Picture this: two years later, faced with carting a lot of stuff North and East, the option of driving out to the Rock is viable – not that I need a viable excuse to do anything.It is the hate of aeroplanes, the carting of overstuffed bags for miles in airports, the overcrowded late planes. It must be that or else why would I put up with Northern Indiana and Ohio, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts.
Being a sequel things cannot be the same. The travel mate, now ensconced in the real world and living in Twin cities, means no human books on tape sharing the trip and sharing of things surreal that are passed along the way – the illegality of the importation of bees,
into Nova Scotia, Marine Atlantic's poster proudly proclaiming three days accident free - leaving the hernia causing large format cameras and all its paraphernalia and only taking the gang – Ubaldo, Ziquinho, the leiquinhas and mounds of film. No worries about passports, taking off shoes, or x-rays.The machine will be different – the now nearing in on 200 000 mile Saturn - which won’t return. It will be left to be sold – would like to keep it as a way of getting about when I had to use airports.
The excuse is having to ship mural sized prints – 20 of them – to a place where things arrive or not and if they arrive they do so on their own time. There was the worry of customs thinking they were valuable opening the packages with less care than required and worse charging some sort of duty.
I reckon that my excitement on driving has more to do with the distance and the near goal – nothing was better than driving north through Maine, the entry into New Brunswick and the Newfoundland lite feel of Cape Breton.
I have forgot the frustration of the first day where after driving forever we were only in Scranton Pennsylvania. I don’t think that I can take yet another trip along the turnpikes of the Midwest.
Again there is this irony. With little time, I would think that I would want to get there but the flights make the next day almost useless as I am running about trying to get my normal bayman’s life back – car, Montréal bagels, drinks at the Duke, cracked eggs at Bruce's. Driving I don’t mind – I think that I would mind if I had to do two days of Midwest turnpikes. As soon as I realise that I really don’t have to make time – well I do have to make that ferry – I can press on when needed then divert when I have time on my hands.
Then there is the freedom of a machine when I am there I can then motor to my hearts delight – or desire or content.
