I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move. Robert Louis Stevenson
Today God provided a perfect Michigan day. It’s in the high 70’s, partly sunny, and the humidity is low. I found myself with the unlikely combination of a gassed-up, topless Jeep, a couple of free hours between meetings, and nothing pressing sitting in the inbox.
I took a joyride.
I headed south - straight into Michigan farmland. I saw barns - old and new. I saw farms that had to add other businesses - this one does excavation, that one landscaping. I saw a young farmer in a wide-brimmed hat, crouched down, repairing some machinery. I paused at a corner and saw a red-winged blackbird settle down on the diagonal of a powerline support wire. I stopped on the downside of a small hill, and heard the grass rustling in the breeze. I slowed down - letting the old Jeep cruise at a comfortable 40 MPH. I got passed by people with somewhere to be. I stopped on a bridge over a small creek, got out, and leaned over to look in the slow-moving water. I watched the water skeeters shooting around it’s surface. I looked at the reflections of clouds in the water. I drove past 3 young kids in brightly colored swimsuits, leaving wet footprints up a blacktop driveway, heading towards the pool. I passed by a shirtless young boy riding his bike - and noticed that it was a bike much like I had as a young boy, with highrise handlebars. I saw people loading haybales onto farm wagons. I saw men building a pole barn, with a front-end loader raised high to hold supplies. I saw a church sign for a small town, not so small that it didn’t have both a Christian and Christian Reformed Church, but small enough that they shared the same sign. I saw lots of campers - some out in the yard either being loaded or unloaded, and lots more stored out of the way, waiting to be pulled out. I saw a farmer fertilzing his field, small trails of dust kicking up behind his tractor.
I savored every moment of that hour, and wonder - as always - why I don’t take more joyrides.
When’s the last time you took a joyride?
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