side track. #1.

there were so very many things that i noticed about this country, about myself, about the land, about other people, about driving, about horizons, about patience, about penske trucks on this little road trip. no way will i ever share them all. i don't really want to. or have the time to. and there is no need to. and no one wants to read them all. so i'll expound here and there throughout the loose narrative of our travels upon some observations i feel like sharing and divulging with you. and by *you* i know that i mean probably no one.

so let me start with a hidden peril of driving across the country. one that i didn't anticipate being as major of an issue as it turned out to be. and, no, i don't mean the check engine light that was lit up on the dashboard for the entire duration of the trip. and, no, i don't mean the deer and rabbits and prairie dogs and whatnot that jot out into moving traffic along the highways. i expected to be tired, i expected that sitting for so long might get uncomfortable, i was braced for night driving and driving in rain or other inclement weather, i was prepared for detours and narrow lanes and construction and heavy traffic. i was even prepared for something like a flat tire in the middle of nowhere. i was not prepared for starvation. ladies and gentlemen, if you care in the very least about nutrition or what you put into your body, if you are in any way, shape or form a vegetarian, it is quite possible to starve to death on a cross country trip. if you are allergic to wheat and gluten, you are almost certain to. i did not know this. i only half-ass packed a few standby items in the truck for nourishment - some cereal, carrot sticks and grape tomatoes. i thought these would be fillers, you know, items to tide me over between stops. i did not know my survival would depend on rationing these items like a refugee. i could not believe the food situation on the road. we weren't traversing siberia, for the love of god, we were driving across america, through populated states with major cities, people do it all the time! it's not that i learned anything i didn't already know. it's just that difference of knowing something and experiencing it. so, yes, i know that the lowest common denominator, the foods that are cheapest and store longest and most easily are those that are by and large chemical concoctions high in fat and high fructose corn syrup. and i know that most of america, myself included, has one eye nervously on his or her bank account and the other despondently on his or her wallet. i also know how to do math, so i know that the foods corporate america is going to put on the shelves at road stops are going to be among the worst there are for you. they're cheap to make, easy to store, and most affordable for americans, who just spent a mindnumbing amount of money on gas at the pump, to buy. but i was, nonetheless, shocked and saddened to see this food as the opposite of nourishment coup play out the entire way across the country. at every single *store* or *mart* at every single turnpike service place or major highway truck stop, gas station and *travel plaza* the only things you could buy to eat were artificially processed or flavored: soft drinks, candy, chips, crackers, snacks, ice cream, sugar laden juice drinks, jerky, highly processed cheeses and some luncheon meats. all i wanted was to find a banana. i set that as my goal. a simple, attainable goal i had thought. i thought bananas are everywhere. they store easily. if i found one i could trust it enough to eat it since i would be discarding the peel, so it would not matter as much where or how it had been stored or who else's hands had touched it before i bought it. i mean these stops are there because they know that there are people who are travelling distances such as we were, who require food and drink in order to stay alive. we are not the first and will not be the last to travel from here to there in an automobile. and furthermore, they cater to people who make their living driving huge trucks gigantic distances all day and night long. anything else you could need to survive while making such a journey you could find - from clothes to toiletries to knives to maps to batteries and cords and adapators up the whazoo to lottery tickets to over the counter medications to books to magazines to caffeine in any form you could imagine it to keep you awake on the road to showers and changing rooms even. there were laundry facilities in some of these stops! but a piece of fruit or a fresh vegetable? not one. i did not find a banana until reno, nevada. we had driven over 3000 miles at that point. now, don't get me wrong, who doesn't love a piece of candy now and then? or a soda? because i admittedly certainly do. sure i'd love some gummy bears!! or should i get the sour gummy worms? decisions, decisions!! that's fun for the first couple of stops. no problem if your trip is only a day or a few days. try existing on that stuff for 12 days. even a junk food whore is going to get bored. you've got to cleanse your palate. you've got to get some nutrients. you're about to spend 10-12 hours in a car, half of which you will be driving that car, you need something in your belly that's gonna help get you through. you don't need to throw yourself into a two week cycle of sugar highs and lows. a crash and burn dance with addiction that's going to wreak havoc on your metabolism and sanity. and you don't need to know that everyone else on the road is either flying on a sugar rush or in that post-sugar crash coma. as if i wasn't already a distrusting, defensive driver. just kidding! i'm a good driver - at least that's what the dude in berkeley who sold us our 1986 bronco told me (in moderate disbelief which he didn't even try to hide) while i was test driving it.

at any rate, thank god for carrot sticks and rice cakes. it was a challenge to keep myself fed, but i managed to and lived to see california, where produce is abundant and i am loving it. it was sobering to see how difficult our economy makes it to be healthy and to take care of ourselves. to not be able to find any piece of produce at any rest stop between new york and california? it seems preposterous to me. driving through all that farm land, past all those ranges and ranches and witnessing with every passing mile the disconnect between the land, what it's producing, what it's capable of producing and the people who live on it, near it, or drive through it. and with that, i will get off my soap box about the implications of the food stuffs available or not available on the shelves and in the coolers. and i will enjoy living within walking distance of the berkeley bowl. and i will never ever get in a car for a road trip again without doing some serious food prep and stock up beforehand. lesson learned.