There and back again: A neurotic's tale

So it’s over.

Well that sucks.

I write this, my last blog entry, whilst huddled in a large jumper depressingly surveying the grey overcast sky out of my window. Yes. In case you were wondering - I’m back in England.

Just under two months ago, when I had just arrived in the US of A, I wrote a blog entitled ‘What I’ve Learnt’ describing my first impressions of this strange and magnificent country. Now, with a little bit more experience of the place under my belt, I’ll attempt to share what else I’ve learnt along the way. The good and the bad.

1) Americans are not all fat, Jesus-worshipping, thick Republicans.
In fact – they are a pretty awesome nation of people. My highlight of the trip hasn’t been a particularly buzzing city or breathtaking mountaintop view – rather getting to meet all the wonderful Americans along the way. People over here are so unhesitatingly friendly and welcoming. Political and religious beliefs aside, they will go out of their way to be-friend you and help you out. They support your dreams rather than dashing them with cynical remarks, they have a habit of seeing the positive in anything, and they’re not afraid to live life. If music is playing they will dance. If somebody is singing round the campfire they will join in. If they’ve always dreamt of building their own house/raising their own bees/getting a book published/meeting their soulmate etc etc – they will god damn work hard to make sure it happens to them. Now I won’t go over the top here. I’m sure there are some sh*tty people over there – though most of them all appear to be television personalities rather than average Joes on the streets – but we need to cut Americans a break. Hell, we could even learn from them. I know England wouldn’t be England without the misery, the sarcasm and the stiff upper lip but wouldn’t it be great if just every so often someone asked how you were and genuinely cared what the answer was? Or said ‘Sorry’ if they bumped into you on the street? Manners may be extinct this side of the Atlantic, but over the pond they are alive and thriving. So, yes, they may be considering letting Sarah ‘Antichrist’ Palin run for president, but as they attempt to ruin the world they will be positive and polite throughout the whole process. And you’ve got to give them credit for that.

2) The world is going to die – and it’s all America’s fault
Put down your recycling box and sit down and listen to me. There is no point in trying to save the planet. You can cycle, recycle, and compost as much as you want but America will ensure every attempt you make is futile. This is one instance where they really do deserve their awful reputation. For one, walking isn’t even considered an option when deciding how to get from A to B. If you’re going to go anywhere – you go by car. You drive to the supermarket, you drive to church, you drive to get ice-cream – mainly because pedestrianism isn’t catered for. Your life flashes before your eyes if you ever attempt to walk across a road, there is usually no sidewalk anyway, and everywhere is such a vast distance from everywhere else. To make matters worse – there seems to be no awareness of the plight we are in. While it is now commonplace in England to crucify a customer who’s forgotten to bring their own plastic bags, in the USA Rich and I watched open-mouthed as a cashier put two plums into their very own plastic bag. Gas is ridiculously cheap – just over $2 a gallon (so it costs about £15 to fill your tank), and finding a recycling plant is harder than finding a liberal in Texas. Admittedly, California is the exception to the rule and seems to be a little less head-in-the-sand about the melting icecaps. But the state’s efforts are insignificant to the rest of the country’s determination to screw up Mother Nature irreversibly.

3) The roads are good – the drivers are terrible
Considering they spend so much time in their cars, you would assume Americans would be pros at driving them. Instead the opposite is true. Yes – the roads are immaculate and stretch on forever in a Roman-orgasm-inducing straight line. But the unblemished tarmac becomes a perilous gauntlet the moment an American motorist joins you on your journey. Firstly – there is no such thing as lane discipline. They all amble along in their massive trucks doing just over 50mph in each lane. Overtaking is a nightmare. In fact, it’s usually impossible. On the interstate there is only two lanes, and half the time cars are driving alongside each other at an annoyingly slow pace. The only way to get your speedometer past 60 is to tailgate as aggressively as your nerves will allow until the dumb idiot in front of you realises they should pull over. If we could combine English drivers with American roads it would be a very happy union. But until then, anyone who believes driving in the USA is a cinch is very much mistaken.

4) When they’re fat, they’re very very fat….
Let me just get one thing straight – Americans are not half as fat as we believe them to be. Actually, in many states, most people are more anorexicly-inclined. Almost everyone we met were regular hikers, would only eat the smallest amount of carbs, and shopped at health food stores. However…and I think this is where the cliché comes from…when you do stumble across an obese American, they will be the fattest person you have ever seen. It’s like they refuse to half-heatedly overweight. “If I’m going to get fat, I’m going to get fat properly”. And it’s very easy to. One evening, whilst stranded in some nowhere town, Rich and I ventured to the cinema to see Toy Story 3 (which is f*cking brilliant btw). And that’s where we found them all. The fat people. Sheltering in the dark from the new health-conscious country they no longer fit into (literally). And I’m talking staggeringly-obese people. People who needed two chairs people. It’s cruelty really that they were allowed to buy the heart-attack-inducing snacks behind the counter. All of them were buying popcorn buckets the size of small houses – one each, even for their small children. The popcorn was already smothered in artificial neon-yellow butter. I found a tap nearby and went to queue so I could fill up my water bottle. However, when I got near the front of the queue I discovered it wasn’t a water tap, rather a tap that gushed out MELTED BUTTER onto the already-coated popcorn. It was a long queue because each customer was spending a good two-minutes holding their giant popcorn buckets under the tap-of-death until their popcorn was actually swimming in molten lard. THEN, if the snack wasn’t fatal enough, they would pick up a giant salt shaker which was actually filled with sugar, and sprinkle massive clouds of sugar onto their butter bucket. Truly terrifying.

5) If you are a vegetarian you will starve
So I’m aware that I may have whinged slightly about the lack of veggie options already. But seriously, for such a western country, the denial of a vegetarian diet was astounding. On several occasions Rich and I sat down in a restaurant only to discover there was not one thing on the menu we could eat. In one place they had even put beef-filled ravioli into the cream-of-tomato soup. If you are anyway veggie-inclined and you come over here – prepare to lose a lot of weight. Throughout the South and Texas, we survived only on bodybuilding protein bars (which taste like vomit) and this disgusting drink called V8 juice that tastes of cold vegetable soup - but worse. This isn’t the land of freedom. This is the land of steak, with Kentucky fried chicken on the side. I’m aware to most of you this is probably a dream scenario – but I just wanted to pre-warn any fellow veggies wanting to visit the States that New Mexico and California are their only two options if they don’t want to resemble an Ethiopian by the end of their trip.

6) What I’ve learnt about…myself (eww)
At the risk of sounding like some sh*t character out of Dawson’s Creek – I’ve found that travelling does change you. Much as I was determined to not return all full of travel-smugness, it’s kind of impossible not to develop (cringe!) when you embark on a massive trip. Don’t get worried –I’m not about to launch into some prose about the infinity I felt with a sick child as we gazed into each others eyes and realised we were the same…but different. I’ve not got any meaningful (yet ridiculous) tattoos, my hair remains un-dredded, I am happy to admit that I am middle-class and that a lack-of-personal hygiene will not hide this from the world, and England will always be my home and it’s not as screwed up a country as gap-year-students will make you think it to be. However, before this trip, anyone who knows me well is aware of the fact I like to have a “life-plan”. I would panic if I didn’t know what was happening next week, let alone next year, and had my life all carefully mapped out up until the age 45. Well, I’m glad to admit that travelling has forced me to stop being such an anal twat and I’ve learnt to enjoy being young, dumb, and clueless. When covering such a vast distance it was actually impossible to plan further than two days in advance. You’re forced to stay in the moment because the journey is the whole point of a road trip. I’m not going to lie – there were several freakouts along the way. My parents like to remind me of the email I sent them entitled ‘URGENT PLEASE READ THIS NOW!”, where the opening line was “I can’t do this anymore. Rich has locked himself in the bathroom because he hates me so much” (he was actually just having a shower). But you’re forced to adapt and eventually I found being neurotic kind of gets in the way of having fun. So now, here I am, unemployed and back in England. The only thing I know about my future at present is that I’m going to watch ‘Eclipse’ tonight at the cinema. Tomorrow – who knows? And for the first time ever…that’s OK. I’m going to shut up now because I’m actually making myself sick.

So that’s it. That’s America. Thank you for dropping in. And some last words of wisdom….

One last thing I’ve learnt? That going travelling is remarkably easy. The most difficult part is making the decision to go. Once you’ve done that – you’re sorted. So my advice is to anyone toying with the idea is to just DO IT. Have you ever met anyone who’s said “Oh, I really regret travelling”? Ummm – no. Because no-one regrets it. So book it and worry about reality later. And book it sooner rather than later – because the rate these Americans are going there really isn’t going to be a world left to explore for very long.

Over and out

Holly xxx