The night air in winslow

Somewhere on my first Cannonball run, deep into the night, we were cutting across Arizona if you can call it “cutting” when the pavement feels like it was laid down during the Eisenhower administration and never revisited. The moon was smoother than that.

I remember thinking, Are these roads actually paved, or did we just hallucinate asphalt?
Every mile felt like the suspension was auditioning for early retirement.

Fatigue was creeping in, the quiet kind that doesn’t announce itself until it’s already wrapped around your brain. So I pulled off on a side road outside Winslow, hoping the cold desert air would do what caffeine couldn’t.

The night air hit like a reset button crisp, clean, almost electric.

I got back in the car and said,“You realize I was literally standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona, right?”

My co-driver who is Welsh, in America just for this run blinked at me with absolute confusion.

He had never heard the song.Not a note. Not a reference. Nothing.

For a moment I wondered if this was some elaborate bit. Nope. Just a Welshman in the middle of the desert wondering why I was suddenly proud of a geography joke.

I started driving again me laughing and awake again, him trying to figure out what on earth I was talking about both of us breathing in the kind of cold air that wakes you up from the inside out.

There was no drama.
No great revelation.
Just two tired guys on a rough stretch of highway, sharing a strange, perfect pause in the middle of nowhere.

Sometimes the road teaches hard lessons. Sometimes it demands grit, patience, or nerve.

But every now and then, it gives you a quiet moment that reminds you to stop, breathe, laugh, and keep going especially when the pavement is trying its best to shake your fillings loose and you are exhausted enough to later swear you saw a black panther run across the highway.