At Exit 29, east of I-75, you can soak up the grease of the birthplace of Kentucky Fried Chicken.
There’s a great book written and compiled by a guy named Dave Hunter. He’s a Canadian, I think. It describes in great detail everything you can expect at every exit and mile of road between the Detroit/Windsor border and Florida on Interstate 75.
It’s fantastic. Seriously. If you ever decide to drive the I-75, buy the book.
But I’m not here to sell this book. Dave’s on his 21st edition. He doesn’t need my help. Sell your own damn books, Dave.
However what I am here to point out is that his Along I-75 book is a great example of the benefit and power of distraction.
The I-75 is a very long stretch of highway and minus the book pointing out some interesting distractions along the way, you might just tune out and wait for the journey to be over.
What a waste.
Every journey can be made better, as the old cliche goes, by stopping to smell the roses… or in the above example, fried chicken.
It’s too easy when we’re going through low points in our lives to focus on the seemingly meaninglessness of it all. There are few more alluring and comfy looking outlooks during a bout of depression than “what’s the point?”
Why even bother going to Florida? (fair question to be honest)
What if Florida sucks? (it doesn’t all suck)
What if Florida doesn’t even exist? (a little far-fetched but it IS a long drive)
What’s the point in going to Florida anyway?
The regular stuff one might pass the time doing in life starts to look a lot like vapid distraction… but that’s a foolish perspective. To be fair, it can be tricky because when you’re low not much is easier than staying low, but that’s usually a sign that we might not be seeing things clearly.
Life IS distraction.
Life is a trip down the I-75 to Florida.
To quote Talk Talk, life’s what you make it.
And we make it with ‘distractions’.
The journey is empty without distraction.
Distraction can fill that void and then some.
Distraction seems like the wrong word.
We’re not really being distracted from anything. We’re in the backseat of the car as it hurtles towards Jacksonville and the disappointing realization that Florida is a huge state and we’re not even really ‘there’ yet.
Minus distraction, we’re just sitting there waiting for the journey to end.
That’s garbage.
Get distracted.
A life well lived is jam-packed full of distractions.
Meaningless and meaningful all at once.
Music, art, friends, charity, family, love, fried chicken and maybe even more.
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I always enjoy your comments and views today’s distraction (of reading this) is positive distraction. Cheers
This back seat photo brought back less than fond memories of driving to Florida with two kids under 5. The car sick one threw up in Alberton, Branford, Woodstock, London .The muffler fell off just over the bridge to the US. We limped into a motel in Lima Ohio where he went off to get a muffler and I did laundry. The second day, Dad overcame his violent opposition to giving kids gravol . My carefully constructed play boxes of distractions disintegrated in the heat. The play doh dried up and the crayons melted. The kids slept most of the day. Not so much at night. Despite this,we all had a great time and the kids (now 48 and 50 still remember it as such. Oh and on the way home two tires delaminated and had to be replaced..sometime the distractions are the most memorable moments.