Somewhere over Greenland

High in the skies over the Atlantic Ocean and I’m treated with a revolving seat thanks to the upgrade from American Airlines. My first class chair can face front or swivel at an angle, connecting with a foot rest that could also be used as a seat should someone want to join me for dinner. Or I can turn my seat 90 degrees from the cockpit where a rather large ledge is offered up as a desk, providing me this keen and luxurious opportunity to write.

It’s hard to believe only a century ago, these flying machines were dreamed up. On the plane tonight I watched a documentary about Dr. Horatio Nelson Jackson, the first man to drive a horseless carriage (now commonly known as a car) across the continent, from San Francisco to New York. He did so in 1903 and it took him 63 days and more than 8,000 dollars in expenses. 100 years before that, Lewis and Clark left Washington DC in search of a route to the Wild West, for which I am thankful as San Diego is one of the finest settlements in the country. It makes me wonder what the next 100 years has in store. Will our exploration in Space or the Deep Sea invite us all into those new frontiers to build new foundations? Will the Age of Aquarius spawn a new human with telepathic sense? Or will our stockpile of century old weaponry backfire and destroy Civilization, as we know it? I’m counting on all but the latter.

Watching the Ken Burns’ Film, America’s First Drive I sympathize with Dr. Nelson Jackson over his grueling drive across the plains. Of course in most places he encountered, the roads weren’t yet developed for his machine. Everything was still shipped by stagecoach and train in those days. In order to get across rivers, he’d have to drive over the train trestles.

Ten years ago this week I too was hatching my own plan to see the other side of the continent. A friend and I had heard about a local girl who moved to Los Angeles earlier that year, and did so without taking her car. So we elected to drive it to her. It didn’t take much to convince her, but we still needed to find a ride home. Another friend of mine moved to San Francisco, but could no longer afford using her car. So I offered to buy it from her for the cost of repairs and usage, with the idea that I’d someday return it to her. And bingo, we had a plan.

Our drive provided hours of sing-a-longs, a few first encounters with cowboys and long haul truckers, and plenty of high-speed hypnosis. We left around on 4 am on December 31st. We first spent New Year’s Eve zipping out of Tennessee, then Little Rock, then Oklahoma City. We listened to the NPR stations to hear the countdown in ballrooms across the country. Sunrise on the debut of 1999 gave us our first glimpse of the high New Mexico desert. The following sunrise would be spent on a snowy southern brink peering into the Grand Canyon. It went on like that for months and became a tremendous year on the road. I drove back and forth 5 times in a variety of borrowed and rented vehicles until I’d found a place to rest my exhausted credit card.

I’ve always held the belief that however you spend your New Year’s Celebration, it will be reflected in the year ahead, such was that year behind the wheel. Here’s another example: If you have the dream of traveling, I suggest packing your bags and having them with you when the clock strikes 12. Really show the universe that your intention is more than a thought. It is an action!

Not being one to watch TV, the turn of the century had the greatest impact on me. While my family gathered in the living room to toast champagne with Dick Clark, I snuck out into the fields surrounding my Mom’s house and spoke quietly with the skies. If Y2K is true and everything blacks out and the technological world is to end, I’d rather be in the protective custody of Nature than surrounded by all of our man made hindrances. Hearing my family countdown with glee from inside the house first made me feel like I was about to miss something. “C’mon Universe,” I said aloud. “I’m here and I’m hoping. Though I’m not sure what I’m hoping for… nothing and everything at the same time. I’ve got no wish. I don’t need fireworks or a pretty girl to kiss. Just recognition that whatever I’m doing with my life is… working.”

Then, 3… 2… 1… Happy New Year. Auld Lang Syne erupts in the house and there’s not a peep outside. No breezing in the trees. No sound anywhere in nature. The witch’s winter tit was so cold and solid and still that the fog of my breathe hung around like smoke billowing from a cigarette in a library. I didn’t drink my champagne. I just kept looking up. And then for whatever magical conclusion, my experience was blessed with the sight of a shooting star. As the tail of the meteor made a scratch across the dark canvas and faded, a joy filled tear picked up where it left off and carved a frozen path down my cheek. I said thank you and threw my champagne glass so high into the sky I could not see the arc before it fell deep into the woods. That year I carried with me a confidence that wherever I traveled and at whatever expense, I was doing exactly as I should; existing in harmony with everything and everyone else.

One year I wanted to be lost in a song among friends so we jammed all night, using the countdown to midnight as a count-in to a musical explosion in our humble apartment. That was 2003. One month later The Remedy would hit the airwaves and my life would become lost in the music forever.

In 2007 I explored I moonless shore in India. I liken that year as some of my greatest achievements in solitude, study, and Self-Discovery.

2008 has ushered in an example of Saturn’s severe energy ruling my world, which is no surprise as I spent the entire New Year’s Eve party in the yard in awe of Saturn’s rings thru the viewfinder of my telescope, as if I’d never believed in the planet’s definitive shape until I’d seen it with my own eyes.

Okay, so I have some kooky superstitions and studies, but so what. I enjoy the romance wrapped up in the effort to find new inspiration and insight. Life is entertaining.

I haven’t yet decided how I’ll spend this coming New Year’s Eve. I’m still anxious to get home first. But looking back on 2008, all I can honestly say is that sometimes it was hot and other times it was cold, and I proudly made my mark at all occasions.