Tuesday, August 19 2008
Mountain Home, ID to Portland, OR

Home again.

I feel like I should be able to find some kind of grand theme to tie my whole adventure together. But you know what? I don’t think life is really like that, all bundled up in neat little lessons and quips and quotes to hand on your refrigerator. No, it’s a lot more complicated than that, and I’m not going to try to put a tidy bow on the past five weeks just for the sake of form.

It’s difficult to believe that all of these things have really taken place during the same trip. I think about my time in San Francisco and Los Angeles, and it seems a lot longer than five weeks ago. Hell, I was in St. Louis at the Arch with Samuel the Amish gentleman on Friday and it seems like months removed from right now.

I’ve done my best to talk to a bunch of different people. I know I could have spoken to more, but I also know that I had to step outside of my own comfort zone in order to approach a lot of the people I did. There was a lot of learning that went on, and maybe some self-discovery, some really good times with friends, and perhaps a little sadness along the way, too.

Ten years ago, I made a very similar trip–though that one was only 3 weeks long. I was a different person then, as all of us were ten years ago. (as all of us were five years ago, or one year ago) Maybe I’ll make another grand tour of the United States once another decade has passed; I know there are many other places I’d like to visit and I’m sure I’ll have more friends to drop in on when that time comes.

For now, I’m going to settle back into my life here in Portland and enjoy remembering my big Road Trip of ‘08. I’m sure my Portland friends can look forward to me babbling on with story after story for a long time to come.

Thanks to everyone who so very sweetly followed along with me by reading and commenting. I’ll keep this blog live as a record and as a nice archive for anyone who wants to come back and re-listen to any of the voices or hear any of my stories again.

For now, I am going to slip into my very own bed and sleeeeeeeeeep. Good night, everyone, and pleasant dreams!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 20th, 2008 at 12:00 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.