Slow and Easy

Days begin to run together after awhile. When I skip a day of blogging—or like yesterday write only enough to serve as a placeholder for a day that requires too much of me to enjoy writing—my recollections of what and when and where fade into a chalky dust. The heat doesn’t help. It petrifies my ability to think, as if my brain were a sculptor’s clay left in a hot kiln to fire and harden. Making the gentle transition from the cool temperatures and high altitudes of Silverthorne, Colorado to the lower altitude and higher temperatures of Castle Rock, Colorado was wise of us, I think. But even that gentle transition was not enough to clear my head. Driving from Castle Rock through Denver was a nightmare; the pavement as we descended from Castle Rock barely covered its own sub-base. The insanity of drivers switching lane at ninety miles per hour was horrifying. Yet we made it to Castle Rock and then on to Amarillo, Texas. Mi novia did much of the driving from Silverthorne to Amarillo; she worried that I was utterly incapable of driving safely, especially on roads patched together with tar and loose boulders. I think I’m getting the order of the days right; the days remain something of a patchwork of vague moments punctuated with sharply felt experiences. We left Amarillo yesterday with me behind the wheel; I drove most of the way.

I do not remember exactly when, but a few days earlier—on the way home from northern California—a bird flew low in front of the car on the highway and turned sharply toward us. I felt a “thud,” sensing immediately that the bird had struck the front of the car, which probably was traveling at 75 miles per hour. But I looked in the rear view mirror, expecting to see its body fall to the roadway; I saw nothing. We did not think more about it for a day or two. Then, coming out of a restaurant one day, we saw its body; the head was lodged in the grille and the body hung down below. I had nothing to use to remove it, so we went on our way. Finally, when we left Amarillo yesterday morning, I dislodged the creature as I bought gas to begin the day’s journey. The poor bird’s body had been lodged in the grille for days; probably since its demise in Utah or western Colorado.

We stopped in Trinidad, Colorado on the drive south from Castle Rock toward Amarillo. We ate lunch at a place called Las Animas Grill before making a brief tour of the downtown area, making note of the fact that the town was very appealing to usWe noticed the bird’s dead body when we returned to the car after lunch, but I had nothing to use to remove its corpse from the car. I felt a sense of embarrassment and remorse as I climbed into the car after seeing the bird’s body there. A decent human being would have gently extracted the carcass from the grille and placed it somewhere out of the path where it might have been crushed under tires or underfoot. But I left it attached to the front of a 2016 Subaru. I still consider myself a decent human being, but that moment argues otherwise.

Amarillo was hot. But the motel was good. Nicely designed, comfortable, and like most of the places we stayed, obscenely expensive. Still, staying in a motel is cheaper than paying for an RV and then feeding the thirsty RV with very expensive gasoline and paying high prices for tiny pieces of real estate to park it (and relieve it of unmentionable liquids and semi-liquids) overnight. But, still, I find some RVs (especially very small RVs) very attractive.

The drive from Amarillo to Hot Springs Village took about ten hours, including occasional stops and lunch in Mustang, Oklahoma, an Oklahoma City suburb. Mustang, Oklahoma is home to an outlet of RibRack, a chain BBQ restaurant. The food was edible, but I would recommend trying someplace else, were I asked for a suggestion as to places to eat in Mustang. There must be better places. But, then, Mustang looks like Suburban Anywhere, America; everything looks artificial and new and identical to things artificial and new everywhere else one finds suburbs of large, nondescript cities.

+++

I’ve been following a blog lately, Kelly’s Quest, that I find interesting and insightful and thought-provoking. I will quote today’s post in its entirety, which is a quotation itself:

As mystics throughout time have found, the road to discovery, to peace and enlightenment is a journey into Self. There is more to our conscious being than we realize and it is from within that we find the keys that unlock our inner wisdom. It is from within that we can connect with the source of knowledge that lies beyond the limits of our five senses.

~ Rosicrucian Manuscript ~

The blog’s posts do not always run parallel to my ways of thinking, but they always spark in me an intellectual pursuit of one kind or another. If nothing else, they encourage me to explore whether my beliefs and assumptions are grounded in my perceptions of reality or whether, instead, they are based solely on what I have been “told” or led to believe. I think it pays to question one’s biases and assumptions and beliefs and guiding principles; they do not always belong to oneself. Sometimes, we think we hold a belief, only to realize on reflection that we “believe” only because we have been too lazy to investigate to an extent that allows us to really understand.

+++

I got more sleep last night than I needed. I went to bed around 11 and woke this morning after 8. On one hand, I hate that I missed all the dark solitude I so deeply treasure. On the other, I woke feeling rested (but sore from too much time in bed) and relaxed. I felt no pressure to jump up and write my blog. No pressure to make breakfast. No pressure to start a cup of coffee. Just relaxed. I have plenty to do today—things I must get done—but I feel no pressure. They will get done. I am just giving myself time to do them.

+++

I feel love this morning. Do you feel it?

About John Swinburn

"Love not what you are but what you may become."― Miguel de Cervantes
This entry was posted in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink.

One Response to Slow and Easy

  1. Becky says:

    Welcome home!

I wish you would tell me what you think about this post...

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.