It’s a play on Travels With Charlie, of course, although I no longer remember exactly what John Steinbeck wrote of his venture across America with dog Charlie. My travels harken back to wanderlust nurtured by my vaudeville-loving, farm-to-city father, by my mother who fed rail-riding hobos outside the back door, and by my own natural proclivity to hit the road. Mine was a wanderlust trapped by the necessities of career, but now freed by the loss of a job on May 11th. My travels will start September 11th with a 30-day trek. And instead of a dog, or more likely in my case, a cat, there will be three other people.

Two of them I know well. The third not at all.

Keith is my domestic partner a.k.a. boyfriend, man friend, lover, soul mate, life partner, or significant other. All of which sound a bit stilted or too personal, somehow, unlike the more generic "husband." I tried "fiancé" a couple of times. But since neither of us has really been on bended knee (fearing, I suspect, the awkwardness of getting back up!) it felt a little untrue.

Keith is a retired architect, professor emeritus from University of Michigan and designer of our half 1940 Cape Cod, half modern home in Lathrup Village, Michigan. He is the fulfillment of my puzzling teen-and-college-years interest in mid-century design, eagerly learning about the Bauhaus, loving the patterns of Paul Klee, and yearning for a liver-shaped Noguchi table (I got a Nakashima, which like me, you may need to look up.) We agree on many things, except, right now, at what degree the thermostat should be set.

Linda is my best girlfriend, my big sister, and my only sibling except for Sandra Seale, the mysterious, never-met oldest half sister. We are very much alike, but not in all ways. She is more girly and I am more bookworm. She has (had) red hair and green eyes, I have (had) dishwater blond and brown eyes. An early definition of our relationship was my being the brat who searched relentlessly for her boyfriend’s love letters. And she still thinks my hair ought to act like hers (my cowlick goes down, hers up.) For many years now, we seldom hang up the phone without saying, “I love you.” Because you never know….

Ken is the unknown fourth. Former Air Force Lt. Colonel, corporate manager, and Republican leaning to our very liberal, mostly liberal and probably liberal. He is Linda’s boyfriend and Keith and I have not met him. That’s right. Never met him, talked to him, or emailed him. We will be living in a 26’ motorhome, all four of us, for the first 18 days of our upcoming journey. I'll let you know how it goes.

It is a journey that starts in Detroit, Phoenix and Austin, where our flights depart for Los Angeles. From there we RV through the great national parks and monuments of Sequoia, Yosemite, Yellowstone, Mt. Rushmore, Badlands, and on to the Lake Michigan shoreline. We will stop in Ketchum, Idaho, to honor Ernest Hemingway and possibly in Oak Park, Illinois, for a salute to both Hemingway and Frank Lloyd Wright.

RV across America. It’s been a dream of mine, now coming true.



Live, laugh, love…for you never know when it will end.