They’re all memorable, except the ones I’ve forgotten about.
Honestly, it’s hard to rate the specialness of that kind of experience, especially since it’s often the case the road trips a person has taken have been in different locations, with different people, different scenery. That said, I’ll go for this one — a 2003 drive from Isla Mujeres to Fort Worth. To clarify, a friend and I left a Caribbean island off the Yucatan coast in his pickup truck, and drove it through Mexico and into, then across, Texas. It was a one-door-closing-one-door-opening kind of trip for me. I’d been living for about a year in Mexico, but just on the island, and had never really ventured into the rest of the country. I made a decision to return to the Norte, because I had stuff I wanted to take care of back home. My friend was just going back for a visit, but was planning to return to live on Isla Mujeres. He is still there now, by the way.
The trip was enough to make me feel like I really didn’t want to leave Mexico. Driving across the peninsula and then through the Gulf region, you get beauty-bombed by the splendor of the natural environment. On top of that, the diversity of landscape and in the population is eye opening. In the US, we generally have a very “flat” idea of what our neighbor to the south offers, and it couldn’t be further from the truth. Every town has it’s own food, it’s own temperament, its own mix of influences. And there is a huge North-South polarity, as there is in the US. It’s pretty cool to watch it change in stages while you ride through, like a slow-motion slide show. And next thing you know…. you’re in Brownsville.
The truth is, not only had I not seen Mexico before my departure trip, I had never seen Texas either. So, I got two educations in about 4 days. Texas ain’t Mexico…well, it kind of is, but…anyway. The further away from the border we got, the more I realized what a sterilized bland hell so much of our country can be. Stopping at the friend’s sister’s house for a night made the glaring physical difference between the two environments come out. Little villages full of small colorful homes with kids and grandmas out in front became endless cul-de-sacs full of cold white and gray houses with huge driveways, huge cars, boring gardens, no color anywhere. That said, there’s gotta be something people there like about it. Or else they wouldn’t be there. I guess.
To be honest, its been twenty years and I’ve never felt I got Mexico out of my system. I have said forever that I want to go back and see more of the country. Who knows? Maybe its time for another road trip. I now live in the Mid-Atlantic. I’d have to drive all the way to the border from here. This time, though, I might skip Texas. Ha!
RUNNING ON ASHES 