2/5 I will not get to be involved much with the dying of my mother, because it will be all about my father.

2/4 “I hope I get to see as much of it as possible in my lifetime, and preferably before I retire.”

2/3 I realize how my excitement for the Jeep had been reigned in while we had only one of them, and it was hers. That inhibition is now gone. I want to know it all, and try it all, all of the time.

2/2 Adam Neely’s video essay about AI music. I had expected sharp and careful consideration, and I was not disappointed. I do think we’ve barely scratched the surface of what it is.

2/1 The time has begun during which I move the Jeeps back and forth in front of the house to charge both of them, each for two-and-a-half hours. This will be easier once I have a longer cable, and also when the street is no longer narrowed by the walls of snow left and right. But for at least another week, we are not going to see temperatures above freezing at all.

1/31 Relation of a country’s size to the modes of transportation available during its existence. My flight to Tucson of about six hours, and my drive back which took six to seven times as long.

Truckers are the gravity of the road. For such long stretches I was all alone with nothing but trucks around me. Each of them a semi with no special markings, exactly the same shape and a smudged out grey because we’re all covered in finely sprayed dirt. The truckers know what they’re doing, or so you presume, although I saw maybe twenty wrecks of trucks having veered off the road into the ditch in various states of damage. But if a truck goes seventy in a curve you can assume that you can do it, too. If a truck slows down you better follow their example. If a truck passes another one, and it takes a minute or two, there’s no reason to get upset or impatient. They know what they’re doing, and they have respect for you too. If your eyes are tired and you’d rather not squint to figure out where the road is going, it’s okay to hang out behind a truck and let them find the way. Their tail lights are everything you need.

1/30 Handling the winter storm came down to just two decisions: Whether to take the northern route via Amarillo, rather than Dallas – which would have allowed me to pass through more states I have not been to, but the weather maps showed bright red and even purple areas in those states, and I saw cars on TV covered in inches of ice –, and then again on the morning in Tucumcari whether I’d go via Oklahoma and St. Louis, or go yet further north to Kansas City. I chose the former, based on the snowfall predictions, and it was alright, although Oklahoma had probably the worst cover of snow on the city highways of all places I passed through. Also, and I did not know that, Oklahoma City is on the easternmost stretches of the Rocky Mountains, and the descent from OKC into the plains was one of the more challenging parts of the drive.

I was always in a hurry. Partly because of tracking and trying to out-maneuver the winter storm, and partly because it was technically a work week, and from Monday I was supposed to have regular work days and drive from the late afternoon into the night. And because of this, I also tried to make as much headway as I could over the weekend.

To realize the potential of this trip, and to actually do something along the way, rather than just eating miles, I should have had two or even three weeks for it.

1/29 Home in Newburgh. Excitedly taking pictures of the two Jeeps together. I will need some time to process what I just did. My mind still feels smudged out along these 2,500 miles. Life feels longer if you do something with it.

1/28 Pittsburgh, visiting N. We first go to ALDI’s and load up the Jeep with more supplies than he could carry on one of his weekly two-hour shopping hikes. Then sports bar. Then three rounds of pool, of which he wins two. For a few more minutes, we sit in front of the fire place in the gigantic Kubrick-style lobby, but can’t find the switch to turn it on.

It is here in this business park that I encounter the only aggressive drivers of my 2,000 miles so far. Tailgate, can’t wait for me to park.

1/27 Columbus, OH. The dates on which I’m writing this are correct, and yet I can find no trace in here of Indianapolis, where I did indeed stay last night. I just drove here from there, in fact. Mind’s a blur. Hard to keep my balance, in fact, as I walk into one of the many, many gas stations, for obvious needs. Also – and I have never felt this while driving before – it repeatedly seems to me we are going down a steep decline among towering mountains and everyone’s pickling up speed as if sucked into a tunnel, when in fact we are driving level, all it is is a plain.