Written Sep 1, 2022
In 2008 my good friend Alan Vaughan called from Gary, Indiana. He was driving to Florida. I told him I was leaving Palm Beach for New England. We hadn’t seen each other in a good 6 or 7 years.
“How you getting north?”
“I’m hitchhiking on I-95. I figure it will take 3-4 days.” I had a airline ticket from West Palm Beach to Boston, but preferred to mythize a northbound voyage. “I’m broke so that’s the only way I can get there.”
“You’re kidding? People don’t pick up anyone, let alone hitchhikers in the late-50s.” He was rightfully stunned by my fictitious plan. “I haven’t seen a hitchhiker from the Upper Peninsula to Louisville.
“Not one?”
“Not one.”
“Well, I’ll be a blast from the past.”
I hung up and then called Alan the next day from the airport saying I was in Jacksonville.
The next day in New York I told him I was in Dillon, South Carolina. On Labor Day I said Roanoke Virginia.
“I’m making real good time.”
By the way I was already drinking wine on Watchic Pond in Standish Maine. I had made good time.
The trip from West Palm Beach to Boston wasn’t fun, but it was fast.
And there’s nothing like Maine at the end of summer.
