I love... Driving

Tonight I drove my Mum home from the casino so my Dad could stay and play for a while. Mum wasn't feeling well and I wasn't in the mood to hang out at a noisy casino wasting money.

It's about a 25 minute drive from the casino to Mum's, and another 25 minutes from Mum's to my place, mostly on the 417. So it was a nice long drive and there weren't that many cars on the road. I really enjoyed it. I could have kept going!

I've always loved driving. Even when I was a teenager and had just gotten my licence, Mum would let me borrow the car and just take it out for a drive in the country. I love doing that. It's one of the things I like to do in the summertime on a weekend afternoon...just head out in any direction and keep driving till I start getting tired of it, and then head home. As long as I know what direction I'm going in, I can always find my way home. That's why I always have one of those little liquid ball compasses in the car. My grandfather used to have one in his car too. All I need now to be just like him is a wobbly-head German Shepard figurine in the back window :-)

What I love most is driving out in the country at night in the summertime when it's balmy and I can roll all the windows down and just drive and drive and let the warm air buffet my skin and the scents of the summer night wash over me, changing as I move through different parts of the countryside. Somehow the world seems to be filled with possibilities then, when there's no traffic to slow me down and the clean night air lets me pass so easily through the darkness. The world is mysterious and it's all there for me to explore. It makes me feel like I can do anything I want.

A good drive is like meditation. The gentle vibration of the engine and the tires on the road lull me into a kind of driver's trance. I can go from point A to point B without have any recollection of how I passed between them. It's a unique kind of adaptable auto-pilot. Anyone who drives to work every day will recognize it. Your mind can wander anywhere it wants, but if needed, you can instantly switch back to manual to deal with those unexpected situations that pop up so frequently in traffic.

Driving is an activity unlike any other I do. My body is occupied, but my mind is free to roam wherever it wants, unharrassed by phone calls or emails or TV or anything else. My eyes flit from one scene to another, taking in everything and processing it all equally. A tree, a cloud, a dark patch on the road, a bird, a couple arguing in the car passing me, an 18-wheeler slowing down on an incline. Amazingly, these things inspire me and suddenly I find myself plotting out entire novels during a two-hour drive to Montreal or a 20-minute jaunt across town.

I love driving. There is no place I think better than in the car. I have solved romantic problems, figured out work issues, composed poems, driven off frustration and written the next great Canadian novel in my head, all while driving. Give me wheels and a highway and a clear, dry day and I am in heaven.