Why Is the Trip Report Always Longer than the Actual Trip?

On a long-ago road trip through New Mexico, I conceded to the request of a road sign to tune into an AM radio station to hear tourism information, only to be rewarded with a series of staticky geographical and historical monologues wrapped in the seductive tongue of Ricardo Montalban. That memory, of sexily narrated anecdotes about local tribes dragging giant timbers from the mountains down to the high desert to raise elaborate mission churches, was the source of my optimism when I tuned in again, on Friday afternoon, heading over Snoqualmie Pass to the other side of the Cascades, to see what the tourism and weather channel on AM 1510 had to offer me. This time, though, I got what I expected the first time, a ghostly voice so deep under fathoms of static that it was impossible to make out its monotonous incantations. Oh well. Probably it just said I didn't need chains or snow tires.

After you get across those beautiful green mountains to the east of Seattle and head south (toward, say, Walla Walla), the landscape of this state heads in a particularly burnt ochre direction. There are orchards and farm fields here and there, of course, but where there are none, there are endless rolling hills of brown. Maybe it is just the time of year for this particular color to dominate? It's brown season.

Road trips always reawaken my pointless fascination with signage. Maybe that's why I was willing to try again with tourism AM radio. I had a few favorites on this trip. There were two or three instances where a vineyard or orchard was labeled, clearly for me, or for some 9-year-old passenger in some other car who at that moment was wondering to herself, what crop is that? Grapes. Apples. Peaches. There was also a spot on another pass, where you could see two glorious peaks in the distance, and suddenly, there was the sign, with two arrows, and it said, That one is Mt. Adams. That one is Mt. Rainier. Then there was the gigantic sign, atop an enormous white barn, inviting me to stop for FRUIT ANTIQUES.

Besides enjoying the scenery and the signage, I indulged in another of the great solo road trip delights- singing along at the top of my lungs to a bunch of my old CDs. Scenery, signage, singing! I know one reader who has already pledged to try to get me into the proper century, at least, with my musical tastes, and I'm willing to come along. But it was still really fun to belt out those old K.D. Lang songs, and some Tom Petty, and some Pixies, and some Beck (although you don't so much belt out the Beck). I also managed to get most of the people on the phone that I was hoping to catch up with. It is a rare and magical luxury to have hours to myself in which to phone someone...not working, not grocery shopping, not stopping the conversation every two minutes to address a question from the back seat. If I missed you, I'm sorry I did.

The drive (though great) was not the best part of the trip, of course. My friend and I stayed in downtown Walla Walla, in a suite that had been converted from old apartments- it was lovely! On Friday afternoon, we wandered the main drag in search of delicious treats that my friend, who is nursing, can't normally eat because of her baby's precocious collection of food allergies. Saturday morning we went for a run and ended up at a breakfast place with fantastic hash browns and very kind service (since we were foolishly short of cash- my fault). So, talking, jogging, eating, talking, eating, drinking, talking, eating, napping, drinking, eating, talking, sleeping. Also, a little shopping. We reflected. We set some goals. We worked it out. It was a good Saturday.

Besides being perfectly equidistant between Seattle and Boise, Walla Walla is a destination for wine tasting, what with all the vineyards dotting the gray-brown hills. Although I like wine fine, and although I am envious of people who are wine-knowledgeable, I think it might be time for me to admit that it is not a thing I'm truly considering, or something I'll get around to someday- I am not cut out to be a wine afficianado. We decided to just stay in town to do our wine thing, since there were tasting rooms all up and down the street. A mere two tastings, as it turned out, one cut short by the unbearably obnoxious pourer at the second place, and then we just drank up the bottle my friend had brought along with her- a local Idaho vintage- back in our hotel.

It always seems to me that the way back from somewhere is shorter than the way there. It was true on the return trip- I had a few more wonderful phone calls, a lot of enjoyable silence, and then suddenly I was back to my little cuties. They were on the fence about one of the presents I bought for them, but still agreed to model them for a picture.


They did like the chocolate dinosaurs and the geodes, which we smashed up out on the patio Sunday afternoon (the geodes, not the chocolates). I could lengthen the way back from this post by trying to distill that feeling of being a person out of my daily role, in a temporary place of freedom and luxury, and what it does for the me stepping back into that daily role, but whatever, we're already here. Best just unpack and get back to it.