Marquis' Weblog

Day 5 – Elko, NV to Sacramento, CA

I just got to the hotel in Sacramento and they have high speed internet access, so I’m finally able to post all of the entries I’d written throughout the trip. For most of my drive, I’d planned on making another funny entry about my drive out here, but now I’m sitting here with a heavy heart, so I've got to get a little serious...

An hour after crossing the state line into California, I got a phone call from one of my friends back home saying that one of our peoples was in a dangerous life situation and that she was trying to figure out a way to provide help. This totally caught me by surprise and it also made me feel incredibly guilty because I would go over to the friend’s house and help if I were back home, but I was left powerless to do anything but try to get information from the friend that called me. I was incredibly distraught after that call ended and I was in a sort of trance while I was driving toward Sacramento. Before I knew it, all of the mountains and trees that I-80 started with in Cali turned into Sacramento highways…then I looked in my rear view mirror and saw a motorcycle cop flashing his lights at me. Apparently, he’d been following me for a couple of miles and saw me speeding down the highway. My mind was so out of it that I didn’t notice him flagging me down until the last minute and I didn’t even realize I was speeding until I slowed down to pull onto the shoulder. I didn’t try to argue the ticket because I knew I was guilty, but it sucked for me to have come all the way across the country without incident and then to get a speeding ticket 10 minutes from my hotel. Oh well, my mother said that I should be happy that I’d only gotten that one ticket over the course of all this driving that I’ve done. As I sit here typing this entry 30 minutes after the incident, I am still more shaken with the thought of not being able to help my friend than I am with any increase in car insurance or speeding ticket fine that I will incur.

I’m tired with a capital ‘T’ after all this driving, so I’m going to take a nap and then jump back into the studying.