View from the North 40: Beware the wild-eyed, feral one

The essentials for traveling out of the country are simple:

• Have a reliable vehicle.

• Have a good driver.

• Bring a familiar blanky and comfort food for the neurotic companion.

• Leave the crazy-eyed feral one at home.

This is a story about my recent trip to Seattle, Washington, in which the only eventful thing, or running joke if you will, is the talking GPS’ continual disappointment with us that we would deviate from its chosen path. Apparently you have to program in food, fuel and bathroom breaks. She was not amused.

My husband, John, had gotten the pickup ready to roll. He’d built a nice sturdy rack out of new wood (I know, weirdly not hicksville-ish, right? More on that later). We remembered to pack everything — clothes, money, water, an extra pillow as well as the dog and his food, treats and blanky (now you know who the neurotic one was). We left the cat safely hiding in the tall grass, wild-eyed and wired for danger (yeah, he’s the crazy, feral one).

We had a beautiful trip through the mountains and plains — trees showing a hint of autumn and the tail-end of the summer crops getting harvested — to our friends’ house in the Seattle area. We had a lovely visit with our friends Joe and Nancy, met a friend of theirs from Australia who was visiting the same weekend, a lovely man named Michael.

During the stay, John got to go to the airport to pick up some aluminum tubing (the reason we needed the new rack). We met a whole host of new people who couldn’t have been more gracious and down-home. It was great to reconnect with Nancy, whom I hadn’t seen in person for about 20 years because John and Joe usually swapped trips, visiting each other over airplane stuff. And Sunday we came home, traveling through the same lovely scenery viewed from the other direction, sunset at our backs. We drove all the way home. It was dark at the end and we were tired.

Are you terribly bored yet? At the very least, waiting for the other shoe to drop or that “it was great, but ...” moment?

Wait no longer.

It was great but, oh my giant jacked-up jogging shorts, the people, the sheer number, mass, speed, press, jumble, energy, amount, volume and round-the-clock, soul-sucking explosion of people.

And let’s not forget or discount or pooh-pooh the fact that I spent hours, like, whole blocks of hours, one after the other, with strangers — real life, small-talking, face-to-face face-time with six total strangers, whom I didn't know existed before that weekend, and one person I hadn’t been around for 20 years.

I don’t know which was my crowning moment of the trip. You decide.

When I found out that our friends’ fancy neighborhood had a housing association that was something like a neighborhood watch, but they’re not watching for criminals they’re watching the other neighbors to write them up and fine them actual money fines for not complying with the schmancy rules. I gasped audibly and said something like “how can you stand it?” but had a tone which clearly, and judgmentally, said, “you have insane priorities for choosing to live here” — while I glanced reflexively out the window at our pickup that looked like a utility truck parked along the street for two days loaded with 16-foot tubing on the rack, and I thought, thank gawd John used pretty new wood for the rack. Because I’m sure that impressed the neighborhood police.

Or maybe it was when I said pharmaceutical reps that schlep drugs to doctors are the spawn of the devil, and then found out that the super nice new friend Michael was married to a drug rep. Of course.

Or maybe it was the moment — after waking up wild-eyed early Sunday morning, convincing John to get up, pack, tell everyone thank-you-we-had-an-awesome-time-goodbye and driving all the way back home, I realized that I was the crazy, feral companion who should’ve been left home.

(John will, undoubtedly, go solo next trip at [email protected].)