After a push at the end, the preparations for my walkabout are done. All of the real estate and bank forms: submitted. All of the boxes helpfully marked “miscellaneous”: stored. All of the jars of specialty ingredients that I used once in six years: given away. My camper van: filled with diesel, tire pressure checked.

Thursday morning the nice man from Carvana came to buy my Nissan Leaf. Thursday night I camped on my air mattress in an empty bedrom. On a rainy Friday morning I wiped up my co-pilot’s wet paw prints five last times, We set out for the distant paradise known as Stillwater. I had an appointment at the Dodge dealership to have two dash lights checked that came on shortly after I bought my new van. I assumed the mechanic would push a secret button to reboot the sensors — like pressing Control-Alt-Delete on a laptop — and I’d be On My Merry Way.

What wound up happening instead: I gave the nice man from Fury Dodge my credit card to replace the titanium frammitz and to calibrate the occulators. Meanwhile, I may or may not have done my best Job impersonation, shaking my fist at God’s cavalier and absurd timing. Thankfully, I’m pretty sure that’s the last time I’ll have reason to do that on this adventure.

After that delay of several hours, I drove to Wild River State Park for a two-night break-in campout. I’ll leave later this morning to visit my 84-year-old mother in North Dakota. She’s taking me out for a birthday dinner tonight. After that I travel to Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Ontario and Colorado again. I am truly On My Merry Way.

I’ve been pondering the term “escape velocity” since April. How many foot-pounds of thrust does a satellite need to reach orbit? How many bank forms and credit card charges does it take for me to slingshot myself from the gravity of a too small but deeply comfortable story?

As is usually the case with fundamental truths, the answer feels like a paradox. What if escape velocity is just another transcendence fantasy, another self-inflated denial of human limitations that can’t actually be escaped? On the other hand, what if slipping the familiar bonds of gravity is what my soul requires as the obvious response to radical grace? What if divine union depends on it? I hope I find out.

GRATITUDE: Thank you to David Kaar for generously picking up a carload of “just a few things” that didn’t fit in my van. Thank you to Denise Melton for the amazing birthday gift of a recounting of the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. Thank you to Edmond Manning for a delicious salmon dinner and the gift of 30 roadtrip haikus to be opened as spirit moves. Thank you to Amy Maxine for the spray-painted poster giving my cupboard fronts a splash of color. Thank you to Alan Hintermeister for sharing what an angel oracle card told him about joy. Thank you to Randall Rogers for letting Tamar and me hang out at his house while Fury Dodge worked its magic. Thank you to Carolyn Laney for adopting my two house plants. Thank you to Oie Dobier for her thoughtful card.

“You can survive on your own. You can grow stronger on your own. You can even prevail on your own. But you cannot become human on your own.” – Frederick Buechner