Greyhound Bus Cancelled, So I Hitchhiked

Interesting past 36 hours. Yesterday morning I was at my brother's in eastern Oregon, where I'd been visiting him, his wife and son the previous few days. I had a long travel day ahead of me. I had a Greyhound bus booked from La Grande that would take six hours to get me to Portland and (if it was on time) arrive at 4:20 pm. I then had a flight from Portland at 7 pm to San Francisco, where I had a hostel reserved for the night. The next morning I would catch a city bus up to Santa Rosa where I would meet up with my aunt and we would then drive up to my mom's an hour north of there in Ukiah.
So my brother drove me over to the Greyhound bus station, where we chatted in the car while waiting for the bus to show up. Thirty minutes after it was supposed to arrive (not surprised that it was late), I figured we might as well pop our heads into the office and see if they had any news about when it would be arriving.

It turned out it was cancelled. Not late, just plain cancelled, because they didn't have a driver. No email from them, no text message, nothing. You're relying on them for your travel plans and they just don't show up and do nothing to straighten out the situation or even inform you. And I had a flight to catch, a hostel reserved, and a long journey ahead of me even if things went smoothly.

In the course of about 30 seconds I decided to do what I do best, and hitch it. I asked my brother to drop me off at an on-ramp to the freeway and see what might happen.

Time was of the essence. It was about 11:30 by then and my flight was at 7 that evening. But of course you need to check in an hour early. So I had 6 1/2 hours to get there. It's a four-hour drive if you're going a steady 70 mph with no stops. And eastern Oregon is conservative country, not exactly hitchhiker friendly.

My brother dropped me off, I got out there and did my thing. Fortunately the skies were clear blue, not a cloud, and yet it wasn't too hot since it's April. Perfect day for hitchhiking.

I stood there for two hours with no luck. Finally I got my break. A car pulled over. Ran up and asked him where he was going.

"Portland", he said.

"Great." I said "'Cause I've got a flight to catch."

Later he would tell me he thought I said I had a fight to catch, and he was thinking I was a boxer or something.

I ran back and grabbed my backpack and hopped in the back seat, because the front seat was full of stuff. He was an older man who was driving to Portland to visit his daughter. He put the cruise control at 74 and we zoomed along, making one short stop for gas.

He dropped me off at the airport at 5:15. I got checked in, went through security and then had 45 minutes left to spare. Got a beer and it sure tasted good.

I'm now at my mom's and this is the first time that I haven't had travel plans in the works in the past year. Looking forward to the next few weeks of hanging out here and (hopefully) figuring out what the heck I'm doing next with my life.