On the road & going looking for a ship

There are holidays and then there are holidays. We all have those that we celebrate with others, and then I’ll bet most of us have quiet little ones that are personal. Some evoke blue moods and others joyous celebration. Some we share, and some are private.

My favorite family holiday is Christmas. It’s the time for family gatherings, celebration of the gifts you’ve received and given – and I don’t mean thosescattered around the tree. It’s truly more those intangible ones that are valued.

But I have a few personal holidays.

At the later end of April every year there is one. It was just after Easter 1965 ( April 18th that year) that I left New York to hit the road. some years pass and I barely recall it, but last year marked the 50th and I spent some time recalling the old days. Then in the fall I celebrate a small holiday that marks the coming off the road. The last road trip, pack, guitar and a large ( sometimes nasty grey cat) on an epic trip that marked the end of the road. These two are not opportunities for raucus celebration – no getting up in a shake a leg boogie, and a wild party. They are quiet contemplations of where I’ve been and where I am going.

My dad had something similar. He had been a merchant seaman (engine room). And annually that Iook would come in his eyes. When in this frame of mind my mother would be cautious. An argument would get him digging around looking for his “papers” -his seamans’ papers. Then he’d laugh and say that he might just go down to the HIring Hall and “go looking for a ship.”

For my mother the going looking for a ship, and my hitting the road, were exactly the same thing. A sort of direct upload from father to son of a wandering way. It may have been why my father never chided me on the road trips. He understood, It was my way of going looking for a ship.

Daily writing prompt

What is your favorite holiday? Why is it your favorite?

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