Blog – Dustin A Coates

“So we pick up the car at 1:30. Let’s plan for something to come up that keeps us from leaving right away and budget for a departure time of 2:30. We should also throw in random hours or half-hours on the trip schedule to make sure we don’t fall behind.”

I wake up Thursday morning at 7 AM. I haven’t woken up this early since I left Tel Aviv and I’m sluggish in rising from the air mattress, clad in leopard-print sheets, on the floor of Shawn’s study. But if I’m going to get to Austin on time to get my hair cut, have lunch, and leave for Brooklyn as scheduled, I have to be up. Or—rather—I had to be up. I’m already behind schedule.

I’ve been living in Shawn’s house in San Marcos, forty minutes south of Austin, for the last five days and I’ve had fun. But I’m anxious to be in motion again.

My hair cut goes smoothly (I tell her to give me a haircut that’ll leave a good last impression and make a good first one.) and lunch is pleasant (Enoteca and La Boite). Shawn goes with me to pick up the car at Hertz and I’m beginning to think that we’re going to leave Austin earlier than we planned. I mentally high five myself for being an amazing planner and we walk into Hertz to get the car.

“Alright Mr. Coates, we have you in the Ford Car Too Small to Fit Three People. We can upgrade you to a Smart Car if you need more room.”

“What about that Nissan out there? How much extra per day would that be?”

“That would be an extra $8 a day, but we can’t rent that out. It needs an oil change. We have an Escalade for an extra $25 a day.”

“Do you mind if we take a step outside and talk about it?”

Although the thought of rolling into Brooklyn in an Escalade is temporarily appealing, I realize that I haven’t owned a car since the fall and—for all I know—gas is $4 a gallon these days. The Escalade is out. I head back inside.

“I know it’s a long shot, but is there any way the oil could be changed in the Nissan this afternoon?”

He thinks for a second. “You really want that car, don’t you? Come back in two hours and it’s yours.”

This means we leave a couple hours behind schedule, but we have a car that will fit the three of us and our stuff and won’t cost us hundreds in gas. I think it’s an acceptable trade-off.

The upside of the extra time is that it allows Kimmy the opportunity to get some food before we leave. Options along the way won’t be nearly this plentiful until we get to New York, so we need to take advantage while we can. Michelle joins us because it’s 2 in the afternoon and she needs coffee.

Somewhere on Congress, Michelle mentions that she wishes she could join us. She has every day off until Tuesday so she wouldn’t be missing any work. If she had only known sooner. I ask her what’s keeping her from coming. Her answer doesn’t quite convince me that she wouldn’t come if pushed in that direction.

“If I buy you a coffee, you’re coming on the trip.”

“I don’t know…”

“What do you get in your coffee?”

The seed’s planted. We call Shawn and ask him to find airfare (around $300 on JetBlue), Michelle decides to go home and pack, and we go back to Kimmy’s house to wait for the car.

“She’s not going to come,” Kimmy says after Michelle leaves, but I’m not as sure. Before she left, Michelle looked as if she was trying to convince herself every reason not to go and was coming up short.

Just then Kimmy gets a call. Michelle’s booked her plane ticket. She’s coming with us.

Around 6 pm, we finally have everything packed and we’re ready to leave. The hatchback is full of gear—my bike and suitcases and bags from the rest—and it has started to overflow into the backseat, encroaching on space occupied by Kimmy and Michelle. Our food will be taking up the center seat on this trip.

My phone vibrates—a text message. “How’s the trip going?” As if I needed another reminder of our lack of adherence to the schedule.

Our first stop is Bay City. We had planned on meeting with my father and getting dinner before driving up to New Orleans but Bay City isn’t the kind of town that has restaurants open at 9pm on a Thursday night, so we’ll make just a cursory stop. I give them the tour—“This is where I went to high school.”, “This is our Brutalist court house”, etc.—and soon enough we’re at my father’s house.

We make a brief stop and, for the first time, saying goodbye to my father is really difficult. Being in Bay City usually does nothing but embody me with a deep-set desire to leave as soon as I’ve arrived, but as we pull away I find myself wanting to spend a few more days with my father and my sister.

But we have to get moving and we head out, set toward Houston. I tell Shawn I’ll give him directions through the backroads, which will help us make up time. Once we get to Houston, I drift off to sleep. My stint of driving is due in a few hours—sometime around 2 in the morning.