Tag Archives: Travel

Yes, Prairie Lights bookstore in Iowa City actually had a section called “Non-Ordinary Reality.” While it mostly had books about visualization and decks of tarot cards, I’m thinking this term applies to any of the in-between states we ferry through, such as between waking and sleep, knowing and not knowing, and other general, even non-metaphoric forms of travel.

Yesterday, for example, I woke in a boy’s bedroom in a suburb of Coralville, Iowa, glanced briefly at the James Bond posters before packing, then drove to the Amish town of Kalona (where I mainly saw tourists of the Amish). There I met up with some of the other Poet Laureati for a reading at the general store, snagged a great cast iron pan for making corn-shaped cornbread in, and drove to Mary’s house, an old schoolhouse overlooking the early spring rolling hills in all direction. After visiting talking over the virtues of great mustards with Tom and eating some astonishing apple tart, I drove south, past what locals call Guru U in Fairfield, stopping for iced coffee where I held open the door for dreamy man in long white roles, edged with gold. Then it was the long sloping up and down west, through farmland, woods, expansive valleys and occasional town before the interstate south, driving through sunset, taking the wrong I-435 near Kansas City and having to retrace some miles, and then shooting west to land at home sometime after six and a half hours on the road.

Although travel is animated, it’s also suspended animation. I’m between the habitual and regular, the do-this-now and what-next of my life and just cruising at 72 mph while listening to, in this case, Tina Fey read her very book book, Bossypants, on tape. Travel shifts time and season. At the same time, unless I’m fighting claustrophobia and missing the earth in a plane, I kind of love the possibilities unfolding in travel. What’s down the next hill? How does the sun barely show itself in a new place? Is there a locally-owned place to eat good fried chicken, and of course the constant question of do I stop here or wait until the next rest stop?

Now that I’m home, I’m surprised to see how new these trees look, bursting with leaves, glittering in the wind, after some days of being among the trees still yearning for leaf. I’m happy to be back in this bed, this bathtub, this house, this zip code. And I’m trying to meld the non-ordinary reality into this reality, just as non-ordinary actually although it may appear otherwise.

In between home and where I’m going, I have landed in a very pink room where a suspiciously calm (but sneaky-eyed) Victorian girl stares furtively at me. This morning, I was home, working in the office and brushing the cat off the computer so I could type. Tomorrow I’ll be reading from my memoir at a conference, then visit good friends for the night. Both there and here are places that swallow me up in routine or connections, but between the two is this night, where I have the luxury of not being on tap for anything.

At dinner tonight, a cafe where I ate pesto-encrusted flounder, I looked out the window, through the pale mesh of the curtain, to see the bank of clouds edged in blue. I listened to two women perform, one singing and playing guitar, and the other on violin. I considered the elegant shape of the salt shaker. Not having people to visit with or a book to read, I had no choice but to be where I was, enjoying the lime in my ice water and listening to conversations spill over from other tables.

There’s a spaciousness and ease in such in-between spaces, a way to enjoy the adventure without any stake in what to expect. Even when I locked my keys in the car, I knew it was fine, nothing to worry over, and after a phone call and handing a man $40 for his minute-long popping open of the car door, I felt a kind of equanimity. Listening to the train in the distance, watching the big floral wallpaper juxtaposed with the big floral bedspread or drinking water from a crystal glass in this room, I tried to just breathe it in, enjoy the nuances and gesture of being rather than doing, and wonder if my dreams tonight will be sweet or ironic.

Whatever happens, I know in-between places are the spaces in which little signs and wonders most often find me, in great part because I’m listening better here (at least when I’m not rushing through), so when, during dinner, the women performing broke into “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” as the sun began to set, I leaned back, smiled and even considered clicking my heels together, but then there are surely flying monkeys of surprise, tin men of love and lollypop kids of sweetness to meet, and I know the way home when it’s time.