So far so good

Yesterday I left around noon. Stopped in Richmond for a yogurt and a coffee. That was a challenge, trying to find something nutritious at a gas station stop. Everything is either white flour or sugar, it seems, in your average gas station. I found some lonely little yogurt cups tucked behind the pillar of a refrigerator, looking almost like they were ashamed to be in such company.

I drove down to Waitsfield after that, where a nice man had been waiting for me for a long time to show me the car. Brent looks like a younger version of Cordell. He was there with two small children. He told me the car in question was called "Ellie." He said that his daughter specifically requested that I know that. So we sat down in the car, a Volvo 240 from 1989, and he started telling me all about it, and then he said, "The only things that don't work are the air conditioning and the cruise control." I sagged. Either of those was a deal-breaker. Note to self: Always ask what's wrong with a car before going to see it.

So that put my day off rather a lot. I had been thinking of trying to get to Boston to see Elaine Bulman, but she didn't return my call that I left at her work. My guess is that she wasn't even in yesterday; she's usually pretty good about returning phone calls. So I decided to head for Manchester, VT to do a little shopping at the outlets there.

On the way down, I started recording a quasi-book on my cell phone. This became tedious, so I stopped at Radio Shack in Rutland and bought a portable recording device, headphones with microphone, and some batteries. Then I decided it was too late in the afternoon to go to the outlets in Manchester and headed west on Route 4 towards the New York throughway (Route 87).

As I drove along I recorded whatever came into my head. I'm thinking that a sort of mini-book about traveling--traveling away from all the hurt of the past few months while traveling further and further into my own past--would while away the boring moments of the trip. I talked a lot about my very recent ex-boyfriend's life and my own experience of him, and tried to examine how I got into the situation with him I was in until yesterday morning. It was a good exercise. Clearly people are complex. Everybody, and every relationship, has light and dark sides. But my main error was--as always--that I didn't believe in myself. Maybe this trip will help.

I stopped at a Japanese restaurant and ate spring rolls and won-ton soup and drank some tea. The bill was less that $5.00. So far so good in the saving money department.

I got to Lake George and discovered, lo and behold, outlets! So I stopped at Orvis and Brooks and was directed around the building to the next shopping center over. There I found the boots I was looking for and a sort of black cat-suit that I planned to wear under a summer dress to convert it into a hip winter outfit.

I got on the highway, then, and went south, chatting all the way to my recording device. It was very, very windy--leaves blowing all over the place so loud I coul hear the impact recording on the sound track as I talked. It got dark and a bit spooky.

I got off the highway at New Baltimore and found a tiny room (feels about the size of a large Christmas present) in a Best Western. I watched tv, ate out of the snack machines, and talked to Oliver and Dad on the phone. I like this hotel. the people are friendly and they look like North Country people (the women wear neither bras nor makeup).

And now I'm ready to set off again going south. I'll call some of the friends I'm going to visit today after nine or so.