It all looked so easy, driving around the United States in an old VW van. That in itself was a dream of ours in some way. The old 'hippy van adventure' we had seen on Irish T.V as kids. "Lets paint it with flowers and dreams and fill it up with love instead of gas'! It was in some way the fun factor for us as we embarked on our mission. But for a mission like this, to reach the masses... you need to actually reach the masses and our wee van just wasn't up for the challenge!
The plan on the side of asking every single person we meet to tell us their dream was to complete 4/5ths of the Dream Team in the form of Kevin on Tuesday 27th in New York City. We decided we could do it in time.... if we 'bombed' it* through Kansas, but Kansas had other ideas. Kansas was like.. "Hold on a minuet!! People in Kansas have dreams too you know!" So, after many attempts to get back on the I70 and get as many miles behind us as possible we started to realised that we were trying to control something that was never ours to control in the first place. So taking the advise of our wireless companions George, Paul, John and Ringo, we decided to just let it be.
That turned out to be the best decision we had made up until that point and so the adventures began...
Friday night: The Dream Machine leaves Denver ("mechanically sound") - Andrew Ricardo Ep1
Saturday daytime: The Dream Machine (reaches its peak) covers a good part of Kansas, The Dream Team enjoy various coffee stops and short naps whilst collecting dreams. Young Caleb is the first to paint his dream on the van. (little did we know he would also be the last)
Saturday just before sunset: The Dream Machine gives up and crawls to safety on the side of a busy highway under construction. Scary I70.
Saturday Five minuets after sunset: The Dream team meet Steve, A State Trooper resembling John Wayne who quickly becomes our Kansas ambassador. His biggest ambition over the days to follow is to prove that his state is in fact not flat and that hills are a plentiful. A gentleman if ever there was one.
This breakdown was a blessing in disguise, and despite the fact that most of our time was taken up in the waiting rooms of some random mechanics or in the passenger seats of the four different toe trucks who came to our rescue (not all at the same time). We saw it only as four more dreams to add to our pot! We quickly got the hang* of asking every single person we met what their dream is weather they were serving us a big mac or had oil on their hands and grease on their overalls.
One thing we have to say is that we were only too delighted to get to hear the dreams of the people in Kansas, and noticed a common humbleness among them all. A common want to live a long and happy life, to bring up their children with God in their hearts, to have everything that they need and not much want for more. A huge lesson we take from it also is that of respect. Respect to what we set out to do. We knew we would be in the guilt's* afterwords had we "bombed" it through any state just to get somewhere else in time. Kevin was fine in the end anyway! (we love you Kevin)
Thank the heavens on this earth that we learnt this valuable lesson on the second day so we will be working from that from now on. Sadly the Dream Machine had to sacrifice itself to teach us this lesson, but The Dream Team live on and stronger than ever!
Ignorance is not bliss.....
And Kansas is not flat!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Irish to American Dictionary.
Bombed it: To bomb it is to go from one place to another very quickly.
Got the hang of: To get the hang of something is to understand the workings of a situation.
In the guilts: To be in the guilts is to feel guilty about something when you are in the wrong.
To see The Dream Machines last few days and the birth of The Dream Team click below
No comments:
Post a Comment