a completely different way to experience America. I would have flashbacks to “The Sting” and met quite a few unique personalities, who had plenty of time to talk in the bar. The Grand Stations built in the 30’s always make me think of my parents traveling, or young men in uniform, returning to their base. You would get snapshots of America, and I always remember the smell of jelly as we rolled through Orville Ohio, home of Smucker’s. Even today, the Acela is my preferred way to go to New York, although the food is a bit more like the airlines. I took Amtrak Sunday night from Boston to meet Rich. Walking up the steps at the Providence Station, I immediately thought about finding the car and heading back to the East Side. Took a minute to reorient, and I had a great dinner and chance to reflect on the past and the future. Train back that night, a plane to Baltimore yesterday to see Rachel, who just got back from France, and I’m currently following the sun back west on Delta. Hop in the car and will still get into the office.
BTW, the picture is of the Salton Sea from the car heading to LA. The light was perfect, and I stopped to capture the moment. Flown over it multiple times as the LAX departure corridor is right there, but I felt it in a different way, having driven over multiple days and thousands of miles. There are new opportunities in California – there are friends and family back East – and in between is an amazing collection of geography, cultures, and experiences that we call America.
Route 66 was the road to dreams from Chicago to California. On your bucket list should be a Coast to Coast drive. And let me know what new perspectives you find.
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