Drive South

We were always looking for true north
With our heads in the clouds, just a little off course
I left the motor running, now if you're feeling down and out
Come on, baby, drive.
Come on, baby, drive south.

~ John Hiatt

Those lines are from Drive South, John Hiatt's "ode to the road" song on the 1988 album Slow Turning.  If I were to make a road trip mix tape (and I have), that song would definitely be on it.  Right before Hiatt's Thank God the Tiki Bar Is Open.  I can feel my motor running just thinking about this song.

I took this picture of John Hiatt two years ago at the Gallery at Bethel Woods (site of the Woodstock Festival).  I am happy to report that he obliged me in my request that he sing that tiki bar song.  I saw him again last winter at Southern Jam, a music festival in Boca Raton.  So yes, I drove south to go to that jam.  And if you are reading this blog today, I am driving south again.  These old bones just can't abide a Northeast winter any more.

But I can't hear these lyrics without thinking about place.  We are born into a place, and for many of us, that place becomes home.  Home: the very word resonates with comfort, belonging, safety.  For most of us, anyway.  But how many of us stay in that place that was our first home?  I have been in the Northeast almost all my life, shoveling snow and paying high property taxes.  And I love my home here . . . in every season except winter.  The reality is this: living in the south is just easier.  I tip my hat (which I promise to wear on the beach) to the People of the North for our strength, our hardiness, our tolerance, our ability to ice skate (sometimes on the driveway, without skates).  Lifelong Southerners have no idea how hard life in the North can be.  No matter how many winters I spend as a snowbird, I will never forget how hard.  And I will be grateful that I have an option.

By the time this is posted, I should be in North Carolina, still driving south.  Maybe John Hiatt will be keeping me company with his songs.  And when I arrive at that Southern home, I will thank god that the tiki bar is open.  Because, you know, I do not drink and drive. (And neither should you.)