Mission Accomplished on Blacktop River

It was hard to leave Virginia, but I'm tired, and it's good to be home.

The trip back took longer than I'd ever have expected and I still haven't figured out why. Lord knows the route I took was a bit longer, but in retracing my steps through Mapquest, the site's Online Map Gurus tell me I'd only have added an hour or so to my trip. Now, even as the single driver, my average speed was probably around 73 mph so these people clearly are crackers.

Nonetheless we did have a nice time, all got to and back in one piece, and enjoyed the process.

Now that I'm back I have to face the many grinding tasks of everyday, beginning tomorrow at 5:30 a.m. with another trip to Rochester NY. Another 8 hours in the car, which by some accounts would be all it would take to get me back to Viriginia even if I went through DC. Heh. Back to Blacktop River.

I'm still trying to figure out this whole myspace thing and in being added today by an artist named Bryan Field McFarland I found this tune of his, which is both lovely and fitting. Thanks to you Bryan for that singable flashback to my perplexed state driving up Route 81 through the glorious Shenandoah Valley yesterday and on, and on, and on.

The rest of you please check out Bryan's music at his myspace site. It goes well with planning, or recovering from, your summer vacation.

Blacktop River
copyright 2006 sassafrasongs

ASCAPw & m: Bryan Field McFarland

I'm on a highway through the Shenandoah

Sky so blue that it hurts my eyes

I've got a cedar-topped box bound with koa

Packed in the back with a week's supplies

I see construction cones in the lane ahead

and it looks like I'll have to merge

So I'm signaling right like a ton o' lead

These other captains won't let me converge

I'm on a rippling ribbon through the world today

I got my windows rolled down and my hopes up high

I'll let this blacktop river roll my blues awayI don't even need to know why

Yeah, it's a great day to live...a great day to die

Out on the road sometimes it gets so lonesome all I can do is feel the wind

The way stretched out in front of me can be so awesome

Sometimes it seems like my only friend

I feel instruction in the heat off the highway

Like the Spirit is settling inRiding this knife edge - going my way

Life could stop. Life could begin.

Chorus

Death is just a door, just a passageway, just another part of being

All the lore ain't gonna scare me away

And it’s not that I'm foreseeing.

Oh, I'm good to go, but I would rather stay,

Cuz there's more here I need to get done

I've got this feeling now that death's my friend,

Not some frightening oblivion

I took a walk last night down by the river

Stinging stars in the Milky Way

And as my leaf crunch steps made me shiver

I caught a whiff of death in the Fall decay

I see destruction looming in the days ahead

These trees are gonna be so bare

And I'm reminded of what Quoheleth said.

No, there's "nothing new" anywhere! [Ecclesiastes 1:9]