The Long Road Home

How far is it from Portand to Austin?

I checked the mileage on the Rand-McNally map and it's about 2000 miles (how analog of me right? would have iPhones it, but alas I have no cell service...we must be back in the West!)

And so, we're making our way home, playing two gigs, one in Cody, WY, 1000 miles from Portland. And on to Wichita, Kansas about 800ish miles from Cody. Luckily, we have a day between each gig, to cover most of the ground.

Here's how we work these drives. We leave right after the gig and drive all night until we hit a town about 250 miles from our destination. Then we hunker down for a lazy afternoon and blissfully early night (when did my preferred bedtime become 8pm? Oh yeah, when I got pregnant). We rise at a reasonable hour and then take a leisurely drive into the town of our gig.

The big bus barrels right on through. But none of us, especially the littlest of us, want to be in the car for 20 hours.

We're all in agreement that as brutal as an all night drive is, it's a fair trade for an early night and a not so early leave time. In fact, today I feel positively...positive. (I was out by 9pm. A little later than my ideal bedtime, but still sweet.)

Yesterday's drive to our stopping point in Bozeman
(where by the way, it totally snowed! But didn't accumulate on the roads, which left the mountains beautiful and the roads passable. The best of all possible worlds.) and today's drive to Cody are reminders of how vast and seemingly uninhabited most of this country is. So much land. So few people. So much space.





So much looks like this.

I've written about this before, I'm sure, but it never stops amazing me. Especially considering how crowded home, or the coasts, or parts of the Midwest can feel. Like you barely have space to think.

It's mind expanding and ego shrinking out here.

I see Cody coming up. I'll sign off now.
-- Post From My iPhone