My favorite American experience: driving on a highway to the sound of a rock radio station

If I were to rank my favorite things about America, this would be near the top.

Yesterday I had this lovely experience. We weren’t even on a road trip. It was just a one-hour drive, on I-10, from Baton Rouge to New Orleans. My twins had finished their tennis tournament in Baton Rouge and we headed to New Orleans, from where we would fly to Florida. On our way to New Orleans, we stopped at Whitney Plantation.

There was a moment on our trip when I experienced what I had experienced many times in the past when driving in America. The feeling is not easy to describe. It’s definitely a positive one. Feeling the vastness of my surroundings but not feel small or insignificant. Moving across time and space but not too fast; fast enough though to feel free and joyful. Being on a journey in every possible sense: life, spiritual, literal. Forever discovering and rediscovering America.

The music is important! I listen to all genres, but I find classic rock especially fitting for road trips. Alternative rock is fine too. Yesterday specifically, I caught the “driver’s high” when U2’s “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for” came on the radio; after that, they played “Heaven” by Brian Adams.

I had one of the strongest “American highway” moments a few years ago, as I was approaching Los Angeles, late into the evening. It was already dark. The kids had fallen asleep so it was uncharacteristically…