
I’m a month-and-a-half into my Ridiculously Random Motorcycle Tour, facing a momentous milestone: closing on my condo.
If all goes according to plan, come Monday I’ll be homeless. Sorry, a resource rich “unhoused individual.” A status that's elicited nothing but wistful admiration from strangers.
No surprise there. What wage slave, career builder or responsible parent doesn’t harbor a secret desire to leave it all behind for the adventure of parts unknown?

America is, after all, a nation of movers and shakers. Immigrants all (Native Americans included). People who left somewhere else for The Home of The Brave, seeking freedom from familiar geography (if nothing else).
I figure humans are hard-wired to explore. Some of us manifest this urge in small ways. A new recipe or couch surfing Netflix, perhaps. Small adventures that keep us from going mad from boredom.
Some of us feel compelled to embark on larger, riskier journeys. Relocating to [initially] friendless cities or a ridiculously random motorcycle tour, for example.

I’ve been thinking a lot about the word "random." Truth be told, I've violated the spirit if not the letter of the law.
I visited my high school homie in Boston. I broke bread with my brothers in Asheville and Vinalhaven respectively (if not respectfully). I hit The Tail of the Dragon and climbed Mount Washington.
All by design.
Otherwise, my modus operandi is on-brand. I ask strangers for a recommendation and boldly go where they've gone before.
I reckon this preposterous protocol qualifies as random. But I’m not sure it’s enough. Here’s how I’ve been...

Once I get my marching orders, I ask Siri for directions to my new destination, listening closely for confirmation (SIRI is no less prone to "gaffes" than a certain president I could name).
Turn-by-turn avoid highways Apple Map activated? Check! Randomness? Gone!
If I was truly traveling at random, I’d stop asking for a new 10-20, see a road and go wherever it takes me. Ending up wherever.
I’m not exactly sure why I haven’t done that. Maybe it’s down to a lifetime of goal-orientation.
That’s how we’re taught, isn’t it? We're raised to believe that mission focus is the key to achieving anything, from career advancement to getting laid to raising a family.
Been there, done that. And now...
I'm smoking a stogie outside a Hampton Inn, shading myself from a sun making a mockery of my plan to escape the Texas heat, wondering what I’m doing here. Why I’m doing here.

My goal at the outset of the RRMT: finding a new place to hang my [many] hats.
Mission accomplished. I've decided to relocate to Knoxville, charmed by the Marble City's reclaimed main streets and easily accessible mountain motorcycling.
Leaving me thinking that travel writing is my remaining raison d'etre. A cruel mistress.
A little voice is whispering in my ear: historical chronicles and personal confessionals are cool, but they're an excuse for not staying true to your original calling: journalism.
A reader brought this sin of omission to my attention when she did me the honor of comparing my writing style to Hunter S. Thompson’s.
As a teen, I was inspired by Thompson's writing. Not the purple prose vomited by the drug-crazed self-aggrandizing blowhard he became.
The self-effacing, no-holds-barred truth-telling jobbing journo who wrote Hell’s Angels and the articles agglomerated in Great Shark Hunt).
This internal upbraiding has led me to realize...

After I finally equip Fritz with a taller "comfort" windscreen back in Beantown, after I visit my BDE friend in Massachusetts, I’ll dedicate myself to reporting on people doing things.
The weirder the better. Writing from the perspective of a man liberated from the normal demands of “daily life” (in as much as such a thing is possible) and commercial considerations.
I’ll also return to the The Dice Man-inspired protocol I practiced back in ‘85, when I motorcycled a BMW “Flying Brick” through Europe and Scandinavia.
I’ll list six possible destinations, roll a die and go where chance takes me. How great is that?

I have no idea how this is going to work out. Kinda the point. Or is having a point besides the point? Anyway, point taken.
I promise it won’t be boring. Because of all the things I have been, am and could be, that is the one thing I refuse to be. Especially to myself.
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I would have suggested more meandering along the coastal inlets of Maine. (Something I may do in due course.) Probably both for the scenery and the people. Jane McCloskey (Robert McCloskey's younger daughter) lives somewhere in that general area. Robert McCloskey wrote three children's books about his family in Maine, as well as Make Way for Ducklings, and others, but my favorite was One Morning in Maine. A decade or so ago, I became obsessed with that book, and probably spent half of a week's worth of working hours going through it, repeatedly. The drawings are amazing. In most of the pictures, something is way off balance!
And then, after a week's worth of going through that book, I noticed…
Yes, it is true that people wander, but it also is true that humans for thousands of years have belonged to a tribe. And that tribe protects you from other tribes. Also, even nomadic people know their home stomping grounds. So in a way, most tribes aren’t nomadic, in the sense that they travel a circle from around a fixed point, and other tribes have their own ven diagram circles that they travel within. So you’re right, it is our nature to wander, but it is also in our nature to have a home. This was brought to mind recently, watching old repeat episodes of Z nation, which is very much about the destruction of tribes and the destruction and…
Robert, congratulations on finding a new home base. Knoxville!!! Or Austin on a smaller and less wealthy scale. Plus the benefit of a four season mid south location you should not experience to many 100 degree melting tyres ob hot asphalt days.