Conversations

I punched the hotel into TomTom and pointed the nose of my aging Audi towards the end of the driveway and towards, in fact, just the beginning of our shared 365-mile journey.  Jane, the voice of TomTom, prepared and thought and planned and warned me as best she could, usually a half-mile in advance, of intersections and of their imminence given my current pace, and she advised me and suggested when to turn right and when to turn left and of when the highway would split ahead and even of which lanes it would be best for me to stay in.  Together, Miss Jane and I made our way south from my home in Maine, the remoteness of which many consider to represent, and speak volumes about, me (and I cannot disagree with them). Heading downwest, we crossed the Piscataqua River Bridge and in turn traversed the No-Man’s-Land of Interstate 95 in New Hampshire that is evermore, for me, in addition to a convenient pair of state-subsidized liquor stores, a protective barrier from civilization (as its inhabitants refer to it) and a place to visit and a place to return from as best I might and as soon as I may.  West, south, into the dark we went, over turnpike and Berkshire, through hamlet and along parkway, and even across major bays on tolled bridges to reach eventually our hotel.*

I had a customer to see the next day.