Tuesday, August 8, 2017

Embrace Life Not Work

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Nico (front) and Christopher relaxing after a day of summer camp. August 6, 2017.


August 8, 2017


I recline my driver car seat back to a relaxing position. However not too relaxing, As the pilot of this ship I don’t want to fall asleep on a 700-mile road trip. I have precious cargo onboard. I have worked my ass off the past 2 months. Time to start embracing life and not work.

I love road trips to escape from my normal reality. The long drive is my window of opportunity to delve into my imagination and explore my wildest dreams on the road map of my brain. I think, maybe my 85,000 word book goes viral, New York Times best seller! Or, I come into a lot of money and I can buy that new house I have been eyeing and I won't have to worry about the down payment. I can plan my future. I see a future tubing down the Chattahoochee River. Man is it good day to dream.

I pull my car away from the swale driveway and we are off. 10 mph, 20 mph, 50 mph. Merging on the highway the asphalt passes beneath the rubber tires while my car cruises 80 miles an hour on this long high way and we are on our way.

My car passes the slower vehicles. These drivers are on their own mission to an unknown destination. They are just blurs while I drive quickly out of this town. I hope life is taking them to the places they want to be, other than work, just like I'm doing now, as I embrace life.

I need a break from heartache and worry. Life is all about work, to make my ends meet, just to live life without worrying.  Bills, mortgage payment, car payment all life's expediters. Now is the time to cast the BS of work aside and have only my family near me and start new experiences. I don’t mind being known as that fictional dad Clark Giswold from National Lampoons movie Vacation. He just wanted to be the best dad who offered the best experience for his kids.

The road noise slightly hums inside my vehicle. The car pierces the air and whistle while it works its way to the Florida, Georgia line.  We are a missile traveling north through the state of Florida headed for the green mountains of Northern Georgia. I am the captain of this trip and I’m in control of when and where we will stop. Oh so I think. Of course I will be overridden by the Commander. She knows what is best.

“Hey look honey, Alligator petting zoo, lets stop!”

“No, keep going.”

“Henry’s Sloppy Joe’s oil based meat served on butter rolls. Lets stop and eat!”

“No, the only gas going on in this car is the gas we pour in it at a gas station.”

The green trees stay in place as my car drives by like a runaway locomotive on an endless train track. My car is slicing through a manmade path. Cows graze in the wide swaths of pastures that are laid before me like an endless bed comforter. The cows could be the dinosaurs that used to roam these parts well before mankind made a footprint. Instead of a Jurassic park moment living in a fantasy of my mind, I laugh at the idea of sticking my head our the window and yelling, “moo.”

"What are you laughing at," the commander asks.

"Speaking to cows on the road side who think I'm crazy and laugh at me as I drive by because I yelled, 'moo'. But only they stare at me, kind of how you are looking at me now."

I guess I should be more daring and go back to dinosaurs and killer snakes. However, there are no T-Rex’s or Velociraptors chasing me down only the Dodge Viper tailgating me. 

My car windows are an invisible force field. They take the brunt of the meteors that are showering the front window. They explode everywhere. I use the “zalphire window wipes” to clear the debris off so I can see outside.  

“Dad, what’s all that stuff on the window?”

“Those are meteors.”

“No they are not,” he laughs, "those are bugs!”

Yes the bugs explode over the windshield. Their little carcasses splatter and are left as little streaks when the windshield wipers glide over them. Those damn marks will never go away. It is as if they will forever be tattooed there like hash marks of airplanes on the side of an Air Force jet that the pilot marks on the fuselage marking numbers of aircrafts he has shot down.


I have 400 more miles to go on this trip to Georgia. Maybe I can convince the car load of zombies to stop at the deserted haunted amusement park. If I can't convince them to stop, well, that's okay because my life is good as long as I continue to embrace life and not work.


Hanging out at the Hard Rock Cafe in Atlanta, Ga. July 16, 2017.

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