An Invitation

Two years ago, I wrote a letter and sent it in the mail to nine people. It was an invitation not to a wedding or graduation, but to an adventure. I spent months crafting each sentence, knowing this was going to be a very hard sell. I needed to break through all the mental barriers of practical adulthood that say, “This sounds nice, but there’s no way I can go.” It had to be poetry that could lift souls beyond the small realm of the known, into a child-like state of wonder and possibility. 

It failed to do any of these things. Some talked or dreamed about it, but in the end no one accepted the invitation. 

Last year shut down any plans to reopen it. This invitation can only be accepted by the very young at heart, and it seems there are less and less of us each year. But I send it out again, this time as a message in a bottle to the far corners of who-knows-where. I promised every year no matter where I was in life, I would be willing to do this. It was one of those promises to never grow up – to not lose the fire.

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The letter 

Thirty volleyball nets are lined end to end in the sand. A constant, burning sun hangs in the sky as an endless mass of rolling blue waves extend far beyond what the eye can see. The beach is lightly populated as a handful of amateur surfers tumble in the water nearby. Dusty RVs, having somehow rattled their way over the Rocky Mountains on a final pilgrimage, have broken down here at the edge of the world. There are cheap seafood shacks with neon signs, one-room beach houses rented by college students, and on the cliffs above, large mansions peaking out behind palm trees. 

This is the 1950s California beach life, where time stops and the politics and troubles of the world melt away. It smells like freedom. When I saw it for the first time, I knew however long it took, one day I would come back, and I would bring my friends. This is the invitation.

The journey is half the adventure, so we’ll drive out – the great American road trip. We’ll get a big van and pile in with nothing to do but talk about everything and crank up the radio. It will take us across the continent, through the flatlands of Nebraska and the Nevada desert, into the Joshua Tree-infested California dream.

We’ll run in the surf, play ukuleles, and drink warm Coca-Cola from glass bottles. On Sundays, we’ll file sunburnt into church and praise the God who made this place, and as darkness falls we’ll ride the curves of Mulholland Drive and stare down at a million city lights.

It’s an endless summer, soaking up the West Coast sun. It’s something we’ll carry with us the rest of our lives, as we dream in our rocking chairs of the good old days when we were young and free. Okay, that’s laying it on a bit thick.

The idea is we pack light, sleep on the beach, and shower at the gym. We’ll pool our money for gas and cheap food, and when it runs out, we’ll head back to the jobs, families, and lives we have here. Whatever awaits us back home, we’ll be there for each other, closer than ever, friends for life. 

Adventure awaits. 

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The objections are many and obvious: it will be expensive in gas and food alone. Since the indefinite timeline may stretch into weeks if not months on end, it will disrupt or even terminate our current jobs making financial recovery difficult. We may already have events and demands planned for the summer. There are too many responsibilities to leave 2,000 miles behind. Especially for married couples and young families, this is downright impossible.

I understand that. But to me these are just more reasons to go. Travel while you’re very young or you won’t do it until you’re very old. This isn’t a fun, final, adolescent fling before we all settle down and become adults. This is about bonding, deep conversations, playing hard, an unforgettable journey, the perspective distance offers, and all the priorities I hope we continue to have as adults – building deeper life connections that will remain strong through the changes coming for many of us in the next chapter of our lives. This is an investment in something we’ll look back on as a test of conviction, of what we believed in, and what we had it in us to do. 

My bags are packed. Will you go with me?

J.

May 18, 2021