Sarah J. Carlson

Contemporary Young Adult Author

An Ode to Wisconsin: Driving on back country roads

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(Taken on Highway 33 between Cashton and Hillsborough. Passed a few Amish buggies on the way, too)

I was digging through old pictures, looking at pictures of my hometown for the purposes of my new novel project Rafa and Rose and I found this picture. It made me miss driving, having the capacity to get in a car and go pretty much anywhere for as long and far as I want. My husband and me have no car here in Singapore. Average cost to purchase, say, a Nissan Versa–$100,000 in Singapore! That doesn’t include gas and insurance. While Singapore does have amazing public transportation, I miss being able to drive, listening to music and meditating on my writing or life in general. I mean look at that picture. What an awesome place to drive through, windows down on a beautiful summer day.

15 thoughts on “An Ode to Wisconsin: Driving on back country roads

  1. Mike

    Driving is good therapy. Riding transit is for robots. Although recently we visited San Francisco and the biggest problem was parking. There are very few parking garages and on-street parking is a nightmare. My wife said she was glad to be back in Wisconsin 🙂

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    1. sjoycarlson Post author

      Thanks!!! I do my best!

      Yes, good point about not writing while driving….though I have to admit when I had a car and I was driving on roads such as that, I was writing in my head lol.

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  2. Dixie Minor

    I loved this picture, and I love to drive, listen to music, or not, and let my thoughts drift. (I mean, up to a point-safely. 😀) I do a lot of my writing work that way-the gathering thoughts before I write. But I also love riding on public transportation. There is something about being in motion and also being not attached physically to where I am every day in my real life, that for me, gets the wheels turning so I can write! Thank you for your post!😊

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  3. jpkenna

    Evocative picture. Nothing like winding rural roads in farm country on a sunny summer day. There are similar scenes here in western Washington state–as there were in my home state of New Jersey. But no Amish buggies!

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  4. When in New Places

    YES!! I’m totally with you!! We miss this so much as well – just hitting the open roads would feel so amazing right about now! Music playing, thoughts flowing, windows open.
    Sometimes it’s those little moments that really make me miss home, that’s for sure!
    ~ Andrea ❤

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      1. When in New Places

        Oh man!! What I wouldn’t do for a beautiful bottle of ranch!!! *tear*
        Thank the foreign food Gods that I’m able to order do it yourself style Ranch packets on iherb, BUT nothing beats the original stuff.
        I absolutely LOVE eating pizza with ranch as well! Amazing!
        I’m liking the sounds of Singapore more and more! Once we go I think we’ll need to bring an extra empty suitcase for all of the things we’ll be buying and bringing back here!
        I’ll need to get the location of the ranch dressing closer to the time as well as any other foreign food area suggestions you may have up your sleeve! 😀
        ~ Andrea ❤

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      2. sjoycarlson Post author

        Yeah, pizza with ranch is amazing. Though it’s really hard to find real pork pepperoni over here because most restaurants try to keep halal.

        I’ll definitely guide you to whatever culinary thing you desire. Singapore has most everything western, though it sometimes costs much more money (ie a bottle of creamer is $16).

        Also, I think my parents in law know of places to go for western things in Korea.

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      3. When in New Places

        That sounds wonderful! But that’s interesting about the pork pepperoni, I didn’t realize about the halal. Yes, the premium on western items always seems to be outlandish! $16 for creamer is up there, but for creamer I’d probably put that cash out a few times a year.

        There are definitely western things here, they’re few and far between and not a great selection. The places that do have a great selection (mainly in Seoul) are SO expensive. That’s why iherb has been our saving grace. Decent prices, healthy and ships cheap ($4 to Korea) and in under a week.

        The stuff we found in Hong Kong you’d have a really tough time finding here. British style chocolate (my husband adores it), amazing flavors in chips – they even had Marks and Spencer!!! OH man, that was lovely! .

        If Singapore has even half of that selection we’ll be golden. We had friends go to Singapore last year and they found Kraft Dinner ~ awesome finds like that will make our day!

        A person never thought they’d covet such junky food until they become an expat and then it’s like pure GOLD! 😀

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