Driving across the country in three days, you realize that America, Pink Floyd, and sleep are all things best experienced at eighty miles per hour. Or so I realized. When I got to my friend Devon’s apartment finally, she moved in to hug me.
“Don’t hug me,” I said. “I probably smell like chipotle sauce and sweat and motor oil.”
“Well I have a shower with your name on it,” she told me.
Later, after I’d showered, I threw the shirt I’d been wearing all week onto her face.
“I hate you,” she told me. Then, “You must be used to the smell. Do you want a bag for that shirt?”
“No, it’s fine,” I said.
“No, you really should put that shirt in the bag.”
Later, after I’d gotten used to smelling like girly cleaning products, I stuck my nose in the bag. It smelled like a dumpster. Like a heroin junkie who had been living in a dumpster. With infected pustules all over his body.
So I had been living on my drive across the country.
I would wake up each morning at a rest stop somewhere. Dawn. I’d check my oil, pee, then start my engine and drive. I’d stop to check my oil, gas up my car, and buy sandwiches from Subways. Sometimes I would buy energy drinks and gallons of water. Sometimes I’d pee. Aside from that, I’d drive.
Driving long distnaces is a marathon of boredom. All I had to entertain myself was my music, and after a while I’d listened to every song on my iPod. I’d count down the miles, calculate in my head how long it would take to reach the next big city.
The sign says 204 miles to Columbus. Three hours. Less. Not bad.
I blazed through the deserts of Nevada and Utah. I climbed into the Rocky Mountains, and drove across the Continental Divide. And then, after descending onto the Great Planes, I drove another two thousand miles, descending to sea level over mostly flat terrain until I finally came to New York.
Now I’m at my girlfriend’s apartment in Brooklyn, and I don’t know what to do with myself.
