So, what’s this?
It started out, as so many things do, with a coincidence.
Item 1: Interstate 40 (I-40) runs through the belly of Winston-Salem, North Carolina, the place I lived in 2002.
Item 2: In 2002, I turned 40 (I, 40).
I-40 and I, 40. That was the entire coincidence. Just that.
Now add this: given my life expectancy, turning 40 meant I was halfway. (Okay, technically, I only get 78 years, but I had been running for more than 25 years, so I added two for good behavior.)
Halfway seemed as good a time as any to have my midlife crisis. (And who says I couldn’t schedule my own midlife crisis?)
Midlife crisis meant a convertible and a road trip. I-40 runs from North Carolina to California. Could I pass that up, a chance to drive I-40 at 40?
I was out there from August 22 to September 21, 2002. Details – words and pictures – were posted to my website as I traveled, and dispatches in a slightly different form were published in nine installments in the Winston-Salem Journal. Many people followed my progress online and in the paper, back when blogging was just starting to be a thing.
This question is as valid now as the one I asked then: Want to come along for the ride? |