There is nothing like a long night time drive to examine one's life. Had one of those today. I had run up to my old college town to see a buddy of mine. He's a veteran (tour in Iraq), married, owns a house, couple of vehicles, and is a contractor for the natural gas company. He is a happy man. The old town is good for some people. But not for some other people. It had an uncomfortable almost hostile feel to it. It oozed the sensation of not belonging. Of being past it. Of being to old to be running around at night. It left me slightly ill at ease. So I went.
I-40 is a 2,559.25 mile long stretch of interstate running from Barstow, California to Wilmington, North Carolina (i.e., across the whole damn country. I utilized about 27 miles of it for the ride. So with the windows down, Radiohead's The Bend's blasting, and chomping on a cheap Clint Eastwood looking cigar I took off home into the night. I had my 4 years in college. They were great. I had my two years in the city. They had their rough moments. But now here I am. But being in that town tonite give me the sensation of being past it. Not necessarily like bad cheese or old cabbage. Just that it is time to start closing doors. Or even more unsettling that there are doors that closed and you sure as shit didn't close them and now you couldn't go back through them even if you wanted to. You reach a certain age and their is just no going back. This is not say that one has to fucking get a job in a cubical, a midsize 4 door with good gas mileage, and a ranch style home. But certain things are now simply not allowed.
So there I was. After I while I put on this mix I had with the Talking Head's "Once In a Lifetime" and simply listened to David Byrne interrogate my thoughts. It was one of those moments where you really thought about whether you had simply wasted vast sections of your life. I have wasted some of it. Drunk. Reading comic books. Watching TV on DVD. Sleeping. Reading Harry Potter. Walking. Driving. Talking. And then there are the parts that I don't remember and I am sure I did some pretty wasteful things their... and some other things to boot. So there I was. Driving. Thinking about......
But, I am glad to be back where I can put those thoughts aside. Crack open a cold beer. Listen to Neil Young. Watching the days go by...

And you may ask yourself
What is that beautiful house?
And you may ask yourself
Where does that highway go?
And you may ask yourself
Am I right? ...am I wrong?
And you may tell yourself
My god!...what have I done? d