all i need is: everything

Some of my happiest times in Africa are when I am driving. I like to drive generally, but here it takes on a much different quality. It's the sheer beauty of Moz, for one thing, and the open, rattling window, the rushing air, the smell of germinating grass, the power of an old big 4WD truck, the physicality of shifting, being on the left-hand side of the road, the way the light fills the cab, how I feel when I am there and driving for kilometer after kilometer, the sweeping expanses of this land, the ideas that fill my head and heart when I drive, the way my soul unclenches. I like the time to dream and the freedom to shout outloud just to do it. I like pulling over on the narrow shoulder to buy charcoal or oranges from pleased rural entrepreneurs, many of them just children, love honking at passerby (laden with babies or school books) to get them out of the way, love zooming past semis struggling to get up the hillsides, sticking my arm full out the window and swatting at all the life whizzing past me outside. 

When I drive, I am filled with the realization that I am doing exactly what I want to be doing, what I have wanted to be doing for as long as I can remember. Which is, simply, to be free, driving in Africa. My home.

on the road to Savane