There and Back Again

Hello friends and faithful followers (aka Dad who keeps bugging me to update this thing more than once every decade—oops). 

So it’s been awhile. I could make up some witty and ultimately utter bullshit response as to why I’ve been MIA for about seven months, i.e. some crocodile beat me in a WWE-style wrestling match in the outback, one of those giant scary (however innocuous) spiders claimed me for its own or, my mom’s personal favorite: “the dingo ate my baby”, but the truth is I just haven’t really cared enough to write about my life while I’ve been out enjoying it. (Sorry, it’s the best excuse I’ve got.) 

In case you missed it, I’m now living farther south than I ever really cared to in good ol’ Atlanta, Georgia. Despite being born and raised (technically) in the South, I still can’t get a grasp on the southern accents I sometimes encounter, I’m lamenting the—albeit terrible—public transit (even you, Translink) I’ve relied on for the past three years, and I’m desperately trying to re-acclimate to a fast-paced culture I didn’t mind leaving behind temporarily while trying not to melt in the blistering summer heat.

Now that I’ve kicked the jet lag and been back in the States for a little over a month and a half, I’ve spent most of my time working at CNN International (and loving it), trying to psych myself up for one more year of school (sigh) and on the road—not quite Jack Kerouac style. Since coming back to the northern hemisphere, I’ve spent a grand total of 72 hours back in North Carolina (sorry, parents). And for the past two weekends I’ve spent about three hours stuck in Atlanta traffic, 24 hours driving through the aesthetically homogenous American southeast and an indiscriminate length of time becoming familiar with the long stretches of I-85’s characterless perimeter while driving to and from the homeland.

So, here are the things I’ve noticed in my two return trips to North Carolina:

1. Leaving Atlanta on a holiday weekend or on a Friday afternoon is kind of like trying to understand physics—slow, frustrating and ultimately futile. Brace yourself for the 1-3 hours of being stuck in highway purgatory: play car bingo, learn a new language, read Don Quixote—all of this (and more!) is possible with your newfound (and compulsory) wait time.
2. You’ll see interesting people when you're stuck in traffic, from the unapologetic Cosmo reader to the hyper-vigilant nose picker—or the random guy with a ferret on his shoulder (stay weird, South Carolina).
3. Despite their claims of being ‘the station with the radio’s best hits’ (because, yes, they all say that), every other station plays the same five songs on rotation.
4. Whatever Taylor Swift lacks in Spotify she makes up for on the radio threefold. If I had $1 for every time I heard “Bad Blood” scan across my radio I could probably afford another return ticket to Australia.
5. On that note, the number of religious radio stations increases from North Carolina to South Carolina and then again once you cross the Georgia state line. It’s kind of like listening to a modern-day reading of a Jonathan Edwards sermon. Fun!
6.  The farther south you go, the more frequent the ‘c’-word becomes—country, not the four-letter expletive. The number of country music stations increases, the Confederate flag bumper stickers become more prevalent and you’ll start seeing billboards for “Country Bride” and “Country Western Outlet - 5 miles ahead on right”. Still trying to figure out what makes a bride ‘country’, tbh.
7. Sometimes traffic jams are caused by accidents. Sometimes it’s 5 o’clock on a Friday and the mass exodus from the city will clog the freeway for what feels like an eternity. And sometimes traffic jams spring from the voyeuristic rubberneckers who find the minor accident on the other side of the median more relevant than the open road in front of them. 
8. There are probably enough tire shreds strewn along I-85 to fill a dozen Goodyear blimps. Sorry, Earth.
9. If you have to stop somewhere for any reason, take an umbrella. Even if it’s sunny when you get out of the car, it will almost positively begin to rain torrentially by the time you’re ready to head back to the car. (Fact: it will always downpour when you’re wearing white and still have a 3+ hour drive ahead of you.)
10. And, a fun one, dead deer on the road still look like kangaroos from a distance. Guess it’s time to brush up on my North American road kill or look into an ophthalmologist.  

Until next time, I-85.