Hello again, and as always, sorry about the delay in posting. This time though, I think I have a pretty good excuse, and maybe even a good story.
Do you remember the ever so common tale of the misplaced traveler? People unknowingly dropped into the wrong time or dimension, completely frazzled and lost, seeing things that are almost familiar but are just the tiniest bit wrong? I know this might seem a bit left field, but stick with me here.
One of my mother's favorite authors, Spider Robinson, has an amazing set of books, and in Callahan's Crosstime Saloon, something similar is depicted. A man wanders into this trans-dimensional bar for the lost and wounded, and recounts his tale of woe; he was held as a prisoner of war for many, many years with his wife. She then dies from lack of care, and shortly after he is released back into the now changed world, completely alone. He stumbles into Callahans, down and out, as many are oft to do, and through the friendly faces and sad stories there, he is given the hope he needs to try to reconcile his new world with the one he was forced to leave behind.
These are amazing books, and this particular story is one that has been told many ways throughout the years, but for me, it was always just a sad story.
That is, until I became one of those travelers.
November 10th, around 5pm, Jackson and I were driving through the gorgeous Pennsylvanian mountains on our way from some Podunk little town to Gettysburg. He was all excited, because history is a large part of the spark in his heart that could power small cities. We were talking when he suddenly turns down the radio and a terrible clicking noise becomes apparent. We quickly decide to pull off at the next stop, and the series of events unfolds as so:
1. We pulled off at an intersection with a 24 hour Sheetz, and an AutoZone. This will become important in the time following.
2. As he pulls into the Sheetz, our steering gives out almost completely.
3. He manages to pull directly into the side of the Sheetz, and as we reach a safe place to park, Bubs stalls and we park quickly, so as to reduce the amount of ground we were losing to gravity and a slight hill.
This is how Bubs came to her final resting place in Bedford, PA, and we ended up home a month ahead of time. We were incredibly lucky to have had the AutoZone right across the road, and if the Sheetz hadn't been 24 hours, we would have been out of a bed that night as well as a traveling home. The two days that followed, with getting the car towed and waiting in a hotel to be retrieved, were arguably some of the longest days of our lives. Everything we'd worked so hard for, every challenge we'd triumphed, every cold night we'd blearily blinked our way through, all of the careful planning, suddenly meant very, very little. Jackson's dad came to pick us up the next day, and we were home the day after that. My mother went up to get our things, and found out that Bubs was completely gone; a busted engine valve. She was sold for $140.
After all of the time we'd put into this trip, the months of planning and waiting, the hours and hours and hours spent working, the endless saving to get us on the road, and just like that, it's all gone. We have to start from ground zero, once again.
But here's the thing, we're different now. Living in a car, being that poor, you learn things. It changes you in tiny, important, indescribable ways. And here we were, three months later, being dropped into an environment that seemed familiar, but was just the tiniest bit wrong.
It hit me the hardest. Jackson came back, and while he had changed, his environment was almost identical. For me, there was another person in my house, everything had been rearranged, and what had once been my island of calm in the hectic world around me had been turned into someone else's sanctuary. When I was dragged home, I didn't have a room, a car, or a computer. I had three pairs of pants, a handful of shirts, a boyfriend, and a stuffed sheep to my name. That was it.
Suddenly, I understood those stories in a way I had never wanted to. Traveler Emie did not fit in the world Regular Emie had left behind, and do not let me lead you to believe this was a happy time. Everything I had worked so viciously for had been ripped away from me, and I felt like I didn't even have a place to return to. There was no space for me in the world that had kept going while I was away.
I'm honestly not entirely sure what happened to make me stop feeling that way, but thankfully, I've been able to find a middle ground between Regular Emie and Traveler Emie. It's not necessarily who I am now, but it lets me blend into society again, which was not a thing that I missed doing. (Makeup and shaving have lost their favor with me almost entirely.) I still feel it though, like a little whipser in the back of my mind, reminding me this isn't the place for me, but I figure that'll stick around until I really do have a place of my own.
Now, I suppose, is where I relay the good news. We're back safely, even if it is under unfavorable terms. We've convinced our parents to let us stay together, so while it's a bit of a hassle, we switch between houses every week. It lets us stay near the only other person who knows who the trip made us into, and helps keep us sane. It's also a lot easier, since we only have the car his parents have let us borrow, which, while it's beastly, gets us from point A to point B, and we're very thankful they have an extra car for us to use in the first place. We've also both been accepted to UNCG, on the day Bubs died, ironically, and we're waiting to hear back from their Honor's College. Last Wednesday I got a job at a Toy Store, and it really isn't that bad of a job, even if it is a lot of standing around. Jackson's been working really hard, and has a few things that will hopefully pan out well in the coming week.
And the trip is still on, oh boy, if you ever thought we were going to give up, you obviously don't know us as well as you'd thought. And while originally we'd hoped to leave again in January, this has become less and less possible as the days pass. Right now, we're going to work our asses off, again, and do whatever we need to do to keep ourselves sane until the summer. After all, I hear it's always 70 in San Fran anyways, so what's the difference? January, June, it's all the same in California, and I can't wait to see it.
