Is This You? What’s It Worth To You?

Road trips are such an amazing way to spend a week or so. Road trip just screams vacation and all the vacation things you can create along the roads you travel.

Travel is a period of time where the rules do not apply. Well let me restate that. The regular rules of kindness and courtesy and you cannot kill anyone. Those rules still apply. But all else is up for grabs. I live by these very easy to follow Travel Rules.

First. While on a road trip, when you stop for gas and the facilities and snacks, you should come out laden with things like you were a kid who was given a hundred bucks and no time limit! Come on, it’s a road trip. Buy the gummy everything. Get that little, or big, container of rich thick cool chocolate milk.  I may have to put the kybosh on those weird little bags of orangish circus peanuts. I’ve never been able to figure out what they truly are. But the bigger the bag of Cheetos the better.

Second. Stop lots and see what it looks like when you are not going 75 miles per hour. There is ALWAYS a reason to stop. Once in Texas I stopped because I was passing cotton fields. I had never seen cotton growing. I ran onto a young kid that knew more about cotton than I could have ever learned from a book. He was, I would bet, going to be the Cotton King of Texas one day. And I will be able to say, “It was worth the stop.”

Third. Be aware, but not afraid. Look at every one of those stops on your road trip in this way. If you were out in your yard, or on your farm, or at work or at the local watering hole, and a couple or a single stranger or a family stopped by, would you treat them welcoming or with the evil eye? Personally, I’m open, but aware of course. You never want to stop somewhere, open all the doors and the hatch back and let out six kids without shoes, a big slobbery dog and the little woman with a look of “HELP ME. I’ve been kidnapped!” Be who you would want to see stop at your corner of the world. In our little town I like to ask where people are from and magically the door to kinship opens up. While out and about I will turn the tables and ask a local, “What’s new in your neck of the woods.” Uh, that really doesn’t work in Manhattan. Just sayin’.

Three ideas to keep in mind, three things that might make your road trips memory making times. But! Yes, a well-traveled “but.” On the other side of the bench seat. HAHA. There are a few things that you might keep in mind. The first day of a road trip, after getting everything ready and packed, car gassed, tires aired up, you went back three times and made sure the stove was turned off and the toilets were all flushed, you should take the driving time to relax and breathe. It gets easier the second day!

The second day goes well. Then day number three through 7 or 14 or 21 or, the “ARE WE HOME YET” day? Well first thing you will notice is that your roomy car is getting smaller by the minute. You’ll swear the rain storm you drove through on the Kansas plains shrunk your automobile by about three to seven inches. By the time you get back home, your Suburban is the size of a Mini Cooper!

As the days roll by and the miles add up and the pictures are taken and the snacks are eaten, the hope of every road tripper is that the memories will be fun, funny and even well worth the time you heard, “PULL OVER I’M SICK.” Then, when you do get back to your own back yard, kitchen, shop, bed, and toilet? Well, the hope is that every time you grab and put on that very cool Route 66 t-shirt you bought on the corner in Winslow, Arizona, you only remember the good times and are ready to again---hit the road, Jack!

Road trips are to go to see grandparents. A road trip is to get you to your cousin Charolett’s wedding. You know the one nobody thought would EVER find a man.

Oh, and the most important thing. A road trip gives you time to get to know a new person in your life. Be sure they road trip well. To spend your life with someone you dang well better be able to go road tripping with them. Are they worth it?

Trina lives in Diamond Valley, north of Eureka, Nevada. She loves to hear from readers. Email her at [email protected]

Really!