Dear UUCM Friends,

I don’t know about you, but I love a road trip.  I love stopping at whatever roadside attractions make themselves known, settling in with music or podcasts or audio books, staring out the window at telephone poles.   I love the conversations that unfold with hours to poke around with half baked ideas, memories and dreams.  I love seeing the road up ahead and knowing I’m going somewhere!  My three year old car has more than 50,000 miles on it—I’ve driven it to both coasts a couple of times and to New Orleans as well!

June 15, I’m setting off on a massive roadtrip—the longest I’ve ever taken.  I’ll start by driving to General Assembly—the annual gathering of Unitarian Universalists for business and for learning, commonly called GA—which is in Spokane, Washington this year.  After a week of GA,  I’ll head up through British Columbia to Alaska!

I’ve been planning this trip for months, with my adventure-buddy Nancy.  What a thrill to not only fall in love again last year, but to find someone as excited about travel as I am, and with a teardrop trailer to boot!  She’s been devoted to figuring out how to make room darkening shades and mosquito guards; I meanwhile booked us the best campsites I could for the entire trip.  I knew if we didn’t have a place to stay I’d start worrying about noon that all the campgrounds would be too full for us.

The mix of planning, and openness to whatever adventure surprises us each day, makes for a wonderful trip for me.  I laugh to remember that last time I set off for Alaska, at age 19, it was by hopping freights and hitch-hiking, with a bag of trail mix and twenty bucks and another restless friend.  Times change!  At that point in my life, having no plan whatsoever was exactly right for me, and we trusted things would work out fine (and they more or less did).  But Nancy and I have a very definite plan.  I’ve made a notebook which outlines exactly what route each day will hold.   We’ll drive back down part way and then take a ferry to Vancouver Island and another one to the coast of Washington, where I’ll facilitate a weeklong UU conference—several hundred people thinking about racism and white supremacy.  That kind of national leadership has been an important part of my ministry and I’m grateful that UUCM supports it, and me, to continue doing it.

I’ll be back in August, with tales to tell and eager ears to listen to your own adventures.  Whether you hit the road yourself, or savor the pleasures of summer at home, may you feel joy and wonder each day.

Bon voyage!

— Meg

Each week, the interim ministry team will share a reflection on the Soul Matters monthly theme, the state of the church, or the state of the world. Meg, Terri and Arif will alternate writing this “In the Interim” post. We encourage your comments.