My wife is gone.  For the next two weeks, my wife is traveling for work.  You know what that means…

Road Trip!  To where my wife is…

What’s the matter with that!?!  She’s in Colorado!  Okay, maybe you haven’t been married as long as I have.  Or maybe you’ve been married longer.  Or maybe you just don’t like your wife…  (I’d keep that to myself if I were you).  Or maybe you just haven’t been to Colorado.

Either way, it’s still a road trip.  Naturally, that means different things to different people.  If you’re 12, it may mean putting up with your little brother irritating you for hours while your dad blames everything on you and threatens to turn the car around.  If you’re 8, it may mean baiting your older sister into violence so she will lose the game on points with your dad.  Hey! It’s just as easy to win the game on points if you take some of them from the other side than if you exert the effort to put them up yourself.  Or, to paraphrase:  Subversiveness is the best offense.  Besides, you may have a promising career in politics ahead of you.

Where was I?  Oh, yeah.  If you’re older, you probably just see it as an opportunity to get away.  This is a viable option if you want to get away TO someplace or if, like me, you just want to BE away.  Please don’t confuse this topic with people telling you to GO away.  I have some experience (a lot) with this subject, as well, but we’ll go into that another time.

Now, if you want to get TO someplace and you’re not concerned with the process of getting there, you may want to find the cheapest flight available (don’t forget to take into consideration your checked baggage charge, carry-on charge, choose-your-seat charge, breathable air charge and bag-of-6-pretzels-that-you-used-to-get-for-free charge.  There is no option for the get-away-from-the-person-next-to-you-who-texts-through-the-whole-flight-because-the-rules-don’t-apply-to-him charge, so you can’t pay extra for one of the things worth paying for).  If, however, you find that the journey itself IS the destination, you may want to travel in a slower, more old-fashioned manner.

Actually, I was referring to driving, but drawn carriage, horseback or even hiking will work.  For our purposes we’ll consider the driving road trip and if you’re interested in one of the other methods of travel you can just read the rest of the article more sloooowlyyyy.

Now, for this type of excursion I would recommend circumven…, circumnaviga…, um, not driving on the Interstate highways.  Granted, in some areas you may want to use it just because, eventually, you’ll have to go back to work.    Most western states come to mind and some are worse (or better, depending on your perspective) than others.  In these areas you are often forced to use the Interstate due simply to a lack of options.  You’ll find there are a lot of things you can see while driving on the Interstate Highway System.  This is just an accident.  Interstate highways were never purposefully placed next to anything interesting but, hey, they have to be next to something, right?  In most cases the things worth seeing were placed there after the highway was built or they were just too costly and impractical to work around.    And yes, that is the kind of thing I would toss in just because I thought it chuckle-worthy, but in this case, it’s true.

Of course, had the designers of the highway system known that, in the future, the human-carved mountain sculpture of a nations great, historical leaders and statesmen would go unnoticed by people checking their “likes” (from people they don’t really know) on a small device they’re staring at while not paying attention to their driving, they would have diverted the Interstate past a perpetual train wreck.  It would have made no difference.

Anyway, if you’re cruising the countryside I recommend choosing a good state or federal highway, preferably one with only two lanes.  This is the difference between “cruising” and “traversing” the countryside.  I would also recommend cutting 5 mph off the speed limit, just to help force you to look around.  If it’s a nice day, open your window…   yeah, I know it’s hard to hear the radio!  You used to be a kid; turn it UP!  Better yet, turn it off.  This is the best way to experience the excursionary pioneer spirit in a few days time.  Would you rather load all your belongings in a covered wagon and slog across the prairie?  I didn’t think so.  Trust me, this is better.

With the wind brushing your brow let your daily problems blow away with it.  Absorb the broad emptiness.  Imagine your solitude if you were an explorer.  Think about where you would be if your car quit.  No, your car didn’t make a funny noise; that was just to make you concentrate on the loneliness, the solitude, the individual strength needed and the fortitude of the earliest people in this unforgiving wilderness.  And the freedom.   You are free!  No constraint…  No restrictions…  No expectations…  NO!  Your car did NOT make a noise!  Maybe you should take the bus.

The point is, use this time to embrace your lack of ultra-modern civilization.  You still have your cell phone, you’re just not tethered to it.  You have your air-conditioning and fuel injection and paved highways and you can have cable tv if you stop at a motel for the night.  Enjoy the disconnect!  Stop to read one of those roadside markers.  Pull off to a historic landmark at the side of the road.  Some of them are very interesting (DISCLAIMER:  Not the one you stop at.  That one will be one of the dull ones.  Still, don’t give up – most of them are interesting and educational).

In other words; relax.

And for those of you not wanting to take a road trip to where your spouse is, you may want to try to think of somewhere you can take a road trip, get away from everything and everyONE for a few days…  and at the same time receive those elusive marital points for your enjoyment.

Wave to me in the aquamarine ’66 Thunderbird if you finally understand.  Have a good trip.