Destinations, Simple Joys, and Discoveries

In the hey-day of Route Sixty-Six, the average family vacation would, in modern terms, be more likely dubbed a "road trip".  No destination in mind, just the open road and seeing the sights, as it were.  I miss that, and wish I had gotten in earlier on it.  A phenomenon I've noticed in my generation and the younger generations is this preoccupation with the destination, and I am somewhat saddened by it.  To be sure, my generation didn't start this trend, but we and those after us certainly continued and propagated it.

I wish to see a return to such a mentality of the journey mattering more than the destination.  Myself, I barely remember things from destinations, such as to a theme park, but I remember the journey itself with some clarity.  On a trip to Texas, I passed through the desert, and saw things I'd never even thought of.  Small things, mostly, but wondrous things to me nonetheless.  I'd never seen, for instance, mailboxes as art pieces before, but there they were.  I'd seen mailboxes set into designs, of course, like the animal whose mouth or rear end must be opened to deposit or retrieve mail, but some of the ones I saw on that trip--well, they defy easy explanation that would preserve the sense of amusement I felt just by seeing them.

Small things, as I said, but good things, exciting things.  I think that if more people were to simply go-- a vehicle or their feet, some money or working as they go, or something; just get out there and go--that they'd rediscover their culture in the most surprising and fascinating of ways.  Did you know that in Weiser, Idaho, there's a fiddle contest open to people around the world?  For a few days each summer, people from around the world gather and forget about everything--race, religion, politics, and everything else--and just play.  Imagine just happening upon something like that.  Spend a day or two listening to people pay the fiddle, then head back onto the open road.

What I'd like to do is, granted, nothing new.  Just get some friends and go along Route Sixty-Six, seeing the things it decides to show us, partaking of the world around me without bogging myself down with unnecessary details about where we're going.  I think more people should do that.  You do that, you travel without a destination, allowing yourself to remain open to whatever experiences your travels bring you, and you learn more about the world you live in.  You come across many microcosm symbolic of the different paradigms that can be found throughout the world.  You come across cities with Little Italy or Little Havana or some similar in them, where there are foods, people, customs, ideologies that you can only find in the "home" countries.

You go, you just go, and you see wonders that you might never see if you stuck to the quickest routes that get you to a specific destination.  You meet people of all walks of life, of all faiths and paradigms, on "road trips", and your own life is enriched by it.  You will see things that you never even conceived of, and even if you disagree with these things, your knowledge of the world is enlarged.  If nothing else, if nothing else, you will have stories to tell friends and family for years to come.  Imagine telling your children and grandchildren about the time you stopped in a diner you saw just because it looked "neat", while passing through a town you never knew existed even though it was in your state.  Those are the kinds of stories, memories, that build more good memories for years to come.