I discovered I did not know my own country. I, an American writer, writing about America, was working from memory, and the memory is at best a faulty, warpy reservoir. I had not heard the speech of America, smelled the grass and trees and sewage, seen its hills and water, its color and quality of light.
Steinbeck wrote this at age 58, in the shadow of his own mortality. When he set out in his makeshift camper, his French poodle Charley in tow, he was seeking to rekindle his relationship with his country after a 25-year estrangement.
In embarking upon a similar exploration over the course of the next three months or so, I will be seeking not to revive a long-extinguished flame, but to light it for the first time. A recent college graduate, and a government major no less, I have become quite praticed in speaking broadly of America and Americans, as though having dwelt two decades in the well-manicured suburbs of New England and four years within the ivied walls of a fortress of higher learning qualifies me as an expert on the subject. But the truth is that I know very little about my own country.
This journal is meant to serve as a log of what I am able to learn about America and about myself over the course of the next several months on the road–lest these lessons, left undocumented, warp and break apart over time, eventually becoming indistinguishable from the other fragments of experience and memory that clutter my conscience. It will also serve as a vehicle for conveying my experiences to friends and family–hence the title, American Postcard.
My intentions with this blog are intentionally vague, because I do not yet know what shape this journey will take. I look forward to finding out along with the rest of you.
