Travel Sketch: Day 2
Photo: Colleen blogging on her laptop at a truck stop under a shawl to avoid screen glare.
We woke up in Kentucky at the nearly filled “Outback RV Park,” an island of RVs surrounded by a mote of dark water, where a pig roast was to be held later in the day.
Under the pavilion, next to the bathrooms and a trashcan, a small dry-ease board hung from a pole. My husband, Joe, like a kid who feels compelled to flay his arms in front of the projector and onto the screen when the lights go out before watching a movie in school, just had to write on the clean slate.
After our breakfast at the camp picnic table, he directed to me to the place where I could empty our trash, making sure I would notice the dry-ease board that now read “Joe Loves Colleen.”
Later, back in the truck, with our 6” long rubber tarantula wiggling its legs on the dashboard, we engaged in some “road trip sort of conversation.” “Why do you think the dry ease board was there?” I asked.
Me: To time the pig roast?
Joe: Maybe there’s a horseshoe game nearby and it’s for keeping score.
Me: To deter graffiti?
He, who had earlier joined in a football toss game with a group of kids, while I sipped my morning tea: Maybe it’s there just for kids to play with.
En-route to Missouri and eventually Colorado, we spoke of our hopes and intentions for the next two weeks of vacation, before falling into silence, at which point I pulled out my notebook.
Sometimes I go through my notebooks and journal to cross out the old notes so I won’t have to repeatedly struggle to decipher my own scribbled scrawl. Such is the work of a scribe on a road trip.
September 25th, 2005 12:00 am
Hello, Michele sent me! And that picture would be great for a “write your own caption” contest!
September 25th, 2005 12:01 am
Hotspots seem to give us the ability to connect in the most unique places. This picture is priceless.
Back from Michele’s. I’m always inspired when I visit here.
September 25th, 2005 12:14 am
Colleen, I am always fascinated by your writing work ethic. You are always working on something and writing something wonderful and controversial and heartwarming. And then I see you at a truck stop in this get up and I wonder about you. LOL.
September 25th, 2005 12:27 am
yeah…it all looks very suspiciously strange. What kind of writing trick am I brewing under there? Joe came out from paying for gas and found me like that. Good thing he has a sense of humor.
September 25th, 2005 2:47 am
Hey, it’s a darkroom for developing word-pictures! 🙂
September 25th, 2005 8:53 am
Are you returning home via the Kansas City area? Give us a holler. Lunch? Coffee?
September 25th, 2005 10:34 am
Michele sent me your way, Colleen. I hope you’re enjoying the journey as much as the stops along the way. A writer should always be gathering material!
September 25th, 2005 12:14 pm
My first thought when I saw the picture was “she’s breastfeeding!”. LOL! Sounds like your trip is going well. I wish you a safe journey:)
September 25th, 2005 1:13 pm
You make me laugh, woman!!! That is quite a pciture! Have fun, sweet lady.
September 25th, 2005 1:28 pm
Great post! Love the pic!
September 25th, 2005 9:10 pm
Where are you going in Colorado? Back in the dark ages I camped with the now ex and the now ex-inlaws in a place near Silver Creek, Colorado. We found a site next to a creek with beaver dams and dear and an old abandoned mine. In the week we camped only two cars went by. I think there was private land on one side near the entrance and national forest on the other side. People thought that road was all private and just didn’t attempt it. There was a spring flowing down over some tree trunks and rocks from the side of a hill. I took a picture and had it made into an 8X10. The next year I stood at the same spot and took another one. Comparing them, I don’t think one rock or limb had changed positions. Truly remote. Truly beautiful.
September 25th, 2005 9:50 pm
I just love those Road Trip Conversations! Have a wonderful trip.
September 26th, 2005 5:48 pm
Popping in to see if you’re having a good time on your trip…and I see that you are. Keep on trucking Col.
September 26th, 2005 5:55 pm
I love the photo! Just goes to show you that a true writer will stop at nothing to get the job done! (I have some catching up to do here!)
September 26th, 2005 9:50 pm
I love the photo.. made me smile.
Sounds like a comfortable laid back trip
September 27th, 2005 12:23 am
I love that he wrote “Joe Loves Colleen” on the dry erase board. That was an awwww moment to read about. Thanks! I hope your travels are wonderful.
October 6th, 2005 6:49 pm
And to think: it’s come to this. Our little Colleen, a blogger and an undercover laptop user, to boot. You go gurl…but come home one day.
November 2nd, 2011 10:37 pm
[…] 6. Sweetest internet search that landed someone on my blog this week: “why joe loves colleen.” They landed HERE. […]