I can hear the trucks on the highway when I get down to the little Baptist church on our road.

It’s halfway to the end of the road, and that’s where I turn around when I’m walking before the sun comes up.

Jenny talked to me the other night about becoming a truck driver.

She thought that we could be a team and travel around the country.

Sounds good if I wasn’t afraid to drive a big truck down some of the crazy grades that are all over the West.

I’m afraid to drive a minivan on those grades.

Imagine how scared I’d be if I was driving a reefer full of pork down a big hill?

Long haul.

Now they call the results of covid that some people experience “long haul”.

They’re pretty jacked up…lots of weird and prolonged symptoms…sick for the “long haul”.

If I could escape that fate, I’d get in the biggest truck and just drive.

I’d drive anywhere where I could be safe…away and safe.

Part of my mail route is a crazy gravel mountain.

Miller Mtn.

I battle Miller Mtn. every day that I drive the mail.

The first time I drove it, even Miller Mtn. was scary.

It’s steep.

Now I could drive it in my sleep.

Nah….better stay awake.

Anyway, repetition helps the fear evaporate.

I’m not afraid of the things that are familiar.

When the mountain is icy, the fear comes back…but after a bunch of years of driving it, I’m not really nervous about being up there.

Van life…long haul trucker…setting up a yurt…out there somewhere…other…someplace “other”.

Someplace other.

One of these days, we need to work at leaving….find our “someplace other”.

But…every someplace other turns into a new starting point if you rest long enough.

Who knows?