Hitching a Ride

I needed a break on my hike today and I turned to that old American tradition---hitchhiking. I probably hadn’t played the game since I was 16 and that would be a few years ago. Guess what? I sucked at it. But I shouldn’t feel too bad---it is an activity Americans rarely play any longer. Here is a look back. Hitching in America took off during the Depression. When I was a kid in the 60’s, there was plenty of hitching rides. It seemed very logical to save myself miles of walking from school and to the mall by sharing a ride with a driver. In those halcyon days I never feared that the driver was going to be a character from Texas Chainsaw Massacre and they weren’t worried that I was Dexter. This past year I traded my wheels for public transportation and with the year almost up, I have enjoyed the experience. The greatest challenge is walking from the train to my home with a bag of groceries. It is a mile and half trip, with a great deal of it uphill and for a man of 62 almost 63 and no longer 16, it has been a test. Yesterday, I was willing to try hitch-hiking and the results were less than positive. In 1966, I would stick out my thumb and have a ride in minutes. In 2012, it is likely that no one will stop their car for a 60 year old man carrying a bag. What do I really have in that bag? As horror movies and horror in the news started to scare the socks off American drivers and pedestrians, hitch-hiking became a long forgotten art to most. Earlier this year, a rare rainstorm hit San Diego and without umbrella and carrying take-out food, I was in real trouble. A taxi stopped in the traffic and I bagged on the window, demanding that he open the doors. The bastard ignored me as if I were a piece of trash. A woman picking up her child from middle school, asked me to take shelter from the storm in her car. She took me right to my house. I told her and I was emotional that what she did that day would never be forgotten. What we send into the lives of others comes back into our own.