"Idiot Driving the Back Roads of Texas"

Maps! They so used to be my friend. I LOVE maps. They got me all over Europe, Hawaii, road trips in the states - EVERYWHERE except today. I trust maps, I rely on maps, I assume they are correct ...

So today I decide to go put air in my tire that was low and had been forever - decided to get it done before Gary got home so I would not look so pathetically like a 'girl', and something in my brain did another of those dangerous *bing* 's. This one literally screamed Road Trip!!!

I have been missing working on my Wildflower Trip photos - so I decided to go again. Went in the Exxon and bought a map. Looked at the roads available and set off (I ALWAYS travel with my cameras - somehow I feel naked without them - and there is still that two headed zebra out there just waiting for me to spot it...)

I get on 90 and look for the road I want - which never comes, and the road forks. I take the north one since I am wanting to head north and sort of decided that any small back road was as good as another small back road - you see, I had my trusty map to get me home again.

I take a few forks and all of a sudden I am at a house that Bonne and I drove by! I mean I was lost in the backwoods of Texas how could this have happened? But I was very, very excited. I had told Bonne that I needed photos of it and she said "on the way back" - sounded good to me. Unfortunately on the way back there was a big ole mini van parked in front of it which totally changed the photo from 'creepy, old, run down house' to 'stupid house'.

So I drive, and drive and I have looked at the map and I am looking for my road - my tiny road that will have magical fields of bluebonnets, Elsie the cow grazing peacefully in a field of bluebonnets and daises, windmills, unicorns and fairies...

NOT ONCE did I ever find the road I was looking for. There were roads approximately where I thought my road should be, but I would always pass it thinking that surely this time, my road would be just up ahead. Nope. And I went back to my mantra that 'any back road is a good back road', pull over, try to find myself on the map (only twice, TWICE - in the course of 5 hours did I find myself on the map), pick a new random road or, having not found myself, shrug and decide that a town would show up sooner or later (mainly later). I will note that this is not exactly the best way to go about things when you are on your second - yes, I am addicted - second route 44 diet coke with cherry and lime.

Took some photos, and all of a sudden I was at I10 - I had gone under it hours before and really thought I was still slowly making my way north. After a few 'damns' I decided that this was fate telling me that my adventure was over, so I turned East and headed home (I actually might still be driving around, lost, had fate not intervened).

A couple photos from my: "Idiot Driving the Back Roads of Texas" collection (of course you will be pestered with these photos for days, so I am pacing myself):

And, I might really be addicted to taking photos of flowers ....