Finding “Third Place” (Road Trip Summary)

What places outside home or work most give you the feeling of belonging now?

“True happiness is really only to be found in sympathetic sharing.” (Johann Wolfgang Goethe)   

A few weeks ago before our latest road trip began, I blogged about the need to include more “Third Place” locations in my travels. That meant making a concerted effort to seek out special places of social belonging primarily to de-stress from such pressures as driving long distances, weather anomalies and the loneliness of being away from home. Interestingly, several planned sites that I predicted in that blog as being “Third Place” friendly never materialized at all during our easterly journey. On the other hand, several people gathering locales arose unexpectedly to calm my often compulsive mindset. Below you can click on the link to that previous blog.

https://onstageformyselfnow.blog/2024/07/25/prioritizing-third-place-travel/

I might clarify as well that such new “Third Place” feelings I absorbed  on this road trip were sometimes undertaken under less than ideal conditions. Consider for instance why would I have felt  positive energy at a spooky looking cemetery with a retired engineer at Cape Cod, Massachusetts chatting about the dangers of nuclear war? Amid similar weird circumstances, what motivation did I also manifest to engage in a picnic table discussion about college success strategies with a family of Pennsylvania strangers as I endured blustery, wind blown conditions atop the White Mountains highest peak at Mount Washington, New Hampshire?

Further hardships overlooked  by me took place at the end of a guided history tour in Southern Virginia as I somehow gained the trust of an autistically anxious tour guide at at the Presidential Library as he became unusually willing to confess off script to me his feelings about the strengths and weaknesses of this museum’s hometown hero, Woodrow Wilson. 

In a similarly perplexing way, it seemed strange that during a pelting rainstorm, tornado alert and total electrical blackout associated with an approaching tropical storm in central New York, my wife and I stepped outside our motel room to “chit chat” for awhile at the adjoining rural grounds with other occupants about how best to evacuate for safer ground. Perhaps then I’d  noticed in the distance the surrounding presence of vast fields of corn in the back of the hotel to calm me down at the time.

An additional Third Place” motive for me came about due to my simple curiosity to learn. For I’d become inspired to “hang out” at an obscure transportation exhibit hall to talk about America’s Steam Train era with a retired volunteer at the Atlanta History Center. Moreover, an aspiring novelist/night host grabbed my intellectual attention as well during evening hours during our St. Petersburg, Florida ‘Bed and Breakfast” stay as we exchanged writing views in the cozy lobby about how best to get our writings published. Meanwhile, a rare showcase of Monet’s  Impressionistic artwork at the Cleveland Museum of Art provided momentary spurts of creative thinking as we lingered around several of these galleries in casual conversation with my wife Ruth’s cousin Jo. 

For added interest, I’ve posted photos of those seven locations described above. I wish you good fortune in making good use of your own “Third Place” travel intentions.