Notes from the journey.

Today I was driving around and listening to Bobby Womack. The air was a little cooler than usual, that hint of seasons and parts of life changing that always makes me a little restless. On the side of the road was a happy young couple with their thumbs out, taking in the coast of California. They reminded me of me when I was almost twenty. I had dropped out of college and fallen in love with a wild-haired boy and his dog. We lived in a teepee and ate fresh-picked things and bathed in waterfalls. Heh. Nostalgia.

One February morning, this fella, his dog and I spontaneously decided to hitchhike from Louisville, west. We had no real destination or agenda, nor any reason I can recall for deciding to leave the car behind, much to our parents' chagrin. It was adventure for adventure's sake. That entire trip could be a novel, but today I was reminded of this particular day spent somewhere in Missouri.

Our last ride had been with a truck driver from Romania. He spoke very broken English but had a Bob Marley CD on repeat and sang along with it in his rich, dancing baritone. He said that American truck drivers were scared to pick up hitchhikers, but Europeans were used to it. He thanked us for reminding him of home, flashed one of my favorite smiles I've ever seen, and dropped us south of St. Louis, at some large highway junction, where he was turning east. To this day, when I see a certain semi on the highway, I imagine he's in there, dancing with barely a hand on the wheel, belting out One Love.

There really wasn't anything around that intersection but a large, man-made hill with four truck stop plazas surrounded by low, plowed fields and midwestern highway. At ten in the morning, we figured it would be a great spot to catch our next ride. By four in the afternoon, we were antsy. People looked at us with eyes that had seen one too many made-for-TV movies about axe murderers. We crossed the highway, ate dinner, had philosophical discussions about life. Eventually had midnight dessert and coffee next door. Around 4am we were grumpy and as sick of that crossroads as we could be, and no cars or trucks had come or gone in hours. Swallowing our panic, we took our faltering spirits outside with the thought of pitching a tent until morning, to find the only ground was flooded, freshly-fertilized midwestern mud.

At this point, my friend, exhausted and all out of hope, looks up at the sky and sighs under his breath: "We need a ride south."

Suddenly, out of nowhere, the sleekest black Cadillac hearse was in front of us. A tall man in a black suit with a white collar gets out so gracefully and says: "Y'all say you need a ride south?"

Our mouths hung open.

"Well, I'm Reverend and this is Sister. Hop on in the back."

And we did. They drove us all the way to Memphis and we slept the whole way.

Those two dropped us off in a groggy, happy, half-awake state in the parking lot of what they said was the best chicken this side of the Mississippi. As he's opening the car door, the Reverend says: "Hey, y'all got any Blast All?"

We stared blankly, not sure what that was.

"I got some in a bag in the car, make ya feel real good." And then he winked.

There was an awkward silence where I was wondering if he was offering us some kind of drugs — hadn't my mother warned me about strangers — but he emerged with a small vial of oil. Blessed Oil. He said he made it special and that he prayed over it every day for a month. Then he anointed our foreheads, and our dog's forehead too, and sent us on our way with his prayers and the rest of the oil to share. It smelled like fresh almonds and magic Cadillac. When I shouldered my bag and turned around to wave goodbye, the car was gone.

So, here we are. All waiting for the next Lift.

I grew up in Wisconsin, and I spent the summer and fall before starting college running a small coffee shop in Door County. I lived in this tiny room in the back — more like a closet, really, but it was my first place of my own, and it came with all the coffee I could drink.

Door County is the peninsula thumb of the state that juts into Lake Michigan in these glorious sandstone cliffs. I'd often dangle my legs off those ancient, sun-baked patches of rock and watch the tiny sailboats far below. In the summer it is a cherry lover's dream come true — ripe also with tourists from Chicago and seagulls, but the winters are mostly only inhabited by hermits who love neck-high snow and feeding logs to their wood stoves.

One autumn morning I had to make a deposit at the bank before opening the shop, but the bank was not on any real schedule there, and on this particular day it hadn't opened on time. Across the street was a parking lot with some large boulders and logs at the far end. Behind those boulders was a wooded path we locals liked to keep secret from the tourists. It was a magic place in my mind. Spruce pines led to silver birch groves and meadows of wildflowers to a little pond with a pier. No one was ever there.

Most of the trees had lost their leaves already and the thick morning frost made my steps crunch. Not even the crows were chatting, but I could hear a faint rustling in the distance — a rhythmic, playful sound. I imagined up around the bend in the trail I might see a squirrel bounding through the crisp, tan oak leaf blanket. I made my steps quieter, my bare toes seeking only the dirt of the trail. I steered through a cluster of pines and stopped in awe.

In the clearing was a young maple, a rich bouquet of the brightest coral leaves. It seemed so small and proud in that moment, against the other bare trees, just a few golden birch leaves on their branch tips. The sound I was hearing was not a squirrel, but this little red maple literally throwing its leaves off one by one with a joyous pop at each release. I stood there for half an hour, scarcely breathing, and watched every single leaf fall. When I left, the ground that had been exposed earth beneath it was perfectly covered in a crimson patchwork. I felt like applauding.

That may seem silly — it was just a tree doing what trees do, after all. But it was also a ripening, a rite of passage, a celebration of patience and timing.

Each tiny step leads to a letting go and a celebration eventually. When it's time. At the moment, trusting this is my deeper art.

One summer, when I was about 17, I had taken my dad's car for the weekend. I'm pretty sure I was supposed to be going camping with friends or something, but instead I was on a solo trip to Chicago. Just because. I had the radio blasting. I was singing along. I had all the windows down, blonde hair and bikini top praising the sunshine, on an adventure, no idea where I would stay.

In my rearview I noticed a bright red car coming up fast, swerving a little, so I pulled into the right lane. In that car were three wild women about eighty, doing at least a hundred. The car was filled with balloons and giant sunflowers, and the women were eating ice cream cones. They had their perfectly permed heads thrown back in laughter — the biggest smiles I've ever seen, still. As they sped off into the I-90 sun, I knew they were dancing.