“Perhaps he knew, as I did not, that the Earth was made round so that we would not see too far down the road,” – Karen Blixen, Out of Africa Before I left for Kenya, I read Karen Blixen’s (nom de plume: Isak Dinesen) book, Out of Africa. Taking place at about this time 100 years ago, the Baroness owned a coffee plantation just outside of Nairobi. Her book is ripe with the soul of the country and its people, with less of the entitled colonialism than I expected. Karen wanted nothing more than for her bones to lie in rest in Africa. She did not get her wish. Her coffee plantation suffered locusts and other acts of God, and she was forced to leave the land she loved, later dying of malnutrition in her Dutch estate. A minor tragedy of dislocation. On the day I took this picture, I wanted nothing more than to make it out of Africa. I’ll likely process the full scope of traveling during the outbreak of a worldwide pandemic over time—peeling off …

“Banish the ghost of coronaaaaahhh…” Before my trip to Kenya, I went to Passport Health, a traveler’s clinic for immunizations and fear needling. There, I was handed a terrifying brochure filled with the potential dangers of my destination. Typhoid. Hepatitis. Yellow fever. And a long list of other shit-inducing diseases borne of filth and mosquitoes and the social nature of human existence. It totaled $1500 to completely mitigate the fear of the unknown. I paid $500 to slightly assuage it, which my Kenyan friend found baffling and idiotic. I also paid dearly for taking the live Typhoid pills that made me vomit for hours on end over the course a week. I took off into an exponentially panicked world. When I left one week ago, the novel coronavirus drifted in and out of the public consciousness. It still felt like a somewhat foreign concept. Other people’s problems. A few days after I landed, COVID-19 did too. Blessedly not via the conduit of me. Since then, it feels like the entire world has screeched to a …

“I always know where I am by the way the road looks. Like I just know that I’ve been here before. I just know that I’ve been stuck here. Like this one fucking time before, you know that? Yeah. There’s not another road anywhere that looks like this road. I mean exactly like this road. It’s one kind of place. One of a kind. Like someone’s face. Like a fucked up face.” – River Phoenix, My Own Private Idaho no label – vintage beach dress $5, ReStyle thrift store.

“Do you know how fast you were going?” the state trooper inquired, inching down his aviators. He lay in wait in a mirage-like speed trap on the desert highway. I spotted him too late, then caught him creeping out onto the highway in the rearview. “Fuck.” This vintage white Caddy with the blood red interior must look like a drug dealer’s wet dream. I fluttered my Bambiest of doe eyes. “I actually don’t. This only goes up to 85.” I gestured to the speedometer, that did, in fact, cap off at the age of the grandmas usually behind the wheel of this particular old-school luxury vehicle. A wry grin flashed across his face, turned on as instantaneously as those red and blue lights. When he came back, he gave me a warning, and this cogent piece of advice, “If that needle gets to 85, slow down!” Jessica McClintock maroon(ed) long sleeveless dress – $3.99, ReStyle Thrift Store | ADAY Something Borrowed black traveling button up shirt – $125, thisisADAY.com | Crocs (but the fashion-y kind) black fleece-lined slip-ons – …

On the menu… appetizer: Polish sausage w/ sauerkraut, split in two – J Dawgs (pictured) main: A dozen oysters on the half shell w/ fresh grated wasabi. Arugula salad. French onion soup. – White Horse dessert: J.S. Ondara show – The State Room Ralph Lauren gold & black striped long-sleeved shirt – $2.99, ReStyle | Liz Claiborne black skirt – $3.99, ReStyle | Frye knee-high black leather boots – $75, Bombshell & Blokes “head to boots” fall make-up event Cheep eats

I’m lost. Not, like, literally. I’m not still in Wendell, being gawked at by pumpers at the gas station across the street, as Kim and I pose in our driving clothes in front of the abandoned Ace (one storefront over from the brilliantly-named Grizzly Dairy Wear). What I need is a big phallic tarot card, telling me, in what I assume is a Barry White ASMR voice, “Hey girl, you’re magic. Poof. It’s all in you. Everything you need to do.” And then—like magic, like I’m wand-renewed with a psyche scrubbed clean of the plaque of regret, longing, fear, and inertia—I do everything I am designed to do. Like it’s in the cards. 12 pm by Mon Ami floral print long-sleeved shirt – $2.99, ReStyle Thrift Store | Hot Kiss jean jacket – $5.99, ReStyle Thrift Store | Dizzire black and white print pants – Idaho Youth Ranch, $4.75 | Crocs (but the fashion-y kind) black fleece-lined slip-ons – $20, Crocs.com Note: Every outfit for this trip was recently purchased during one glorious visit to …