i meant to type the word "fear" but i typo-ed it out to be "far." and then i meant to write the word "word" but i typed work. four days of driving alone and completely sustained on coffee and old packs of ramen will make a mess of you. a shaky, malnourished, cross eyed mess. or maybe i meant to muse on how "far" i've come, literally and figuratively. and maybe i am yearning for work... who knows? i do. but i just don't know it yet.
to the point of this strange entry (maybe)... on my drive out east i got to see the midwest. i got to smell the cornfields and talk to some genuinely nice however, concerned, folk. i got a lot of the same two questions: "what is a girl from california doing out here?!" and "aren't you afraid?" two very valid questions with two very uncertain answers. firstly, i am in terre haute, IN or pataskala, OH because it is on the way to the Delware. at least that's what i tell them and for the most part it is true. so i guess that particular answer is not uncertain. and secondly, to answer the question regarding fear, yes and no. no at first... but once the question is asked and i let my mind wander i get a little scared. but really, what scared me the most was that this question was on everyones tongue. and most of the time it was one of the first things out of their mouth. i'm poking along the highway, drinking my mickey d's coffee, and camping out... am i doing something that should grant fear? apparently so. it makes me uncomfortable and a little fearful when everyone (and when i say "everyone" i mean the 3 or so people i encounter at a gas station or the campground) is suggesting that it is something that is so common and so obvious.
i guess i took it to heart and to an all too personal of a level. i kept thinking about fear... and i may have over did it. on my drive i went from fearing the dinosaur like giraffes in my dreams that were attacking my car to fearing huge semis zooming by me and spraying my windshield with a blinding sheet of water to fearing the idea of having no plan whatsoever post "mission: east cost." yep... first two probably worth fearing. that last one?.... uhh..
i've thought about it, it being fear. (could you tell?) and i could fear a lot of things... but why waste the energy and thought into it? well, because it is a survival trait. duh! and really, drawing the line between necessary and un-necessary fear is not at all thin. it will be a long time before i can trust river water above my knees and i will drive 10 below the speed limit if i can't see anything. those are black and whites for me. but fearing the future? fearing being alone? or fearing making the wrong decisions? those i think i should be able to do without. but how do you erase that uncertainty? wow, now i'm delving into another heavy word: uncertainty. well, in my world it goes hand in hand with fear. all i know is that there is plenty of negativity associated with fear and uncertainty, but what i fail to keep in mind is that i fear ideas like the future because they are completely open to me! and that is quite the positive thought. my future is not set in stone, i'm not going to be married off like my grand mother or sent to work in the cornfields of middle america. i'm alive, i'm pretty darn happy and i have to ability to change things. if i am scared or uncertain i can change my path or change myself.
i'm glad that i was asked if i was scared by strangers. it makes sense... i'm a young woman traveling by myself in a puny civic. i'm not trying to belittle my sex or anything... it's just a strange sight in pataskala, OH. it reminds me that i can't trust everyone and unfortunatly there are people and things out there to fear, naturally... however it reminds me that i have a very special opportunity. and i am so very lucky to be able to just pick a place on a map and drive to it to see it, be in it, and breathe it. in bishop or boulder or any other vagabond infested place my trip might seem kind of lame... but in pataskala, OH i feel so very far from lame.
