Read Once Upon a Road Trip Online
Authors: Angela N. Blount
Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #General, #Psychology, #Interpersonal Relations
Once Upon a Road Trip
Once Upon A Road Trip
Angela N. Blount
Published by Artifice Press®
ISBN: 978-0-9895809-7-7
Copyright © 2013 by Angela N. Blount
Cover photography by Danielle Barnum
Cover art by Revalis
Editing by Courtney Wichtendahl
An Artifice Press book / published by arrangement with the author
ONCE UPON A ROAD TRIP
All rights reserved.
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Book Club Discussion Questions
Disclaimer
“This memoir is based on the author’s personal experiences over a single summer. Events and conversations have been depicted to the best of my recollection; several years after the fact, and with the assistance of actual journal entries used for documentation. Some incidents and dialogue have been condensed for the ease of retelling. Names and identifying details have been changed or omitted to protect privacy. It is only my intention to tell my story, not to cause anyone harm or defamation.”
For my dear husband, without whose support,
I might never have had the gall to chase my dreams.
Thank you for being my favorite adventure.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
And for our children.
Because one day, I want you to know the whole story of how I met your father.
Part 1
“How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.”
-Henry David Thoreau
Prologue
May 14
,
Free Spirit. Wanderlust. Soul searching. …I like to think of this as more of a pre-life crisis. What else could compel a “normal” eighteen-year-old girl from a semi-functional family in a small, Minnesota college town to get into her car and drive around the country for two months? Regardless of how bizarre that sounds, this isn’t some impulsive whim. I’ve been planning this little venture for nearly six months now; contrary to all sound advice.
It’s my first day of owning this journal. Not that I’ve ever cared much for journals or diaries, but I thought it might be wise to keep a record. Although, wisdom isn’t something anyone I know would equate with this little road trip I’ve got planned. I’m wary of it myself, but I also know it’s something I need to get out of my system. I’m not driving over 6,000 miles just to sightsee and meet people. While that’s part of it, I see this as a huge personal growth opportunity for me. Hopefully, I’ll be using this journal to keep track of said growth.
This will be my “Walkabout,” to borrow the Australian term. Just another step in the process of me finding myself, and figuring out what I’m here for. I’ve been putting a lot of thought and prayer into my preparations. While part of me is afraid to go off and do all of this alone, that only confirms in my mind that it needs to be done. I don’t like the idea of being afraid of anything. And so, I’m trying an approach I’ve come up with recently. If something scares me I’m going to charge straight into it until, a) I become so used to it that I no longer fear it, or, b) I end up unconscious. Okay, so this plan might need some tweaking. It’s more of a work in progress. Just like me.
Mom has been on edge ever since she realized how serious I am about doing this. I can’t blame her for caring, but I wish she wouldn’t worry. She was the one who pointed out that I was up and running at eight months old, and my very first word was “Bye-bye.” Not “Ma-ma.” Not “Da-da”… “Bye-bye.” If that’s not a sign, I don’t know what is.
Of course, my second word was “donut.” So maybe I’m reading too much into that…
~Ang
Chapter 1
Angie smoothed her slick palms down the seams of her scarlet graduation gown. Though dusk was falling, the loss of sunlight only took the barest edge off the early June humidity. Around her pressed hundreds of her classmates, all filed into rows in front of a portable stage that had been erected on one side of her high school football field. While she’d already endured the stifling situation for nearly an hour, the anticipation of having her name called threatened to drive her to the brink of nausea.
She distracted herself by rehearsing her steps in her mind. It was a necessity for someone who had difficulty navigating perfectly flat terrain, never mind the three steps up onto a rickety snap-together stage. For better or worse, it would all be over soon.
“Please God, don’t let me fall,” Angie prayed under her breath. Finally hearing her full name, Angeli, called out, she began her trek. Her anxiety peaked as the rubber of her squared heels caught along the grass, reminding her again of the Senior Prom debacle.
She’d worn these same ill-fated shoes that night. Having no success at finding a date, she’d decided to go stag along with her Somali friend, Millune. Denying her tomboy sensibilities for once, she’d spent hours in preparation for the evening — going to the trouble of coercing her long brown hair into holding curls, donning a shimmering floor-length gown, and even plunging into the foreign territory of wearing makeup. Turning prom into a girls’ night out hadn’t seemed like such a bad idea, up until the Grand March announcer stumbled over Millune’s name and mistakenly introduced the friends as a couple.
Angie could still hear the ripples of laughter and surprised murmuring of the crowd. The error took her attention off her feet just long enough for her to trip on her way off the stage. She missed the railing, and two years of Aikido training kicked in.
Tucking her head, she converted her fall into a front roll, allowing her weight to curve along her bowed arms. Landing unhurt in a crouch on the red carpet, she sprang back to her feet, mind racing for some way of making the epic blunder look more intentional. She then clasped her hands together and raised them above her head in a triumphant gesture, and was met with a roar of applause from the photo-happy crowd. Amid the creeping burn of humiliation, determination had steeled somewhere deep within her. She wanted much more than a laughable existence in an obscure, Midwestern town.
For the last two months, Angie hadn’t heard the end of that disastrous night. Her peers seemed to delight equally in poking fun at her clumsiness, as well as her supposed “outing.” She had yet to decide which was worse: the mocking, or the sympathetic inquiries. If any part of her had been holding out hope of dating while she was still in high school, it died a painful and awkward death at prom.
Oh well.
As far as she was concerned, the selection pool had always been shallow. Or at least, that’s what she often told herself to fend off the suspicion there might be something terminally undesirable about her.
Now, in the final moments she would have to see any of these people, she was determined to maintain her dignity.
Angie pushed the past out of her mind as her foot touched the first step. With the stage squeaking under her firm stride, she crossed to the middle of the platform. Managing a smile for the school principal — a stern looking man in a gray suit — she accepted a scrolled piece of paper. This wasn’t the real diploma, of course. That would be arriving in the mail the following week. She planned to be gone by then.
Continuing on to the far side of the stage, she met the second set of stairs and held her breath, counting steps on her way down.
One, two, three.
Crisis averted.
Relieved to have her feet safely on the ground, she made her way back to her original position to wait out the remainder of the ceremony. As per a new rule, no one would be allowed to throw their graduation caps at the end. Evidently, someone somewhere had put an eye out. As an alternative, her classmates readied streamers and cans of silly string while a favored English teacher took the pulpit to deliver a few final words of inspiration.
When the speaker made mention of graduation caps signifying success and knowledge, Angie’s attention strayed. She didn’t feel successful or knowledgeable. Having completed the requirements to pass high school, she could at least claim a sense of accomplishment. But she had come to think of it as mere survival rather than true success. In this particular rite of passage, the objective hadn’t been to slay the dragon, but simply to avoid being eaten by it for four years.
While she technically knew more facts coming away from it than she had going in, she’d accumulated many more uncertainties. What career path should she take? Where would she want to live? How could she make her life count for something worthwhile? What did it feel like to be in love? These questions all seemed critical, and in no way did recalling the square root of Pi prepare her to answer any of them.
An exuberant shout from the teenage mob signaled the finale, snapping her back to reality. The crowd dispersed in all directions amid a blizzard of confetti and streamers, with the majority making their way toward the after-party in the school gymnasium. Angie wasn’t interested in dragging out the goodbyes. After hugging her parents and posing for a few obligatory pictures, she wove herself through the scattering masses. Turning around to a tap on her shoulder, she found herself nose to nose with her best friend, Elsie.
At roughly the same height as Angie, just a few inches shy of six feet, Elsie was an eccentric creature in form as well as demeanor. Her eyes shone a bright and cunning shade of gray, like the surface of a pond after a freeze. Unruly russet hair fell as it pleased to frame her dusky, rounded features, which alluded to a vast and indistinct muddling of genetic heritage. For this particular occasion she’d chosen an elaborate red and gold Mandarin dress to compliment her willowy form. As she leaned in obnoxiously close to Angie’s face, the contrast between her friend’s elegant attire and childish demeanor was downright comical.
“Boo!”
“Ahh,” Angie answered flatly.
“You look like crap.” Elsie chirped out, in her usual cheerful tone.
“Thank you.” Angie rolled her eyes. “So are you riding with me?”
“Yeah. The ‘rents dropped me off.” Elsie made a sweeping indicative motion toward the migrating horde of seniors. “Sure you don’t want to stay for the shindig?”
“I’d rather thrust a sharp stick into my eye,” Angie said in a glaringly unexcited tone.
Elsie tapped a slender finger to her chin as she pondered, “We could go to Walmart and I’ll let you push me around in a shopping cart.”
Angie shook her head. “Too risky. They almost banned us for life last time, after your little pillow-bin-diving incident.”
“Killjoy.” Elsie grinned. “Well...we could try an overnighter at the diner. Let’s swing by my house so I can grab a sleeping bag.”
As Elsie spun around to move in the direction of the parking lot, Angie saw a confrontation coming out of the corner of her eye. She shot out a hand and caught her friend’s shoulder. But while a collision was avoided, the near-miss was enough to draw the attention of the passing pack of girls.
Mindy lurched to one side, as though the mere threat of contact with Elsie might result in leprosy. An average-sized girl with a fit build, her flaxen hair fell to just above her waist. Her face was set with fine features, but corrupted by the contempt she wore so readily. The exaggerated dodging movement caused her to strike shoulders with Sarah, an athletic, dark skinned beauty. They were the Beta and Alpha of their pack, respectively. Shadowing the duo were three other girls of similar social status.