Back On the Road- A Message of My Intent Traveling Across the U.S.

            Tomorrow I am about to embark on a new adventure.  I’m headed north to make my way through Georgia, South Carolina and then up to North Carolina.  After that I’m not sure where I’m going to go, so I’m writing this little diddy as an introduction to my intention before I set off into the unknown.

For those of you who don’t know my story well, last summer I decided to leave my home in California to return to my birthplace, Orlando, Florida.  I had been craving some kind of adventure that would teach me about myself and about the human experience.  I wanted to finally get to know my extended family: my grandmother, aunts, cousins… all these people I missed out on knowing having grown up on the wrong side of the country.

So, I quit my job and two weeks later was on the road, traveling across the U.S. with only a vague idea about what I would do when I got there.  

I had to take my drive slowly because I have this damn back pain, that limited the amount of time I could bear sitting behind the wheel.  It took me two and a half weeks for my feet to be able to dance in the sandy Central Florida soil.

Well, now what??, I thought….

For two and a half weeks I had been driving from state to state, following a dream, meeting beautiful souls, the wonderful people of America, and for the first time in my life I felt free. 

Maybe that was because I felt somehow connected to these new characters I had been coming across.  I met rest-stop workers sitting in the shade in Needles, California; how could they could bare living in that 126° Mojave desert heat, I wondered??  I met a group of boys trekking through Texas to do radio station interviews for the local country stations.  They helped me when I found myself stranded after losing my debit card somewhere near a milk shake shop six hours prior in New Mexico.  They shared stories of a country life, clearing land to start their own farm.  Their own farm?!  Who does that?!  Nobody where I’m from…  And there are so many others that I’ve come across here in Florida since I arrived in July, I can’t even begin to describe all these people, but I’m in awe…

It didn’t occur to me, at first, that there was something to be said about these chance encounters with strangers.  Their lives contrasted with the bubbled up life I had had in the Orange County suburbs.  Oh man, have I been sheltered, or what?!  It made me think:  Well… what the heck do I know about anything?  About life?  What do I know about work??  How do these people do it??  What do they know about living?  How can I achieve happiness and peace in spite of my pain?  What is love, anyway??  What is freedom??  What can I offer back to those who’ve treated me with grace?  How can I continue to pay that grace forward when hurt people turn around to hurt me and others? 

So, I’ve been here in Florida trying to figure it all out and figure out my next move.  I realized that I’m sick of hurting; I’m sick of being unhappy, and I’m sick of missing opportunities because I was too scared and shy to stick my neck out and talk to people I don’t know.  I’ve made a decision, a commitment to heal in every way possible by living the life I want, by purging all forms of fear in my life, and focusing on unconditional love for all, especially love for the self. 

It’s time for me to live my life the way I want to live.  And I want to travel.  And I want to know people.  I want to understand what it means to be an American.  I want to know what makes us tick.  How is life in suburban California the same or different from a country life in rural towns across the U.S.?  What kind of mentality does it take to spend your life in affluent Winter Park, Florida?  What’s life like in the beach towns?  What are people doing in the Appalachians?  Why do we humans behave the way we behave anywhere, really?  I’ve spent seven months out here getting to know my beautiful family, and now it’s time for me to learn about the rest of my family, my kin, my friends, my acquaintances…. everybody!

With just a camera in hand, a guitar, and a car, I’m setting out again to start an ethnophotographic project to get to know the People of America.  Using photography, song, and the written word I will illustrate what American living is all about.  For me, it means to live freely, to survive, to follow my dreams, to live as I want to live, to learn how to choose joy over worry, to reject socially constructed norms and rules like the expectation for a 28 year old woman to settle down, pop out some chillens, buy a house… etc…..  Nah, that stuff is not for me…. Not yet, anyway….

I don’t expect this journey to be easy and I don’t know yet what kinds of experiences I’ll have or what kinds of people I’ll come across, but my goal is to connect with open souls, those who are open to hearing about my message on love and freedom and what it means to be an American.