Pardon My French

There weren’t enough movies to prepare me for what it would look like.

My knowledge of the desert consisted of it being a dry, sandy place where scorpions live, people used to die of thirst out there and the only shade possible comes from the rare cactus. But, it just wasn’t real to me.

It’s a climate zone that’s always been so far away and beyond my understanding that it was practically mythical until we drove over the Texas and New Mexican border.

It seemed to come out of nowhere and surrounded Interstate 40 almost immediately. It was so… open. Miles and miles of different shades of tan, dotted with copy after copy of the same tiny shrub. The landscape was inconsistent, with sudden dips, cliffs and monstrous mounds of rock that are so dry, they look as though they could crumble if you touched them.

There is the occasional occupied trailer, house, ranch or tiny collection of homes nestled near the highway, but there are far more empty ones. The boarded up gas stations, rusty signs missing letters, forgotten cars and hollow homes are spooky. An old, lone blue bus plopped in the middle of a clearing, surrounded by nothing else but desert, actually made all of the hair on my arms stand straight up. Things that seem out of place, that belong there just feels a little eerie.

I did my best to shoot a video of what it’s like out there, but, the Macbook’s camera wasn’t really made for that sort of thing and so it’s not the best quality. I’m still getting the hang of shooting these videos and still have a lot to learn about it. Phi said I’m already starting to appear more comfortable on camera. Bear with me.

The Desert from Caitlin Foyt on Vimeo.

I love our relationship.

Phil and I have been in the car together for two straight days and we don’t want to kill each other like how I’d surely want to any other human being.

I’m really glad that we ended up taking the single car. Just having him beside me, whether we’re talking, in silence, sifting through the iPod or listening to podcasts of NPR’s “Radio Lab”–it always feels good with him there. This has been such an easy and smooth journey.

I shot this short video earlier today. It’s me sort of “checking in” from inside the car.

Day 2: From The Car from Caitlin Foyt on Vimeo.

We drove about 650 miles yesterday and ended up at a Days Inn in a small city called Sunset Hills, Missouri, just outside of St. Louis for the night. It wasn’t as far as or itinerary had anticipated but, I figure that Day 1 is probably the most difficult. Spending hours in the car requires some stamina.

We faced a few minor set backs. Most notable involved Phil having to take part of his car apart after Kiwi crawled behind the storage console beneath the car’s climate control/ radio panel.

We didn’t even realize that there was an opening near where the heat blasts out at our feet. And even if we did know this, we probably wouldn’t have expected my cat to crawl inside that crevice. It was during one of our first pit stops that we left Kiwi in the car to eat lunch and she ran and hid in Narnia.

When we came back to the car, we were confused that Kiwi had disappeared. We spent a few minutes scouring through the heaping pile of our junk that packs Phil’s car’s interior from door to door. Then, we started to worry about the possibility that someone might have taken her. Phil almost immediately made me feel better, though, when he pointed out that 1.) he had locked the doors (and had to unlock the Escape to get back in) and 2.) my purse and the rest of our valuables were still in the car.

I found the opening and felt her furry coat. I tried coaxing her out but, she wasn’t moving. She wasn’t blocking any vents, didn’t appear to be at risk of being zapped by a wire or having anything equally awful happening to her. She was scared and hiding had seemed to help her to feel better, so I left her where she was. I would reach inside and pet her every couple of minutes to continue to calm her. I soon began making attempts to grab her but, the way she was positioned inside the console meant that I couldn’t get a good grip on her and she kept squirming out of my fingers. I started to worry that she might actually be stuck.

When we stopped at a gas station near Benton Harbor I made an more earnest effort to pull her out of the hole. When I grabbed hold of her lower back, she wouldn’t budge. This made me convinced that she was stuck.

Phil found a Phillips head screwdriver that he kept inside a roadside assistance pack in his glove box and did his best to unscrew the plastic parts. The threads were poorly made, because they were plastic, so he couldn’t push hard on the heads of the screw. It took a long time to get that console taken apart.

I was worried that Kiwi might be hurt or could become hurt, so I kept crying out instructions: “Don’t pull hard! No twisting! OH MY GOD!” While Phil struggled to pull this cat out of the interior of his car. (I’m actually very impressed that Phil didn’t become noticeably frustrated by this.) When he finally got her out, she was fine. No broken little arms or cuts. She didn’t even look worried. She was fine.

That damn cat gave us a heart attack.

For the most part, since then, Kiwi’s been doing pretty well. She alternates between my lap and Phil’s, usually peacefully sleeping. She doesn’t like change in the car, though, and so each time we stop and open the door, she tends to panic. We have been taking turns pumping gas and using the bathroom so that she doesn’t get too scared and/or try to hide in any dark and constricting places. We managed to sneak her into the hotel with us last night without getting caught and she didn’t really seem phased by the day at all.

On a different note, being out here, on the road means I’ve learned that everything looks similar no matter what state you find yourself in. The mid state’s mountains are a wild card and drastically change the landscape but, otherwise, same farms, same wind turbines, same “Love Jesus”-ey billboards–whether it’s Oklahoma or Indiana. It’s interesting.

Today Phil, Kiwi and I disembark on our estimated 3 day journey across the country to Los Angeles, California. It turns out, we’ve got a lot of stuff between the two of us and a lot of it isn’t going to make it into Phil’s Escape. We’re shipping my car so that we don’t have to drive all day, everyday for the next short week. Looks like we’re going to have a lot of boxes coming to our door, too.

Cross you fingers for us. It’s show time.

D-Day from Caitlin Foyt on Vimeo.

“…So, you don’t have a job lined up out there, yet?”

For a moment, this person pauses. Their eyes softly glaze over before they dart to the floor. If this is a family party, there’s most certainly a glass of something alcoholic in hand and relative x/friend of my dad’s takes a quick swig from it.

“You sure this is what you want?” This is the second time I’ve been asked this question during this conversation, only this time, relative X isn’t meeting my eyes.

I bob my head back in forth, in their direction, and take a sip from my own glass.

My explanation of the plan, of how Phil Hornshaw and I are to move to Los Angeles doesn’t fall in line with the structure of careful planning that dictated the course of my entire academic career, from elementary school to graduating from college. It’s inadequate.

“This is reckless and irresponsible,” their expression seems to read. “You’re just two kids, shacking up (god I hate that term) without a plan.”

Sometimes they pat me on the shoulder and add a half hearted “best of luck to you, then” before wandering off, but usually, they beeline across the gathering, pushing past assorted relatives, looking for my dad. They want to ask him what he’s thinking letting his baby move across the country.

I’m no child, but my parents don’t know how to parent a 20-something. It’s not something I fault them for entirely, these things take time to learn. But, it’s still difficult living in their house when for years I lived on my own. Living here has me feeling like I’m treading water. I’m going nowhere, working retail, the same plain kind of day in white suburbia, everyday, no challenges to be faced, ever.

I feel that being here is keeping me from being independent, in any sense of the word. It’s occurred to me that I will never save enough money to make my parents worry free, ever.  But I think that soon, everyone will understand that I need something different, somewhere different. I need diversity in my surroundings. It will be OK, guys. I will be OK.

There seem to be fewer jobs in Michigan, everyday. I have a job, but I didn’t go to college to work retail. In California, there are opportunities for writers, and friends currently living there may be able to help us network our way into those jobs. If not, I do still have Trader Joe’s and realistically, what’s the difference between living here and there and working at the same place?

Phil and I don’t have any debt. We’re happy, we’re healthy, we’re dreamers and we’re people with good work ethic. The whole picture hasn’t been developed quite, yet, but, we’ll work it out. We’re strong and there’s no reason to keep waiting. Our time is now.

It’s a move the two of us have discussed for the last half of a year but, to everyone else, it seems kind of sudden. We’re leaving Thursday, February 11, sometime in the early morning. We’re taking a few days to drive there, in one car (we’ll come back for the other car and the rest of our stuff later) and we’re staying at a friend’s place until we find a suitable and affordable apartment. I don’t have a job, yet, despite my constant perusal of employment sites like JournalismJobs, CareerBuilder, Monster.com and even Craiglist. But, so far, no bites.

Until opportunity knocks (and I’ll be standing near the door, so to speak) my Trader Joe’s job transfers and Phil still has his job.

Sure, the big change is scary. Change always is. I cried the first day I arrived at school–broke down in tears the moment my dad’s Silverado Pick Up left the parking lot, leaving me there alone. Same thing in Grand Rapids, Cass City and in France. But, I held it together, learned a lot of things about myself and these experiences, good and bad, they helped me to grow up.

I’m not worried, though. Because I’m not alone this time.

We can do this. I know it.