Roundabouts, Roses, and the Color That Calms Me
I needed to get out of my own head, and instead of staying in it, I reached out.
I made plans with people I hadn’t seen in a while, and once I started putting it together, the day filled itself quickly. What started as a simple idea turned into a full itinerary, mapped out stop by stop, with just enough time in each place to sit down, catch up, and then get back in the car and do it all over again.
I also went into this thinking I was going to vlog it. I had the vision, the intention, the whole “main character with a camera” energy, and then immediately forgot to film anything meaningful once I got there. So while this won’t be a full vlog moment, I’ll share some of what I do have and add some clips here.
Overconfidence Is Not a Navigation System
I don’t use a GPS when I head north.
Up there, I navigate by landmarks, the kind that get baked into your brain without you realizing it. Turns aren’t street names, they’re things you expect to still be there.
What I did not account for is Grand Traverse County apparently having an unhealthy obsession with roundabouts.
Case in point: there was a blinking light I always turned left at. Except…there isn’t anymore.
It’s a roundabout now, a full rewrite of something my brain has relied on for years.
So I drove right past where my turn should have been, because in my head, I hadn’t reached it yet. I just kept going straight, trying to recalibrate in real time while on video chat with my therapist.
At some point I landed on, I think this hits Front Street eventually, and committed.
It did.
Still felt like a setup.
Stop One: Suttons Bay
I had just wrapped up my therapy session, deposited some cash at the bank, and thought it would be funny to send my first ex-husband a GIF of Ron Swanson standing up and saying “she’s here.” IYKYK.
The plan was simple: send the GIF, drive by, commit to the bit, keep moving.
Then I actually saw him.
Something told me to stop, so I did and we caught up a little bit on his lunch break.
That morning, I had bought roses. I handed him two—one for his girlfriend and one for his co-worker—and left.
Stop Two: Tom & Fishtown
I pulled up to Tom’s house and found him sitting on the porch with his dad, immediately giving off Letterkenny vibes—Yooper edition.
I joined them, we caught up for a bit, then headed to Leland to grab sandwiches from Village Cheese Shanty.
North Shore. No tomato.
I am obsessed with those sandwiches. I craved them hard during pregnancy, and at this point, it’s an annual tradition with Tom. It’s not even a question of what we’re getting.
Same order. Same spot. Every time.
Stop Three: Taylor
By the time I made it to Petoskey, the day had already stretched itself thin in the best way.
We met behind Duffy’s Garage & Grille. She snuck up on me and I jumped out of my car with two roses in hand. I said, “Roses for you because our men don’t get them for us, but our girlfriends will.”
And that was that.
We then went into Duffy’s, ordered mules and appetizers, and caught up. I hadn’t seen her in about three years and so much had changed for both of us.
After, we wandered the empty pre-tourist season streets to Kilwins for some sweet treats. I, of course, grabbed stuff for my girls. Then, on the way out, we both melted when we saw a husky with its owners.
Unfortunately, the rain cut our time short, but it didn’t feel unfinished.
Three Versions of Me, Still Out There
At some point on the drive home, a thought resurfaced from a blog I wrote about how a different version of you lives inside everybody’s head.
And I felt that.
Each of these friends holds a different version of me.
Westley knows the version of me who grew up alongside him, the one who believed in building something beautiful together, who wanted a life that made room for children and stability and all the things we thought we were working toward. He also knows the version of me who didn’t yet have the tools or the language to save it when it started falling apart.
Tom knows the version of me who was in the middle of it collapsing, doing my best to function while everything underneath me was shifting.
Taylor knows the version of me from high school, the one who was struggling quietly and then loudly, who filled her calendar with concerts and became a little band-boy crazy just to drown out the noise in her own head.
Each of those versions showed up in small ways throughout the day, shaping the conversations we had and the way we understood each other without needing to explain much at all.
The Soundtrack of It All
The entire day had a soundtrack.
I drove fast, blasted music, and sang like I had something to prove. I talked nonstop at every stop, like there was something in me that needed to be emptied out before I could sit with anything else.
By the time I got home, my voice was gone. My throat was raw, the kind of physical reminder that I had pushed through every bit of energy I had.
It felt earned.
The Part I Didn’t Get To
Somewhere in the middle of all of it, I kept thinking I’d find a minute to pull over and sit by the water.
There’s a stretch along M-22 where the water turns this unreal turquoise in the shallows, a color that doesn’t feel real until you see it in person. That has always been my true favorite color. That water has always had a way of steadying me, of pulling everything back into place.
This time, I didn’t get to sit with it.
I filled the day with people who steady me in a different way. The water would have just been the quiet exhale at the end.
Next Time
Next time, I’ll pick one place and stay long enough to absorb it better.
I’ll sit by the water. I’ll slow down. I might even use the GPS.
And I’ll let both things exist at the same time without trying to force them into the same window.
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