Driving Home

Betty's Run is a week past. I've been to Vancouver and come home. I'm back into my normal life, or as normal as life can be for me. My friend Chris Gordon drove with me yesterday, making the trip in the passenger seat. I managed to drive the whole way, without incident. It was a 12 hour driving day, plus a couple of hours for stops, visits along the way, gas, etc.

I am pleased that I could still make that drive. In fact I did it easily. There was, and is, little strain when I drive. The driver's seat in my truck is perhaps the most comfortable seat I use. It beats my wheelchair by a mile, and even has one up on my fancy power chair; it is attached to my truck. Mile after mile passes by with very little effort on my part, the steering wheel easy to turn, cruise control on. Highway driving is the best.

This does not mean I should not have someone with me when I travel; I should. As Chris says, it is a kind of risk/reward thing. I can see what he means. More and more there are things of increasing difficulty for me. Getting in and out of the truck is tough enough. Fueling up requires that I find a full service gas station, something impossible in a great many places. And then there are things like the possibility of a flat tire or some other vehicle problem.

Still, I like that I retain some independence. I like that I can still depend on myself to make it work, to get myself from there to here and from here to there. I like that I continue to feel the freedom of the open road. I'm not sure how long it will last, so I am going to enjoy it while I can. I'm pretty sure I will do another road trip this summer, perhaps to Bella Coola, along the last stretch of major highway in BC which I have not yet driven. That sounds like freedom to me.