It was a hard day of work out in The Real World. If you haven’t stopped in to visit before, I’m a “professional storyteller.” Yes, when I was young I got a whuppin’ for “telling stories,” and now people pay me to do that. I confess I told a different kind of story in those days.
Telling stories is a “performance,” and my adrenalin runs high all day. As soon as I leave “the stage,” all of my energy drains in a rush. As a result of that exhaustion, I had one of those experiences today that frighten the heck out of me. I don’t know if this has ever happened to any of y’all. If it has, you will know exactly how I am feeling at the moment.
I loaded my gear into the car and drove home. The next thing I knew, I had my hand on the ignition to turn off the car. I was parked in my own driveway, with the sudden realization that I remembered absolutely nothing of the drive! I had been on “autopilot” all the way home. This means that I had the potential to be a very unsafe driver. It scared the livin’ daylights out of me.
This was not the first time something like this has happened. Sometimes, I just get lost in thought while I am driving. I actually write stories in my head while I am toodling down the road, and those usually turn out to be the stories my audiences like the most. I’m that woman you saw on the freeway just talking and waving her hands around. Yes, it looked like I was crazy and talking to myself. You just figured I was talking on my cell phone with one of those Bluetooth earpieces, but I wasn’t. I am crazy and I was talking to myself.
Once, driving for nine hours home after a full day gig in South Texas, I was developing characters for a ghost story (now a piece that I perform at festivals with my husband playing the blues guitar in the background). Here’s the paragraph that was coming together:
An interesting looking old man he was. His coffee colored skin was wrinkled like crepe paper. His long neck looked like that of a turtle sticking out of the starched collar of his crisp white shirt. His black pants were ironed with a sharp crease, his shoes were spit polished until they gleamed, and he wore a snappy black fedora on his grizzled gray hair. Over his right eye, there was an black patch, like a pirate might wear. A long jagged scar bisected the wrinkles on his cheek below it. But, the most amazing thing to me was that the old man could play that guitar so well when he was missing the ring finger and the pinkie on his right hand.
quote from
“Sometimes, All A Man Can Do Is Play The Blues”
by Shelly Kneupper Tucker
Now, during this trip, I had been caught in a flood and had several other harrowing experiences. All I really wanted to do was get safely home, but I got sidetracked by my thoughts. Suddenly, I saw that I was about to cross the Red River into Oklahoma! I had driven more than thirty miles past my home in the middle of the night. I missed seeing all of the road, because I wasn’t paying attention.
I’m sitting here plumb tuckered out. I can think of many other colloquial expressions for “tired” that also apply. I’m too pooped to pop; my git up an go has got up and went; I’ve been through a wringer and been hung out to dry; I’m worn to a frazzle; I’ve burned all my coal; I’ve got an axle draggin’ in the dirt; I’m an empty shuck; and I feel like I’ve been rode hard and put up wet (read nothing else into that phrase, please).
As I sit here thinking about all of this, that old demon “Introspection” has started whispering to me. Was this my karma nudging me? How much of “The Road” am I missing, because I’m not paying attention? I’ve been spending a lot of time concentrating on this computer lately. My poor Spousal Unit is feeling like a “Blogging Widower.”
He has gone to get some Chinese take-out. When I get my “second wind,” I think we will go hear some music at a local bistro, drink an ale or two, and just spend some time together. A night out will do us good. I think it’s time for me to spend some time with the other passenger on my travels down this road of life.
Y’all have a good evening and watch yourself on The Road.
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{ 7 comments }
Reading about your colloquial sayings reminded me of the book that I am currently reading. I linked to it, but just for reference it’s I’ll Let You Go by Bruce Wagner, and it is just filled with both colloquial sayings as well as (for me anyways) advanced vocabulary.
In any case, i know how you feel about driving and then realizing that you’re there. Although I don’t think that it’s ever happened that drastically to me, I know that in times past I have suddenly been somewhere and had not even realized that the previous few minutes had even happened. To know that there are people out there that are going through the same thing, well that’s a pretty frightening thought indeed!
Yep, it is Derek. I’m hoping to get some rest so it doesn’t happen to me again any time soon! I’m more worried about those of y’all trying to drive on the same road with me.~skt
Shelly, that is so scary, and I bet most everyone has been there, I have, although not all the way to the river. Guess we all need more rest and less thought some days. I know I do.
Leon and I go shopping or out to dinner together, and thank goodness laugh together, but other than a recent trip to the park we haven’t gone “out” for real fun. Hmmm. I do get his almost undivided attention weeknights until 8 or 9 o’clock depending on how late he got home, then the basement becomes his movie domain (except Idol nights or if one of us needs more attention, LOL)
Glad your introspection went outward toward all of us.
I am notorious for not paying attention to my drive. Once, on a drive to San Diego, I wound up at the border with Mexico. At least I spotted the “Warning – This is the last exit before you LEAVE THE COUNTRY” sign. Close call!
I too have been known to daydream while I drive and get home on autopilot; frequently actually. Sometimes it’s productive when pondering the story I’m writing. But then I get into the mess of whether I should just remember it all till I get home, pull over to write it all down, or try to write while I’m driving. I’ve done all three, the last of which is rather scary for the people driving alongside me. I should probably stop that.
Yes it’s a frighting feeling for sure and it’s happened to me a time or two. I think you were probably driving just fine, you weren’t sleeping just thinking of other things more important than a boring drive. If big foot had jumped out in front of you, you would have remembered. lol
Glad you ended up in one piece! I love it when you say “tuckered!” You’d be a hoot at a party!!! Keep up the rockin’ posts! (California slang for really good)
“Tuckered” is appropriate. Is that why I married the man?~skt
Oh, I’ve so been there — in a place I’ve driven to/through, totally unaware of how I got there, I mean.
I worked for a couple of years in West Texas, and well remember one night when I “came to” about 40 miles away from where I should have been.
Very eerie.
At the same time, I couldn’t help but be a teeny bit impressed by my powers of concentration — not on the road, granted, but on my story.
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