Another great trek northward

First up: I made it to my sister Eileen’s house in Michigan safe and sound, surviving a harrowing I-75 drive through Cincinnati and Dayton that had me white-knuckling the wheel for an hour.

Second thing: Deb would NOT have enjoyed this drive. Just being honest. She’d be OK with a little bit of sight-seeing routes, but not to my degree.

“You’re taking me for another one of THOSE drives!” I’ve heard her complain time and again.

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Well, spiritual Deb doesn’t have the same sway as Earthling Deb, so I avoided the interstate when I could.

For example, I didn’t get on the freeway until well into, Georgia. Stayed on U.S. 41 all the way from Inverness. Get north of Williston, and U.S. 41 turns into this beautiful old Florida escape. Too bad I gotta drive 90 minutes of aggravating traffic to get there.

Other trip highlights:

— I mentioned the other day that I have Deb’s car. She drove a ‘24 Kia Soul. I drive a ‘15 Chevy Malibu. Not exactly in the same class.

This Kia has all the bells and whistles. What jumps out is this Big Brother feel to the dashboard. Not only does it give me a little replica sign to tell me the speed limit, it’ll set the number in red if I’m speeding. Frankly, that’s being a little too pushy. And I’m a little freaked out that my car knows the speed limit.

Here’s another thing. On occasion, not often, but over the years I’ve become a decent knee steerer. You know what I’m talking about. Steering with my left thigh while twisting the cap off the Coke bottle. It’s not like I drive miles this way. But to the Kia fun patrol, one second of knee steering is too much because it actually has the nerve to TELL ME to place my hands on the wheel.

Hey Kia, mind your own business!

I know, I know. It’s all for safety. I’m just joshing. Sorta.

— I-75 through Atlanta is not the place for the claustrophobic driver. As I’m creeping through the downtown area, I notice a wall of cars across six lanes going the other way and the same thing across six lanes going my way.

I don’t drive much through Atlanta, but every time I do and run into these backups, I think how there are people stuck in traffic who do this every single day. Imagine that: Every day’s commute includes massive traffic jams. I always return to Citrus County grateful for our smalltown traffic problems.

— I tried to take notes but ran into a problem. I usually use a reporter pad while taking notes when driving (it works better than knee steering). I didn’t have a pad nearby, so I had to type notes into my phone, which is impossible while driving. The note taking stopped somewhere in North Carolina.

— I grabbed two Cattle Dog frozen hot chocolates on my way out of town Tuesday morning. Wednesday morning, I stopped in a small town coffee shop (sorry, didn’t type in the town. Darn note taking!), sort of the local Cattle Dog, and had a frozen hot chocolate. Not bad, but definitely not Cattle Dog standards.

— A funny story from yesteryear, one that will NEVER see the light of day, occurred in Room 13 of the Sunset Motel in Murphy, N.C. Of all my Deb memories on this trip, none beats Room 13 of the Sunset Motel. This was our first stop during a week’s long trip to Michigan for our four-year dating anniversary. (Preachers, close your ears.) We laughed about Room 13 of the Sunset Motel for years after that.

I hadn’t been back to Murphy in quite some time and was happy to stumble upon the little motel. I pulled into the parking lot and snapped a photo of Room 13’s door, just another silly reminder of my late wife that brought an outflow of tears. 

— How am I doing? OK. I’ll get into the details later, but it’s been an extremely emotional and spiritual journey thus far. I’ve wanted to text Deb a thousand times with this detail or that one. It’s been four weeks. I miss my wife so much.

This weekend is the big family Thanksgiving shindig. Looking forward to it.

Have a great weekend, Citrus County friends.

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