To say that I absolutely hate to travel must be an understatement of my feelings. Travelling is one of my favorite nightmares. I understand why people love road trips but I’m sorry that I do not have it in my genes to sit in an automobile for ten hours straight just to see a rocky mountain with trees and weird old men who make the best tea ever. Don’t get me wrong. I love road trips in theory. I absolutely adored the one in “Love & Luck” and especially that one in “Paper Towns”. Probably because it’s quite a bit closer to reality. Well, as close as a John Green novel gets.
People get sick, can’t afford much needed bathroom breaks and take time sleeping and no one tries to sing some song.
But in reality, I get nauseated and sulky and the road trip actually feels like the reward for all of my sins.
This particular road trip was a bit different. Did it finally convince me that road trips are actually fun and not overrated and travelling has always held a certain awe for everyone? No.
But in reality, I get nauseated and sulky and the road trip actually feels like the reward for all of my sins.
This particular road trip was a bit different. Did it finally convince me that road trips are actually fun and not overrated and travelling has always held a certain awe for everyone? No.
I cannot stress this enough that I want people to use horses again and stop visiting their faraway relatives unless there’s a war or a famine or death or all three.
The road trip in question began at a very unusual time for me. 2 AM. That’s the time most people reserve their delusional thoughts for. Also, it has proven on certain occasions to be an excellent time for mental breakdowns and/or listening to that playlist of yours. But on Sunday, I wasn’t enjoying my 2 AM with my maddening thoughts neither was I listening to champagne problems on repeat, instead I found myself sitting in a car, travelling at least 5 hours to go take an exam.
To be honest, I had honestly planned to sleep on the ride but there’s something remarkable about 2AM things….except decisions. All decision made at 2 AM are horrible. No exception.
My 2 AM was …..beautiful. never liked travelling at night but roads were vacant. Except for those flashy traffic signs there was no one else roaming on the streets. My town seemed eerily haunted yet I must say that there are only a handful of other occasions when I have found this town of mine to be so beautiful. The usually brightly lit shops and plazas seemed ghosted, the golden spark that previously ignited during the day now dead, their commonly luminous window panes dark and lifeless. For some reason I loved these lifeless roads more than those with the spark of life dancing in them.
As we moved farther & farther, beyond the outskirts of the main city, I discovered a strange new life. A hidden world. Where 2 AM nights are when the people rise. Late night cafes with rough, haggard men smoking and sipping their tea. People chatting and laughing, sitting around fires. Those flames were bright in contrast to the faint white street light. Petrol stations where people with red blood shot eyes stare up at every passing car. Not an ideal world but something new all the same.
The road just grew wider and wider and apart from the us in the car, our sole companion was the thin crescent hung in the sky, staring down at us all the time. The night has never been more beautiful. And as much as I hate sitting still in a metal death box with wheels for hours, I think that was the one of my nicest rides.
I saw us leaving city lights behind, shining, twinkling in the distance and soon we were enveloped in the peaceful dark of the night with no source of light within our sight. But our calm lightless flight was soon over and the road we had been travelling on solo for the past half an hour was now shared by other vehicles. Trucks. Large colorful, some clumsy and ugly others just hideously, bright trucks and trailers. Our car was simply tiny as compared to them. They wobbled on the road and our car whooshed past them. Mostly there were fields and crops on either side of the road but once in a while we would pass some truck stop, where scores of trucks were parked, their drivers either consuming a lot of caffeine in the nearby shady hotel or lying down facing the night sky. There were also some motels on the way, their horrendous neon signs, half flashing their preposterous names:
The road trip in question began at a very unusual time for me. 2 AM. That’s the time most people reserve their delusional thoughts for. Also, it has proven on certain occasions to be an excellent time for mental breakdowns and/or listening to that playlist of yours. But on Sunday, I wasn’t enjoying my 2 AM with my maddening thoughts neither was I listening to champagne problems on repeat, instead I found myself sitting in a car, travelling at least 5 hours to go take an exam.
To be honest, I had honestly planned to sleep on the ride but there’s something remarkable about 2AM things….except decisions. All decision made at 2 AM are horrible. No exception.
My 2 AM was …..beautiful. never liked travelling at night but roads were vacant. Except for those flashy traffic signs there was no one else roaming on the streets. My town seemed eerily haunted yet I must say that there are only a handful of other occasions when I have found this town of mine to be so beautiful. The usually brightly lit shops and plazas seemed ghosted, the golden spark that previously ignited during the day now dead, their commonly luminous window panes dark and lifeless. For some reason I loved these lifeless roads more than those with the spark of life dancing in them.
As we moved farther & farther, beyond the outskirts of the main city, I discovered a strange new life. A hidden world. Where 2 AM nights are when the people rise. Late night cafes with rough, haggard men smoking and sipping their tea. People chatting and laughing, sitting around fires. Those flames were bright in contrast to the faint white street light. Petrol stations where people with red blood shot eyes stare up at every passing car. Not an ideal world but something new all the same.
The road just grew wider and wider and apart from the us in the car, our sole companion was the thin crescent hung in the sky, staring down at us all the time. The night has never been more beautiful. And as much as I hate sitting still in a metal death box with wheels for hours, I think that was the one of my nicest rides.
I saw us leaving city lights behind, shining, twinkling in the distance and soon we were enveloped in the peaceful dark of the night with no source of light within our sight. But our calm lightless flight was soon over and the road we had been travelling on solo for the past half an hour was now shared by other vehicles. Trucks. Large colorful, some clumsy and ugly others just hideously, bright trucks and trailers. Our car was simply tiny as compared to them. They wobbled on the road and our car whooshed past them. Mostly there were fields and crops on either side of the road but once in a while we would pass some truck stop, where scores of trucks were parked, their drivers either consuming a lot of caffeine in the nearby shady hotel or lying down facing the night sky. There were also some motels on the way, their horrendous neon signs, half flashing their preposterous names:
Goodnight Motel; Last dinner Motel. I was half sure that something sinister was going on there. Least dangerous scenario: drug cartel. Most dangerous scenario: murder hotel.
Also, I saw a Subway….in the middle of nowhere. Like there’s a honeysuckle thicket on the right, its branches poking the small block building and on the other side was a standing wheat field. Why was there even a subway?
After about two hours journey on those small-town roads, we were finally on the highway. Did I ever mention how much I love the highway? I love the highway. The highway lacks interesting trucks in the same lane as ours and those insidious motel side decoration but otherwise it is pretty nice. The moon had finally disappeared from the sky and now it was the dark before twilight. That time when I believe that there are the greatest number of stars in the sky. The time on highway ran out pretty quickly and we were finally in our destined city.
It was pretty great except that it was 5 in the morning and the whole city was sleeping and I refused to go into any of those crafty lodgings or motels and we were on a budget so any 5 star hotel was totally out of question. After wandering like hopeless ghosts on the roads for almost half an hour, we found a petrol station with a tuck shop.
It was now twilight and we were sitting at the side of a petrol pump, with cardamom tea in our hands. There was a faint whiff of cigarette smoke that the light breeze carried. not a good idea to be smoking here but I could see no on presently smoking there.
It was so silent that I felt out of place. it was the kind of place where reality feels altered. Like you’re stuck in a video game with a glitch. Except that you don’t feel so calm when there’s a glitch in the matrix. We stayed there for an hour or so. I never get to see the sunrise on a petrol pump because the sky got darkened by the mingled dark clouds even before the blue hour was over. It started drizzling. I wasn’t anywhere near the ocean. Nor were any mountains in sight. It wasn’t clearly any major metropolis. Not as dark as Gotham. No forests. No plains even. Just a random petrol station with horrible red and gray building and a charcoal road with potholes. But I can swear it was one of the nicest rain I ever experienced. The sweet salty scent of wet soil now accompanied the now fainted smell of cigarettes.
We left then. I had a test to give. It sucked. Horrible. But I had a good feeling. So we may say that the attitude was nice, the results were not. Aka the vibe was good but not practical. But I was fine after I listened to shake it off several times on repeat.
We ate some really overpriced horrible burgers from an overhyped place. I got a drink which was like a glass 3\4 filled with ice and like as little sprite as they could get away with. I was mad but I kinda liked it. I know I know that our traditional market has suffered the constant privation of an industrial revolution to our capitalistic yet barely surviving economy but I still like a lot of ice in my drink. That somehow freshens me up. Too much ice. In water, in sprite , in everything that needs to be chilled, ice!
The journey home was somehow longer and quitter. Partly because I blew the test and partly because everyone was dead tired. Especially me. No sleep in the last 24 hours, 3 cups of tea, a lot of soda, a mind straining 4-hour test and approx. 10 hours of travel. I felt like a zombie. And all I wanted on my way back was to sleep. I already knew that we’d pass a haunted subway and eerie hotels, nothing new awaited me.
Just so it happens my brain rebels to sleep on purpose. Every night I fall asleep after scrolling my Instagram or reading a book up until that moment when my eyelids are drooping. Because I know that even if I try to sleep when I am not about to faint, my mind will start writing a fanfiction of a crossover of super mario and sonic the hedgehog and somehow, I will find myself thinking of a climax where Darth Vader takes over the planet and our heroes along with teenage mutant ninja turtles save the universe from the wrath of Sauron. I know it doesn’t make sense. It never does. So no thank you. I would not like to try to sleep and end up having anxiety because in an alternate universe, Dr. Strange is dead.
The fields whose silhouettes I could barely see at night were now showered with the dying sunlight of the evening sun. The golden hour. McDonald’s M looks like a work of art when light hits it from that angle. There were cattle grazing in the pastures and there were people working the fields. Some clouds still lingered in the sky and the wind was bit chilly as if announcing the arrival of the coming fall. Or as I like to say: The East Wind is coming. I love the story of every Greek God. We read their mythology, and we read their works of philosophy and science and we all know Plato and Diogenes and Socrates and we believe that the Greeks were so smart but we forget that they believe that all their gods lived on a mountain and no one ever thought of climbing the said mountain and checking if their gods are even there or not so they might be as smart as we think they were but it is what it is.
Soon enough the sun started setting and turned from an over bright strain to the eyes into a dull golden speck that somehow adds too much aesthetic. Green crops, the sunlight melting, with a blue- orange sky and a beautiful sun- it could’ve been such a good windows background- pity no one uses the default one anymore. People got so creative over time.
And when the sun finally touched the horizon, the clouds that were wondering so aimlessly previously formed a halo around it and the amber evening turned into a haze of vermilion and lavender with darkness merging into the blues from the west. A kind of scene that we often read about in books but when we actually see it, we realize words can’t even capture the feeling the sight brings, let go the scene.
By the time we reached home, my back was stiff and I couldn’t feel my legs, my kidneys seemed to be wooden planks that were torturing me inside out. I should’ve stayed hydrated.
Also, I saw a Subway….in the middle of nowhere. Like there’s a honeysuckle thicket on the right, its branches poking the small block building and on the other side was a standing wheat field. Why was there even a subway?
After about two hours journey on those small-town roads, we were finally on the highway. Did I ever mention how much I love the highway? I love the highway. The highway lacks interesting trucks in the same lane as ours and those insidious motel side decoration but otherwise it is pretty nice. The moon had finally disappeared from the sky and now it was the dark before twilight. That time when I believe that there are the greatest number of stars in the sky. The time on highway ran out pretty quickly and we were finally in our destined city.
It was pretty great except that it was 5 in the morning and the whole city was sleeping and I refused to go into any of those crafty lodgings or motels and we were on a budget so any 5 star hotel was totally out of question. After wandering like hopeless ghosts on the roads for almost half an hour, we found a petrol station with a tuck shop.
It was now twilight and we were sitting at the side of a petrol pump, with cardamom tea in our hands. There was a faint whiff of cigarette smoke that the light breeze carried. not a good idea to be smoking here but I could see no on presently smoking there.
It was so silent that I felt out of place. it was the kind of place where reality feels altered. Like you’re stuck in a video game with a glitch. Except that you don’t feel so calm when there’s a glitch in the matrix. We stayed there for an hour or so. I never get to see the sunrise on a petrol pump because the sky got darkened by the mingled dark clouds even before the blue hour was over. It started drizzling. I wasn’t anywhere near the ocean. Nor were any mountains in sight. It wasn’t clearly any major metropolis. Not as dark as Gotham. No forests. No plains even. Just a random petrol station with horrible red and gray building and a charcoal road with potholes. But I can swear it was one of the nicest rain I ever experienced. The sweet salty scent of wet soil now accompanied the now fainted smell of cigarettes.
We left then. I had a test to give. It sucked. Horrible. But I had a good feeling. So we may say that the attitude was nice, the results were not. Aka the vibe was good but not practical. But I was fine after I listened to shake it off several times on repeat.
We ate some really overpriced horrible burgers from an overhyped place. I got a drink which was like a glass 3\4 filled with ice and like as little sprite as they could get away with. I was mad but I kinda liked it. I know I know that our traditional market has suffered the constant privation of an industrial revolution to our capitalistic yet barely surviving economy but I still like a lot of ice in my drink. That somehow freshens me up. Too much ice. In water, in sprite , in everything that needs to be chilled, ice!
The journey home was somehow longer and quitter. Partly because I blew the test and partly because everyone was dead tired. Especially me. No sleep in the last 24 hours, 3 cups of tea, a lot of soda, a mind straining 4-hour test and approx. 10 hours of travel. I felt like a zombie. And all I wanted on my way back was to sleep. I already knew that we’d pass a haunted subway and eerie hotels, nothing new awaited me.
Just so it happens my brain rebels to sleep on purpose. Every night I fall asleep after scrolling my Instagram or reading a book up until that moment when my eyelids are drooping. Because I know that even if I try to sleep when I am not about to faint, my mind will start writing a fanfiction of a crossover of super mario and sonic the hedgehog and somehow, I will find myself thinking of a climax where Darth Vader takes over the planet and our heroes along with teenage mutant ninja turtles save the universe from the wrath of Sauron. I know it doesn’t make sense. It never does. So no thank you. I would not like to try to sleep and end up having anxiety because in an alternate universe, Dr. Strange is dead.
The fields whose silhouettes I could barely see at night were now showered with the dying sunlight of the evening sun. The golden hour. McDonald’s M looks like a work of art when light hits it from that angle. There were cattle grazing in the pastures and there were people working the fields. Some clouds still lingered in the sky and the wind was bit chilly as if announcing the arrival of the coming fall. Or as I like to say: The East Wind is coming. I love the story of every Greek God. We read their mythology, and we read their works of philosophy and science and we all know Plato and Diogenes and Socrates and we believe that the Greeks were so smart but we forget that they believe that all their gods lived on a mountain and no one ever thought of climbing the said mountain and checking if their gods are even there or not so they might be as smart as we think they were but it is what it is.
Soon enough the sun started setting and turned from an over bright strain to the eyes into a dull golden speck that somehow adds too much aesthetic. Green crops, the sunlight melting, with a blue- orange sky and a beautiful sun- it could’ve been such a good windows background- pity no one uses the default one anymore. People got so creative over time.
And when the sun finally touched the horizon, the clouds that were wondering so aimlessly previously formed a halo around it and the amber evening turned into a haze of vermilion and lavender with darkness merging into the blues from the west. A kind of scene that we often read about in books but when we actually see it, we realize words can’t even capture the feeling the sight brings, let go the scene.
By the time we reached home, my back was stiff and I couldn’t feel my legs, my kidneys seemed to be wooden planks that were torturing me inside out. I should’ve stayed hydrated.
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