Zen Driving: Being Witness to Where the Road Takes You

Not long ago, I took a meandering trip through rural Nevada’s high-desert, covering eight days and 1,500 miles, on two-lane roads and dirt tracks.

I loaded up a backpack with a few changes of skivvies, a cooler for water and fruit and hardboiled eggs, as well as an oversized state atlas, and headed off.

But there was one thing that I did not do.

I did not turn on the radio. I did not use the CD player.

And I did not miss them.

I drove in silence, mile after mile, across so many county lines, anticipating turnoffs miles ahead. I just drove, all the while watching the arid valleys and basins of the American West approach through my windshield and slip out through my back window.

I kept a lookout for wild horses. I spotted grazing burros and an elk bound before my car. For some miles along a dirt road, a predatory bird seemed to track me.

I call it Zen Driving.

And I have been doing it for more than a decade now.

I used to be that guy who cranked up the volume, who judged long distances by CDs. I was a nervous driver. On longer drives through flat Midwest terrain, I killed time by spinning though the outermost bandwidths of the AM dial, listening to the early-morning farm reports and Bible-thumpers try to scare you into submission.

Once, at dawn, I tuned into a radio station broadcast from the Pine Ridge Reservation, held rapt by the Native American chants and drumbeat and felt like I’d gone to church.

In the city, or on soulless freeways, I’d wish away the drive by listening to NPR and Terry Gross interviews. I’d hear Carl Castle tell me how the stocks had closed that day, all as a way to disconnect with the tedious drive.

I didn’t stop to think, to actually witness the natural landscapes that I passed through. Like Dorothy wearing earbuds as she traipsed along the Yellow Brick Road.

For my generation, music and road trips are inseparable, one Ozzie, the other Harriet. The CD player provided a rollicking soundtrack to Kansas or the Baja, or the New Jersey Turnpike. It was like the car ran, not on gas, but on a thumping bass back beat.

If coffee is for closers, silent drives were for losers.

For me, Southern California was the worst.

I once commuted to Santa Monica along the 10 freeway from the Mid-Wilshire District, sitting in traffic morning and afternoon, so frustrated that I’d chew my cud like an old cow. I plotted lane changes, grinding my teeth while the traffic in the adjoining lane buzzed past at 50 miles and hour while mine sat dead still.

Then I read about a study that said in the long run, you didn’t save any time whatsoever by lane-swapping like a meth addict heading for a score. I tried talking books and those worked for a while.

But then I moved away from all the congestion, the screaming billboards and other cars.

I moved to Nevada.

On jaunts into the desert, I turned off the radio, and I just looked around.

It felt strange at first, and then it didn’t.

It felt right. Healthy, even.

Now, even in town, no radio blather for me; I drive and I think.

What do you think about, people ask. Don’t you get bored?

No, I swear to Jesus, I don’t.

Alone, behind he wheel, I watch closely where the road is taking me.

On a long drive on Nevada Route 318, I tracked how the tarmac flowed, connecting one valley to the next, over rises that offered new views that left me breathless in their immensity.

I spotted campers sitting in chairs at dusk, taking in a particularly precious view, and felt kinship. Neither of us was listening to anything but our own thoughts, I’ll bet.

As the miles pass, I read road signs, I concentrate on personal issues as my own best counselor and listener. I work out story leads, my mind free-falling through the material until I find just the right words, until I find my way.

They say movement soothes the brain. Take that crying baby on a long car ride. A walk is the best time to work though issues with a friend or loved one. I sleep well on trains.

I would like to add that long solitary drives, with only my thoughts riding co-pilot, is the closest to God I’ve ever felt on Planet Earth.

I no longer kill time on the road.

I live it with pleasure.

John M. Glionna is a writer and freelance journalist based in Sin City. His website is johnglionna.com.