I guess it must be wanderlust or trying to get free...
...from the good old faithful feeling we once knew.
Carefree highway, let me slip away on you.
Even with the intermittent stomach death of the last few days, I feel more like myself now than I have in I don't know how long. Yesterday was spent visiting the DOWNTOWN Oklahoma City area and then heading to Norman for a turr of the National Weather Center. After dinner and a turr of the OU campus, we headed back to Kim's place for random discussion and video from the Comfort Inn destruction incident.
As an aside, if you have a chance to visit the Oklahoma City National Memorial, you should definitely do it. It will wreck you for a little while, but this is my second visit and it was no less moving than the first. I don't think anyone can read the offerings left on the western fence and not get at least a little misty-eyed.
In any case...
Today, we once again got up at 1 pm and took our sweet time getting moving. We drove east into Arkansas (I can cross another state off the list), and it was quite beautiful, even if it was pretty stereotypical in the western portion of the state. The Ozarks are more impressive than I expected.
As I type this, I'm on the turnpike between Tulsa and Oklahoma City. Looks like tomorrow's severe threat is remarkably minimal for the central plains states, so I suspect tomorrow will be a travel day for points northward, perhaps to set up for early next week and see some sights along the way. In any case, I hope like hell that this newfound sense of relative calm will accompany me back to more familiar climes.
A happy accident tonight took us along scenic US 412 in eastern Oklahoma, which was much like many other scenic routes we have been on in the last 5 days, in that it had me thinking about a slower pace of life and the pressures that success itself foists upon you. I often envy those who are content to live out their days in modest and quiet surroundings, toiling away for just enough to scrape by on. I wonder what they've figured out that I haven't.
Last night, as the four of us stood in the parking lot of the weather center discussing the frustrations of our lives, I remarked that I didn't think I'd be this dead inside at 25. Days like today, and the past several, show me though that my soul is still very much alive, if crushed occasionally beneath the weight of life, responsibility, expectation, and injuries past. That's just how life goes, and certain changes in my life will make that easier to work with in the coming months. The greatest highlight of this trip is relearning what it is like to not be haunted by things you can't control.
In any case, I haven't seen Indiana in a long time, but I do sort of look forward to getting back and doing a little road tripping of my own. Oh, and if you ever had any doubt, Gordon Lightfoot is about the greatest traveling music one can own. I've listened to my Lightfoot greatest hits CD about three times today and it has provided a wonderful backdrop for the "salt of the earth" surroundings in which I have found myself. Enjoy, for example, this offering:
"Restless"
There's a kind of a restless feeling and it pulls me from within,
it sets my senses reeling and my wheels begin to spin.
In the quietude of winter you can hear the wild geese cry
and I will always love that sound until the day I die.
There's a plain and a simple answer to each and every quest
from every quiet dance who might be a special guest.
In a movie made for TV or a late night interview,
you might even find them on the Young and the Restless too.
Do you get that restless feeling when you hear a whistle blast
like an echo from the past of an old engine flying down a road that's ironcast?
The lake is blue, the sky is gray, the leaves have turned to gold.
The wild goose will be on her way, the weather's much too cold.
When the muskie and the old trout too have all gone down to rest,
we will be returning to the things that we love best.
Do you get that restless yearning when you think about your dad
and the scrimshaw that he had of an old schooner roving neath a sky that's ironclad?
There's a kind of a restless feeling and it catches you off guard
as we gaze off at the distance through the trees in my back yard.
I can feel that restless yearning of those geese as off they roam
then trade that for a warm bed and a place I can call home.
Will you get that restless yearning when you hear the wicked blast
of a spectre from the past of a cold diesel rolling down a road that's built to last?
Still I get that restless feeling when I hear a whistle blast,
see an image from the past of an old schooner flying down a sky that's overcast.
Carefree highway, let me slip away on you.
Even with the intermittent stomach death of the last few days, I feel more like myself now than I have in I don't know how long. Yesterday was spent visiting the DOWNTOWN Oklahoma City area and then heading to Norman for a turr of the National Weather Center. After dinner and a turr of the OU campus, we headed back to Kim's place for random discussion and video from the Comfort Inn destruction incident.
As an aside, if you have a chance to visit the Oklahoma City National Memorial, you should definitely do it. It will wreck you for a little while, but this is my second visit and it was no less moving than the first. I don't think anyone can read the offerings left on the western fence and not get at least a little misty-eyed.
In any case...
Today, we once again got up at 1 pm and took our sweet time getting moving. We drove east into Arkansas (I can cross another state off the list), and it was quite beautiful, even if it was pretty stereotypical in the western portion of the state. The Ozarks are more impressive than I expected.
As I type this, I'm on the turnpike between Tulsa and Oklahoma City. Looks like tomorrow's severe threat is remarkably minimal for the central plains states, so I suspect tomorrow will be a travel day for points northward, perhaps to set up for early next week and see some sights along the way. In any case, I hope like hell that this newfound sense of relative calm will accompany me back to more familiar climes.
A happy accident tonight took us along scenic US 412 in eastern Oklahoma, which was much like many other scenic routes we have been on in the last 5 days, in that it had me thinking about a slower pace of life and the pressures that success itself foists upon you. I often envy those who are content to live out their days in modest and quiet surroundings, toiling away for just enough to scrape by on. I wonder what they've figured out that I haven't.
Last night, as the four of us stood in the parking lot of the weather center discussing the frustrations of our lives, I remarked that I didn't think I'd be this dead inside at 25. Days like today, and the past several, show me though that my soul is still very much alive, if crushed occasionally beneath the weight of life, responsibility, expectation, and injuries past. That's just how life goes, and certain changes in my life will make that easier to work with in the coming months. The greatest highlight of this trip is relearning what it is like to not be haunted by things you can't control.
In any case, I haven't seen Indiana in a long time, but I do sort of look forward to getting back and doing a little road tripping of my own. Oh, and if you ever had any doubt, Gordon Lightfoot is about the greatest traveling music one can own. I've listened to my Lightfoot greatest hits CD about three times today and it has provided a wonderful backdrop for the "salt of the earth" surroundings in which I have found myself. Enjoy, for example, this offering:
"Restless"
There's a kind of a restless feeling and it pulls me from within,
it sets my senses reeling and my wheels begin to spin.
In the quietude of winter you can hear the wild geese cry
and I will always love that sound until the day I die.
There's a plain and a simple answer to each and every quest
from every quiet dance who might be a special guest.
In a movie made for TV or a late night interview,
you might even find them on the Young and the Restless too.
Do you get that restless feeling when you hear a whistle blast
like an echo from the past of an old engine flying down a road that's ironcast?
The lake is blue, the sky is gray, the leaves have turned to gold.
The wild goose will be on her way, the weather's much too cold.
When the muskie and the old trout too have all gone down to rest,
we will be returning to the things that we love best.
Do you get that restless yearning when you think about your dad
and the scrimshaw that he had of an old schooner roving neath a sky that's ironclad?
There's a kind of a restless feeling and it catches you off guard
as we gaze off at the distance through the trees in my back yard.
I can feel that restless yearning of those geese as off they roam
then trade that for a warm bed and a place I can call home.
Will you get that restless yearning when you hear the wicked blast
of a spectre from the past of a cold diesel rolling down a road that's built to last?
Still I get that restless feeling when I hear a whistle blast,
see an image from the past of an old schooner flying down a sky that's overcast.