Between last night and this morning, I packed up, hooked up the trailer, loaded the motorcycle, and hit the road for a weekend in Maine. It feels good to be back on the road again, unhindered by things I have to do like deal with stuff from my storage unit. In fact, it feels quite liberating to have everything I own right here with me. This is the first time in my journey that’s been the case. But now, wherever I go, all my stuff goes, too.
There’s not a lot to tell about the drive itself. I left in the late morning to avoid the mobs of idiots, mainly from Massachusetts, who clog the southern Maine highways from mid-afternoon until late evening on a summer Friday afternoon. While there was more traffic than my mid-week drive to deliver the table, it didn’t start to slow down until I reached Freeport, home of L.L. Bean. I used to be a delivery driver in central Maine, so I bailed off the highway and took back roads I knew the rest of the way to Lisbon, where Amy parked me on the lawn for the weekend.
After getting stuff done, we went to dinner at Gritty’s, my old hangout from when I lived here almost 20 years ago. Then we went across the street to the Craft Brew Underground, which she’d been wanting to check out for a while, and knew I’d like with a wide variety of amazing brews. She introduced me to a couple from Southern Tier Brewing, a peanut butter cup imperial stout, and a vanilla scoop imperial ale. Both were among the best beers of their kind I’ve ever had. Then we took a brief tour of places I’d been and even lived before enjoying some twisty roads on the way back to the house. There are reasons why we get along so well.
This all sounds perfectly normal, right? What would you think if I told you the last time Amy and I were in that part of town together was to go to the courthouse and get divorced? Yes, we were married. No, we don’t hate each other. Sure, things were tough during the split, but that was over 20 years ago and we’re over it now, better off as friends. Society tells us that when a relationship, and especially a marriage, doesn’t work out, you’re supposed to hate each other afterward. But I reject a lot of what society tells us we’re supposed to do. I live in a van, for crying out loud.
Smokey Da Van 