In late April I made my way up the east coast. First stop—Myrtle beach, where my mom grew up. I visited her childhood home, and met the man who was renovating it. He allowed me inside to look around inside, which was cramped and piled high with the clutter of construction and depression. My mom rarely talks about her childhood, but she had mentioned climbing a tree in her front yard with her best friend. It was still there, stoic and shady.

I counterbalanced this oddly poignant visit with a Krispy Kreme doughnut and a royal sleeping spot right by the beach. But the beach held more tension—I filmed washed up jellyfish and discovered a dead bird just out of reach from picturesque waves.

TALK ABOUT THE PEOPLE I MET ON THE BEACH WHO TOLD ME LIFE AND LOVE STORY?

Ilan and I met up again in Denver, and went on to see little otters in Lily Lake, frisbee our way through Moab, hike around Arches National Park, horseback ride through Monument Valley, ogle at the rock formations in Goose Neck State Park, take baths in Lake Powell, watch 4th of July fireworks over Las Vegas, sweat our way across the Hoover Dam, melt through a Death Valley heat wave, and “ooh” and “ahh” our way under the canopy of the Sequoias.

Perhaps the most pleasant day of the entire trip was July 6th, 2023, spent at South Creek Falls in Sequoia National Forest. Here a sloping riverbank led down to shallow water full of sand and rocks, all covered by tree-filtered shade. We played like little kids, hunting for cool stones, making dams out of rocks and mud, and splashing around. I made a drawing of Ilan using soft, white stone. In the most story-book fashion, the day only ended when Ilan got his first-ever bee sting and we ran for equal fear of an angry hive, and of a potential allergic reaction.

We unwittingly visited Yosemite during the busiest weekend of the entire year—a years-in-the-making hiking trail had JUST opened, yielding an experience no less beautiful, but certainly less pleasant. What came next was much more our speed. We were driving Highway 1 (as one does on a Cali road trip) and pulled over when we saw the spectacular show of nature at Davenport beach. Wildflower-stuffed meadows led right to the edge of cragly cliffs with wide ocean views. We hiked up a path to an overlook, and I pointed out the textured rock formations of a neighboring outcrop. I was so excited about the beauty that I grabbed Ilan in a hug, and he turned and kissed my cheek. As we clambered down from the outlook, a man approached us. He said he was a professional photographer on a work road trip, and then he showed us what he had captured on his drone.

The rest of Highway 1 did not disappoint: we went through a cloud-shrouded Golden Gate Bridge, played a spirited game of frisbee golf to knock down a sandcastle we made at Stinson beach, and had the funkiest ice cream and unusual cheeses on a rare splurge. In mid July we spent the night at a story-book dock. Thick fog and high, close cliffs separated a small restaurant/bed & breakfast/grocer/outdoor supplies shop/office building from the rest of the nearby town. Seals were known to visit the rocky shore, but the most memorable feature sat partway down the dock itself: an enclosed, hot shower, perched on top of the ocean. At this point we had not had the luxury of a proper shower in a while, so before the afternoon got even colder, we traded coins for tokens inside the pizza parlor, gathered towels and soap, and had five whole minutes each of a hot, high pressure stream.

Redwood National Park is where I made my Redwood Rubbing on a fallen log, before we beelined up the coast, stopping only for gas and about a million curiosities. A Park Ranger in the Redwoods told us all aggregate fruits in North America are edible (everything that has the little spheres like blackberries do), so we picked and ate berries on the side of the highway. We ate cheese at the Tillamook factory and hugged at Hug Point, where I met a van-lifer with three large golden retrievers (how?!). Whale-watching and tide pooling were less cool than advertised, but then we saw it: a sign for a fish hatchery.

Ilan asked, Okay, how badly do you want to go? Out of ten?

I looked at the sign more closely. To the fish place?!? Like a 2. No, okay, like, a 3?

Okay, I’m at an 8.

And since 3+8 is greater than 10, off we went. This system proved quite useful in deciding what to do and what to prioritize, and the rules were simple: we had to average at least a five between us to do something—so our scores had to add up to at least ten—otherwise we wouldn’t go as a pair.

The math worked in our favor, as a Native American man who made a habit of hanging out at Quinault National Fish Hatchery regaled us with stories of the area and of his bear hunts, and gave us each a bear claw. It sounds like I’m making this up, but I swear it’s true.

The next heavy-hitter was Olympic National Park. It was now the end of July. My body was beginning to crumble under the constant change in temperature, altitude, location, sleep schedule, diet, and routine. I got the sickest I’d been all trip (which, by the way, was saying something as I was under constant threat of blooming colds). Ilan took over, finding us a safe spot to spend the night amongst other campers, who graciously helped him level the minivan on rocks and who kindly made sure I had all the meds I needed. In the middle of Nyquill-induced sleep, Ilan shook me awake. Feverish, I still registered the importance of the sight: a cartoonishly large moonrise perfectly silhouetting a ridgeline collection of trees, all veiled in a haze of crystal stars.

I don’t really remember the next day, or much about Olympic National Park itself, but I know that as soon as we descended from the mountain, we ran smack into the annual lavender festival—which had shockingly little lavender involved. My true respite came when we we were guests for two nights at a family friend’s house in Seattle. Forrest Inslee fed us brilliantly fresh food from his resplendent backyard garden, left us to sleep as long as possible, and offered up thick watermelon slabs when we woke up. I was refreshed mind, body, and soul after just two nights.

My family’s Door County vacation meant a quick trip hiatus for me and a solo adventure in Vancouver for Ilan, before we reunited to visit a college friend of mine and to explore the Dale Chihuly glass museum. Here we encountered more free professional photography—though this time we knew about it and pretended to be frogs, because don’t we look funny?

Our first real, paid campsites (can you believe we shelled out?) came at the end of our trip, because it was the only way to see Yellowstone with any semblance of fun and efficiency. I must say, we had much nicer accommodations at much cheaper (read: free) camping spots, but I can’t complain as we snagged one of the few remaining sites for the month. Yellowstone was, of course, fabulous. White cliffs at Mammoth Hot Springs! The rainbow rotten egg lake lake of Grand Prismatic Spring! Waterfalls and clay bubbling up out of Indiana-Jones-style mud pits!! God-perfected canyons! Freaking OLD FAITHFUL! Then there were HERDS OF BISON WITH THEIR BABIES! (I liked it. I liked it a lot.) It was worthy of every bit of praise I’d heard, and certainly worth the camping fee.

We sped east to get to Chicago in time for Ilan’s newly-secured research job—but not so quickly as to miss counting how many stairs it takes to climb up to see Mount Rushmore up close, or wander through The House on the Rock in Wisconsin. Our very last night on the road—the finale of this entire two person production—saw us getting Thai food in Milwaukee before winding across treacherous old train tracks next to Lake Michigan into a no-mans-land waters edge clearing. It was a perfect blend of the wilderness we had just come from, and the urban center we were heading toward: tall, wild grass and graceful trees framed the lake edge, where a low spot revealed cigarette butts, plastic wrappers, and beer cans, drawing the eye up the bank and toward a moldy mattress pushed up against a tree. Our night was punctuated with the steady rhythms of waves slapping the shore and reggeaton thumping from a nearby car radio.

This was our secret spot, made more special by the fact that it used up all of my adventurer’s road tripping magic. Months later, after we’d settled into our new jobs and Chicago apartments made out of real walls, Ilan and I took a weekend trip up to Milwaukee. This time it was easier to find the secret spot, and to navigate across the tracks. But once we rolled onto the familiar grassy clearing, I couldn’t shake a feeling of deep, unsettled anxiety. Though the spot featured the same mix of beauty and odd characters as before, this time I couldn’t relax. I didn’t feel brave, or adventurous. I couldn’t soak in the beauty of the water, or shake off the warnings of the moldy mattress. Walter was no longer home in the way he had once been—back when he alone had served so faithfully, so intimately, so wholly, as my home.

Two years later, I briefly regained my road tripping magic while driving out east to visit family. I hunkered down on a shady street in a quiet commercial development near a hotel, stopping on my way home from Winston Salem, NC. My previously smooth bed time dance had turned clunky without practice, and it took me triple the time to set up the sheets, cover the windows, pee, and brush my teeth. Settling in for the night felt like meeting an old friends who had drifted away—a reunion that I know is one-of-a-kind, but can’t bring myself to treat as such. It echoed the painful but essential lesson of my twenties: no treasured relationship is impervious to tarnish.

I’m selling Walter soon. It has nothing to do with road tripping magic or lack thereof—not that any of that was his fault—but everything to do with hard truths, gas mileage, and practicality. Of course, I’ll miss him. Walter has seen me through almost all of my four-year relationship, through all my post-college jobs, through deaths and births, through life direction decisions, and the making and losing of friends. So if you ever see a maroon Honda Odyssey with a “Hello! My name is Walter” bumper sticker, give him a wave for me.

I will soon discover how to say goodbye to a home that I built myself out of scraps, savings, and willfulness.

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