How do you start a life change? Is it like a race? After prep or training, stretching, lined up, waiting for the gun. Pop. You are off. Similarly, how do you finish? Is it crashing through the tape, collapsing, exhausted, dry heaving, hearing manly comments, “Bro. He left it all on the field, man!”? Or […]

Photos taken in 1977 in Wise Fools Blues Bar, Chicago – © W. Brett McKenzie I began this trip without a theme other than it was a voyage to my future life. I knew leaving the Northeast would mean traveling well-trodden paths. South and west was new, undiscovered country. That meant west of the Alleghenies […]

Memory and acting on memory can lead to unexpected and surprising discoveries. My previous visit to the battlefield, close to forty years ago, was purely functional. It was a stop on the way to Pittsburgh, a ride we found too far to manage in a single bite from Rhode Island. I had no particular interest […]

I’ve got to show roads some love. Without roads, I could not embark on this adventure. So here’s to the roads—my close, close companions. My voyaging began in New England. I know those roads well, having lived there longer than anywhere else in the world. North and south, they run long; east and west, they’re […]

I worry about Wilson. Is he happy? Am I treating him well? Is this a good life for him? He did not ask for this life. This contains a presumption that he has asked for a certain life – a little anthroprocentric. A good friend tells me to stop worrying – “He is more resilient […]

Apologies if you have been trying to follow my adventure. I was off the grid in the Shenandoah Mountains. When I descended to post from a cafe, I had lost all my updates. Will need to try to recreate. Hang in there, I will be back. I can blame my distraction on an attached deer […]

We all need rain. These days it often comes too much, too quickly, and in areas that may not need it. I left Rhode Island in rain – blustery storms that increased as I approached the southwestern border. Rain has characterized major transitions in my life since a child. My mother took me and my […]

Three days of a foul nor’eater shredded the American flag flying at the South Yard of the marina where I keep my boat. One of my first stops on my tour south from New England will be joining a group of veterans at a campground in Tennessee where, among other activities, we will conduct a […]

I’m at the point where I just want to leave. I’m fussing more than I need to. I’m as ready as I’ll ever be, and anything I’m missing I can buy on the road or order from Amazon once I’m settled somewhere for more than two days. I don’t need more clothes—I’m planning to do […]

Now I am on version three of this site — it began as a commentary on found art and art experiences — shifted to document my experience as a care-giver that lasted through the passing of my partner. Now it focuses on my future life — the life that I am living following the great […]