Winter 2006

No Place Like It

It took driving across the country with wishbone to learn where home is
Minneapolis, Minn.

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“THERE’S SOMETHING QUESTIONABLE on your mammogram,” the voice mail message
said.

It was the latest in a series of crises I’d faced since moving from St. Paul to Seattle the year before. I had moved for all the “right” reasons: for love, a job with a big-name ad agency, and the West Coast’s booming Internet economy. But everything was tanking — the romance, the job, not to mention the post- September 11 economy. I’d never felt more isolated and stupid — and now this.

“I’m going to end up sick, bald, and alone,” I told the counselor. I had been meeting with him for about three weeks, hoping he could help me figure out what to do next. “What if I die here?”

“Well,” he said. “let’s assume a worstcase scenario. Let’s say you’ve got three months to live.What would you do?”

Suddenly I was very clear. “I’d quit my job,” I said. “I’d put my stuff in storage. Then I’d take my dog, Wishbone, and hit the road.”

“What’s stopping you?” he asked.

What was stopping me? Money? No, I had a stack of cash in savings. Fear? I wasn’t afraid to travel. So what was it? Then it hit me: I just didn’t know where to go.

I ruled out Minnesota, where I had lived for ten years. I’d had enough of ice, butt-numbing cold, and polar fleece. I ruled out my native Pittsburgh, where my parents lived, as an insurmountable step backwards that all the therapy in the world couldn’t cure. So I looked south. Seattle’s constant rain made me feel as if I hadn’t seen the sun in a year. And maybe, as I traveled, I’d have an epiphany. Maybe, as I drove into a particular city or town, there would be a sign showing me that if you live here you will be happy. Thankfully, the cancer scare turned out to be nothing. I gave notice at my job, broke up with my boyfriend, stashed my stuff, packed the car, bought Wishbone the equivalent of a doggie car seat, and hit the road.

We drove and drove. Through Oregon, where Wishbone and I ran on the beach in the cold rain; Santa Barbara, where a guy in a bar gave me job leads (was this a sign I should live there?); San Diego, where Wishbone and I ran on the beach in the warm rain; Santa Fe; San Antonio; Houston; Atlanta; and Nags Head, North Carolina, where Wishbone chased crabs on the beach in the sun. Along the way, I stayed at dogfriendly inns and hotels, with friends and relatives I hadn’t seen in years, and kept in touch on my cell phone and through e-mail at the local library.

“Guess where I am?” I called my friend Eric at my old job in Minneapolis in the middle of March.“Uh, Texas?” he asked.

“Apalachicola, Florida,” I said. “It’s 82 degrees here.”

“I hate you,” he said. “When are you coming home?”

I gave him a vague answer. Where was home? I gotta go see my parents in Pittsburgh first, I told him. Then my brother in Cape Cod. Then maybe....

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