I was just looking at a map of the U.S. I have traveled around the country a lot without ever actually living anyplace but in Columbus, Ohio. I have been in 43 states. I am missing a couple of New England states, Hawaii and Alaska. Most of those states were visited in optimum times of the year for pleasant weather. Several times I have said that if I could, I would like to live here (where I was at that moment).
The first time this happened to me was in 1958. I was 7 years old and we were on a family vacation to Florida. We were on the eastern edge of North Carolina when we stopped for lunch. I'm not sure what town that was but it was a family-type restaurant located in a nice neighborhood. The restaurant itself was clean and modern. I remember an outer space-ish chandelier, the type popular in the late 1950s. I thought it was a very neat-o restaurant in a really keen neighborhood. I probably had my standard restaurant meal at that age consisting of a hamburger and a chocolate milk shake. It was undoubtedly wonderful. As we piled into my dad's Oldsmobile to travel on down the highway, I declared to anyone who would listen that I was going to move into the neighborhood, right next to that restaurant, when I grew up.
About 20 years ago I was in western Colorado. My lady friend, Diana, and I had just spent a few days in the Rocky Mountains and we were headed west to Utah. We had a motel reservation in Grand Junction, Colorado. I remember pulling into the motel parking lot, looking to the east and seeing the Rockies, majestically glowing in the late afternoon sun. The next day we traveled west and immediately we encountered the headwaters of the Colorado River and the first traces of the Grand Canyon. Wow, to the east the Rockies, to the west, the spires and red rock canyons. I made a mental note to move to Grand Junction should I get the chance.
On the eastern side of California there is highway 395 going north and south. It goes through a little town of Lone Pine. To the west of the community are the scenic Alabama Hills, known as a film location for countless westerns. Travel a little farther that direction and you're in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Trek out of Lone Pine east bound and you're in desert. I have always appreciated the somber, unbound view across a desert. Diana and I have passed through Lone Pine a number of times and each time I have liked the feel of it. On one trip we actually gave a quick look to a house that was listed as for sale. I would not have had the courage to seriously consider it, let alone sign papers. Maybe somewhere in the back of my mind was that place in North Carolina. That was a pretty nifty chandelier.
