WALKING ROUTE 66

Keep On Doing This, He Said. This Is Life

It takes all kinds to make the world go

I was on the road by 7 a.m. Taking the clue from the image above, I decided to let it be and kept going through the ups and downs of the way. For the first time since I started walking three weeks ago, I encountered hills, if you can call them that.

I would start jogging as I approach the dip and let the momentum carry me upward as far as I can go. It was fun.

I was in Gillespie a little after Noon. As I got to the store at the edge of town, a gentleman pulled up in a pickup truck and said he had seen me walking earlier and wanted to know what the story was.

I briefly told him and handed him one of my flyers and went in to get something cold. As I was getting ready to pay for my ice cream bar, the man came in and asked me if he can talk to me outside.

He said he’d checked out my website and would like to help me out. He handed me $200 and told me to keep doing what I was.

Mind blown!

I learned from the cashier that Gillespie used to be a Miner town and that they have a cafe, but not much else. It was lunchtime, so I headed to the cafe. The liver and onions lunch was excellent.

I checked with the waitresses about where I could spend the night in town. She said there was a Catholic charity that may be able to help me out.

Another option was a house at the edge of the town that’s been on the market for three years. No one lives there, and the cops don’t bother to check; I might be able to spend the night there. That did not sound good.

After lunch, I went to investigate the Catholic charity house. There was supposed to be a park in the area too. I saw a police car parked outside a house and saw someone in the front yard. He turned out to be the first of three people who were less than helpful in six months. He wasn’t rude but came close.

I went back to the cafe to get dinner, and they were kind enough to let me work the crowd, and I made enough money to cover both the launch and the dinner.

It was getting late, and just when I was giving up hope of finding anything, I saw three guys standing on the sidewalk in front of the Tavern. One of them said he had seen me walking earlier in the day, and we got to talking. They were all volunteer firefighters, and when they learned about my dilemma, one of them called the police dispatch to see if the officer on duty would come by the fire station, and no, it’s not an emergency.

They told me there is a gazebo along the bike trail in the direction that I’ll be traveling in the morning. I could spend the night there, and the officer can come by periodically to make sure I was okay.

Officer Miller, however, was not keen on the idea because he could not drive up to the gazebo on the bike trail. Instead, he said, why don’t I use the gazebo right behind me next to the fire station. If anybody called to report anything, he would know it’s me, and he wouldn’t have to worry about it.

I went to sleep around 11, and even with the lights in town, lying there in the gazebo I could see the Ursa Major in the Starry Sky.

Within an hour, the universe called; I had forgotten to water and fertilize the flower bed. I said to myself, What a Wonderful World, as I drifted off to sleep.

As I think back and reflect.

It is truly a beautiful world. It may have taken a pandemic for most of us to slow down and see the beauty of it, but it has always been there. People are kind and friendly, and life is worth enjoying.

I remember, one of the firemen called his wife to see if her brother was back from the show. If he was, I could use their trailer for the night. He was not back yet, and we got the okay to use the town gazebo. There is no need to hustle and get all stressed out to make money to buy things to impress people we hate, as George Carlin noted.

Stay blessed and be happy.

More details of the day’s event at the original blog post.

And just for fun

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As always, thank you for reading and responding.

Here are a couple of earlier stories:

Rasheed Hooda is a published author, and a regular contributor and editor for ILLUMINATION, a writers’ community on Medium, where writers support each other.

He is a self-proclaimed weirdo who lives a Freedom Lifestyle and writes about related topics — Travel (a top writer), Personal Growth, Freedom, and entrepreneurship. (Get the Newsletter)