Arrived in Santa Fe, New Mexico, November 29th, 2 A.M.
Jeep Odometer: 194,889
Trip: 3,880
I drove out of Texas on a wimb (sp?)—a wimb of Faith. After getting my oil changed in Austin, I stopped at the gas station across the street to fill up for a long drive to Santa Fe. I pumped. I paid. I got back in the Jeep. But it wouldn’t start. I tried again and again, but no luck. So I walked back to the oil change joint, told them the news, they acted surprised (I wasn’t), and they drove me over to check it out. After the mechanic tried several times to start it, with no success, he offered to call a tow truck to haul it back over to the shop.
“Let me try one more time,” I said. I tried and it turned over. The check engine light was on.
“You can take it, or we can bring back over for a diagnostics check,” he said.
I wanted to go. I want to say “F it” and ride, but I erred on the side of caution.
After an hour of drinking bad coffee, reading even worse magazines, and wondering what the hell the Latino family next to me was talking about, a mechanic came around the corner as I puffed on a cigarette. I followed him to the back where the Jeep was running with four guys standing around it.
“So what’s the word?” I said.
All four of them just looked at me with no answer. Finally, the head guy spoke up. “We don’t know. The check is bringing up nothing. I’d love to just tell you something and work on it, but I can’t.”
Twenty-six years and eight months later and I finally met the first honest mechanic of my life. It must be a Texas thing.
“So what does that mean?” I asked.
“It means you can take it as is…if you wish.”
I shrugged my shoulders, as if saying, “Okay, I don’t have any other choice,” and I got back in the saddle.
“Have a safe trip to Colorado,” he said, and patted old Charlie on the hood as I waved and pulled away.
So I pulled away from Austin around 2 P.M., roughly four hours past my original plan. A recurring theme in my life. Like this blog—17 months in the works.
I knew I’d run out of daylight much quicker than I wished. But when the sun is heading west over Texas in the late fall, it looks as if it will never set.
Wrong.
It sets.
And it gets awfully dark when it does. If I can provide any bit of advice from my Odyssey, this is the most logistically important: GET GAS EVERY CHANCE YOU GET. Especially in west Texas on I-10. It’s IMPERATIVE! There are 100 to 150 mile stretches between gas stations. And the one I found, the gauge on the Jeep eerily close to “E” wasn’t attended by anyone. If I didn’t have a credit card I would’ve been screwed.
All through the night I rode like Cassidy and Sundance, leaving no trail behind…unless Hail Marys leave a trail (not sure), because I said more than I could count. I was never scared. Honest. I can truthfully say that that was the most dangerous drive of my life, and I was never scared. You can’t be scared. If you are, you won’t make it. Or, you will, but you won’t realize how unbelievable it is to be alone with God, your safety and wellbeing entirely in His Hands. I believed and He answered. I showed no worry and He rewarded me. I believe the Bold of Faith are always blessed. And I can say that from experience. I just wish I could say that I’m ALWAYS Bold of Faith.
Probably the most unsettling moment of the leg was a stop I made just south of Roswell, New Mexico. As I pulled into a gas station, somewhere around 2 A.M., a full contingent of Banditos were gassing up their motorcycles. I had seventeen hundred bucks cash in my pocket, but I had a beard that nobody, I repeat, nobody F’s with. I believe a man’s physical size is irrelevant if he walks with conviction, wears a beard like a lumberjack, and carries a look in his eyes like he’s wanted in several states for murder. That, or I looked like a broke homeless man who lived in and out of his Jeep. Either way, it worked.
I pulled into Santa Fe early in the morning and found a room at the Motel 6 just off of I-40. I carried my valuables into the room, brushed my teeth, and called it a night. I spent almost 14 hours, 11 of which were in the pitch dark, driving across the southwest, and I was beat. I slept like a baby.
I have to admit, as sad as this is to me, I have since lost my trip log and atlas. Therefore, I cannot remember the exact time or mileage for the final two legs of my Odyssey. I can only hope that I left both somewhere that someone picked it up, looked at it, and grew inspired to do the same. However, 13 months later, I will recount the last two legs of my Odyssey the best I can.
I woke up in Santa Fe just before noon, checked out of Motel 6, and ate breakfast at an I-Hop. Then I gassed up and hit the New Mexico road, west by northwest, with Colorado on my mind. I can honestly say that New Mexico is one of the most beautiful states in the country. I used to always think it was just a barren wasteland of brown. But I learned that it possesses colors like I’ve never seen anywhere else.
I crossed the New Mexico/Colorado border in the late afternoon hours. The Rocky Mountains were mine for the taking, and I had no other choice but to belt out John Denver’s “Rocky Mountain High” as best I could. Be grateful you weren’t there to witness it. It was a butcher job at best.
I went as far as Durango and checked in to a Super 8. I went into town, sat at a Starbucks, and made a last ditch effort to find a Telluride residence on Craigslist. Nothing was giving. I would have to just drive into town the following day and find out in person.
When I woke up the following day, what was supposed to be my last on the road, it was cold as hell. I can remember that distinctly. It was the kind of cold that makes breathing a painful task. I looked at my atlas and wrote down the last directions. Then I put my things in the Jeep and I started cutting north through the teeth of the Rockies.
When I finally got to state route 145, forty miles south of Telluride, I stopped at a gas station. That was the moment I realized I was in the wild of a lightly developed wild west. The gas pump was one of those types that has a revolving ticker and nowhere to pay with a credit card. So I went inside, where an older guy in blue jeans and a flannel shirt attended the counter.
“I’m going to fill up on pump two,” I said.
“Okay. Go ahead,” he said.
“Do you want a credit card or a hundred-dollar bill to hold until I know how much it is?” I said.
“No. I can’t run, but I can shoot,” he said. He was dead serious. No chuckle or laugh followed. I’m absolutely convinced he had a shotgun loaded and ready to roar behind that counter.
So I filled up, paid, and turned up 145 North to my destination. If you ever get the chance to drive into Telluride, Colorado, on a sunny winter day, from the south, do it. Don’t think about it. Just do it. You will be very glad you did. Granted, if you drive a 1995 Jeep Wrangler, there will be times you think you’ve pushed your luck. That moment will probably come on descent from Devil’s Pass. It’s the only time in four years of owning Charlie that I thought she was going to explode. It sounded like Tommy Lee was trapped under the hood with nothing but his drumsticks and an eight-ball of cocaine. Also, certain moments come back to you in an instant, like the moment a mechanic on Cape Cod said I should look into having the brakes worked on. He said it wasn’t imperative, but he also said it 4,000 miles earlier, nearly at sea level, not 10,000 feet above it.
Obviously nothing tragic happened. Unless you can describe the panoramic sprawling snowdusted mountain views as tragically beautiful. I can. It’s one of those views that, in looking back, makes me think I can die peacefully one day, knowing I have it locked in my memory somewhere.
I pulled into Telluride around 11 A.M., and I had driven through it by 11:05. And that might be a liberal estimate. It’s THAT small of a town. But where it lacks in size, it makes up for in personality. I was there. I had made it. Home sweet home. Or so I thought.
I will forever hold that day and night close to my heart. I will never feel like a failure for leaving it behind. Maybe, perhaps one day, I will experience more than 24 hours in that little ski town atop the world, but it just wasn’t in the cards that time around. In the short time I did spend, I made several friends, drank good beer, an even better margarita, and I met, possibly, the love of my life. Man she was a doll. I teamed up with half a dozen locals in a losing effort on Trivia Night, lost my winter gloves, and fell wearily to sleep, utterly lonely for the first time in a long time.
My decision to continue west the following morning was probably initiated by a myriad of factors.
1. I was so hung-over I vomited profusely, first in my hotel room, and then on the side of the road as my head pounded. And I never vomit after drinking. I’m not 16 anymore.
2. I had absolutely nowhere to live, and the only hotel room I could find was $100 a night.
3. I had nowhere to work. I could have found a place, I’m sure, but I was a little more concerned with the place to live part.
4. Panic. The funny thing about having money, as opposed to not having it, is the fear that is born, paralyzing your spirit to live in exchange for living not to lose the tiny little monetary treasure in your bank account.
5. Loneliness. I knew I would make friends. I already did. I’m probably the best guy I’ve ever known at making friends. Seriously. I haven’t met a person yet that hasn’t wanted to be friends with me. And I say that with humble honesty.
Looking back, however, the factors that initiated my spur-of-the-moment change in plans were God’s Way of telling me where I really belonged—with my brothers.
On the 20 hour drive from Telluride to Los Angeles, only stopping for gas several times, I convinced myself I was doing it for “career” reasons. It was time to finally use my college education to make money. And where else was a better place to use a Professional Writing and Multimedia Production degree than Hollywood? I still believe that. However, I now know that wasn’t the reason God wanted me in Southern California at all.
I pulled into the back parking lot of Cliff’s office in Hollywood just after midnight. I was tired. I hadn’t eaten a thing besides an apple all day. I was probably delirious from staring at the road for almost a full day straight. And I wish I could say that I knew I’d made the right decision the moment I first saw Cliff’s face. But life doesn’t work like that. No matter how hard you try to turn life into a movie, and I have countless times, it’s not. I wish I could say I knew I made the right decision the moment I first saw Matt’s face, but I can’t. I knew I made the right decision countless times over the five months I spent in Los Angeles. Because that’s where life is real—those “in between” moments. That’s where reality always surpasses anything you can dream up in your mind.
It was the nights Cliff and I watched basketball games together, or, I ashamedly admit, The Bachelor…which I still think Brad should have picked Chantel O. For some reason he suffers from the same “Blonde-haired, blue-eyed Southern Belle Obsession” that I do, and that has plagued many a men for the better part of the past three-hundred years. It was the nights Matt and I sat at The Counter, indulging in monstrous burgers and splitting a plate of fries and onion rings. It was the hikes Cliff and I took up Runyon Canyon, philosophizing like two artists, two brothers, always seem to do. It was the late night hangouts Matt and I shared over a couple of brews and the Master Kush. It was the friends I made at Morel’s, and the laughs and fear of the general manager we shared. Really, when it all comes down to it, two things can summarize everything I learned about life in those five months:
1. Nothing, absolutely nothing can take the place of family. There’s just something about blood that doesn’t lie. There’s laughs and moments only to be shared by brothers. There’s more to learn about yourself through your brother’s eyes than anyone else. There’s more joy in one minute with your brother than ten-thousand with your best friend.
2. Anywhere you go, anywhere at all on planet earth, if you are willing to open up, you will make friends and learn new things. One of my favorite things to do, when I say my prayers every night, is to ask God to bless each and every person I’ve ever spent time with. My father once said to me, “One thing you can’t ever say is that you don’t have friends everywhere.” It’s funny how it takes someone else saying that to fully realize it.
And so, there it is, 13 months past due, but completed once and for all. My 2010 Westward Odyssey covered 45 days, 5,200 miles, and crossed 17 states. I climbed mountains and crossed rivers. I slept under blankets of stars and the roofs of all eight of my siblings. I spent time with friends, from Massachusetts to Ohio to Tennessee to Texas to Colorado to California. I held each and every one of my 23 nieces and nephews in my arms. I spent time with my father. What in the world could have been better than that? Nothing. There’s nothing I dreamt up before I embarked on that journey, and nothing I’ve dreamt up since, that even comes close to what I actually experienced during those 45 days of my life. Reality always surpasses imagination. But you can only know that for sure if you really go out and do that which you imagined.
God Bless, Your Brother in Christ,
Anthony P. Vasko
