[driving thoughts]

I drove to and from LA last night, making a quick airport drop-off for the lovely Molly and then turning around and heading right back home. Most people wouldn't enjoy four hours of driving without really getting anywhere, but I was loving it. Any form of gravel gets me going. Any form of movement, really - running included. The act of going somewhere is always laden with potential and heavy with anticipation. Maybe this is why Donald Miller's words resonate: "We are simply moving for movement's sake." Selah. We move because we see new things with each new direction we follow. And this changes us. Evidently, even a change as small as driving beneath the lights of a big old Hollywood city instead of sleepy Santa Barbara's streets is movement enough for me. I feel nearest God in these journeys (miniature or otherwise), perhaps because it is then that I am most free. Or perhaps because he created all things to change? Miller suggests that we must leave, that we must experience change, because it is God's nature to craft things that are malleable and mobile, and I tend to agree. This too is why I have begun to love seasons; because of their familiarity, their specific scents, and because one gives way to the next, winter stepping back to allow spring to...spring. These thoughts have been spurred on by Miller's book, Through Painted Deserts. If you have not read it, DO. Highly, highly, recommended. Maybe it's just one of those books that hits you in the exact instance you need it to, but it seriously got to me. After this post, I promise I will stop bringing up his writing allllll the time, but I just had to throw this last recommendation in.

So last night I drove through all the Los Angeles lights and felt the same clean peace and giddy potential I always do while en route. The potential is what gets me. For some, getting there is most assuredly NOT half the fun, and those some would be confused to see me smiling to myself all the way home. I had the serenade of Van Morrison playing in the car, and his music brings to mind such goodness - successful trips in the car and the warm seasons and slow nights sitting outside. He sang all the way up the 101, a voice that has been present in my life for years (Davis, you reading this?). And when I saw the mountains of Santa Barbara after my short and solitary road trip I was ready to be settled again. Those mountains get me every time. As they came into view I was once again oriented by the high peaks, and grateful for my time to move if only for the sake of movement.