MOTORCYCLE JOURNALS
MOTORCYCLE JOURNALS
Written By Lindsey Dolan
I found myself sleeping under a canopy of leaves and stars in the middle of the Tetons … on a couch.
It had been a day for the books. I had travelled with my bike from the middle of nowhere Montana, through Yellowstone National Park, to Jackson Lake in order to reunite with the TAPcouch. The last year of living like a partial vagabond has made this couch my home. Lying down in a campsite, sleeping bag and cushions, felt as good as returning to the lodge after a brittle cold ski day to sit by the fireplace. The couch is my house- a place of safety, a hug in a piece of furniture.
When I had gotten to the campground, I hoisted the couch on my shoulder and started hiking it into my site. The man camping next to me immediately started a conversation.
I’ve learned that if I want to be left alone, I can’t be within a half mile radius of other people with the couch.
Turns out he was good friends with my eldest sister Kelly, and had attended every Fourth of July party on my father’s boat. Coincidence or couch magic? I spent the night around his campfire being fed food and stories of his year of travel. I told him about the couch, and started to realize how much of my life revolved around it.
We discussed the motorcyclist a few campsites down. A legitimate biker, he had heat plug-ins for his riding suit. The man had travelled from Florida to Maine, roughly tagging along the AT, and was on his second bike trip. This time he started in Virginia, destination Alaska.
“If this works out, I see myself selling everything I own and taking my bike through South America. For me, this is life as it should be.”
That’s how I’m starting to feel about my couch. If this keeps working out … societal disconnect for a universal reconnect, hit the world with a mobile living room.
Sidenote: The man sitting on the couch is a wild life photographer. He told me to start this blog while I was sitting and waiting for bears to cross Mud Pots in Teton National Park.
-Lindsey Dolan
One Response to “MOTORCYCLE JOURNALS”
Hey Lindsey.
Hope you are doing well on your trek. Let us know if you get close to Tahoe. Yosemite or the Bay Area.