A Reason

There are moments in life that amaze me. That’s likely all that keeps me going. Particularly such a moment that feels like somehow the universe is all in perfect alignment. There’s no possible way it could be a coincidence, only something that was absolutely meant to happen.

I had such a moment today. A friend and I were on our way back to his place when we saw fluorescent pink signs leading to a garage sale. The first thing that came to mind is that maybe it would be better not to go since it would just be other peoples’ junk. But one person’s junk is another’s treasure. I have also been looking for a low cost bike and had no luck at the local bicycle commuters’ society. So we decided to take a look.

They did have a couple of bikes there but they weren’t what I was looking for and had seen better days. We browsed a bit and I caught a glimpse of a bookshelf under a tarp. I hesitantly lifted the tarp a little to see the books. The woman running the garage sale excitedly leapt up and removed the tarp to reveal a bunch of books on the shelf and beside it. She was selling them for fifty cents each and had quite a variety of genres.

I am an absolute book whore. I freely admit it. She was very animated in saying which ones she’d enjoyed the most and asked what we liked to read. I told her that I write and as such like to read a lot and wasn’t too particular about genre. She said she envied me and said she was a teacher. So I browsed and selected books. Another person came along and purchased a lot of books as well.

The woman went to the garage and said she was waiting for some space on the shelves to put out more books as she put a box on the table and started to open it. As she did, she was describing her favourites again and none really caught my interest. When she got to the bottom of the box, she held up a book and looked straight into my eyes and said she was positive it was the perfect book for me. It’s called, “Blue Highways A Journey Into America.” She went on to describe that it’s about a man who’d lost everything, had no money, and decided to embark on a journey around the United States on secondary (blue) highways.
I was astonished and how freakishly accurate she was about selecting this particular book for me. I told her so.
I have no money. In fact, today I went to the bank to take some money out of my RRSP and harassed the government to get their shit together so I could sign what I needed to in order to get my welfare cheque. The premise of this whole blog is that I’d like nothing more than to sell all my stuff and live in an RV. I’ve always had a soft spot for rural towns and ghost towns and anything off the beaten track. I almost always select the secondary highways over the main ones. There’s so much to see that otherwise I wouldn’t have. I also love to take photos and write. There usually aren’t a lot of scenic spots to pull over on a main highway. They were built to get places quickly. I’ve got plenty of time.

So now the wanderlust has been sparked once again. Two years of school seems like a very long time. It doesn’t have to be though. I mean it’s eight months at a time with four months of break in between. I need to work on finding some way to enjoy life where I’m at until I have the means to move forward. Having a skill and a diploma will help me no matter where I end up. I know this program is what I want to do. In terms of school, the time does fly by very quickly.