Embrace the Detours

I recently saw a t-shirt in Wimberley, Texas that said, “Embrace the Detour.” For those who are not familiar with Texas geography, Wimberley is an “off the beaten path” small town 38 miles southwest of Austin in the Texas Hill Country. I was in Wimberley with my friend Mary Ann because we have committed to extending our business trips after the “business” is finished. We are doing this to experience the “local culture” of the cities and surrounding communities on those business trips. We had just finished a week of meetings in Austin, which are held quarterly. Instead of immediately heading back to Dallas/Fort Worth, we had a nice dinner in Austin Friday night while listening to live music and headed to Wimberley on Saturday.

Seeing that t-shirt got me to thinking about a conversation that I had with my husband earlier. As I wrote in the blog post about our 40th wedding anniversary, my husband is a planner, and in many cases that has served us both well. I certainly believe in strategically planning for the future, so that we can be as prepared as possible. But, I also believe it is impossible to chart a course to get from point A to point Z without expecting there will be a few (or many) detours along the way.

Since I work in the field of injury prevention, I’ll use a motor vehicle analogy to explain this further. I think I’m a pretty good driver. I learned to drive when I was 15 years old and have had lots of driving experience since then. I have a car that has all of the latest safety technology built into the vehicle. But, if I notice another vehicle coming toward me in my lane where I have the right of way, I’m not going to stay in my lane – I’m going to swerve to avoid crashing. It doesn’t matter if I’m driving correctly, and the other person is wrong. What matters is my ability to course correct. And, that’s what I think detours are.

I think I officially began to embrace detours many years ago when my daughter and I were traveling to Colorado on one of our annual snow skiing trips. On this particular trip, we were just south of Colorado Springs when Staley announced we needed to find a restroom. I was immediately irritated. We had just stopped for gas an hour earlier, and I was annoyed that she hadn’t taken the opportunity to use the restroom at that time. But, I also knew that punishing her by making her wait until we arrived at our hotel in Denver, which was more than 2 hours away, was not a good option. So, I took the next exit and began looking for some place that had a restroom. About a mile down the road, we found a very cute and quaint country store that not only had clean restrooms, but that served organic foods and possibly the best chai tea I’ve ever had. That place became a “must stop” every driving trip to Colorado after that.

Since then, I’ve tried to learn from every detour my life has taken – even the painful ones.

Our trip to Wimberley wasn’t exactly a detour because it was planned. I discovered Wimberley thanks to several articles I’ve read on social media about the “best small towns in Texas to visit.” Wimberley was on every list. It didn’t disappoint. Nestled among many Cypress trees along the Blanco River, this town of just over 3,000 population is thriving!

There are no chain restaurants in Wimberley. No Starbucks. No Walmart or Target. There is an H.E.B. grocery store, which made Mary Ann (one of my foodie friends) consider if she could actually live there!

We spent hours wandering through the many quaint shops and art galleries. We started to believe that every person who lives and works in Wimberley must have had an intensive course in customer service! Every person in every shop, whether they were younger or older, was so gracious. They took the time to talk to us and answer our questions. And, we weren’t the only customers in the shops. There were many customers, yet every time a new customer would come in, we witnessed the same warm behavior from the sales clerks. It was impossible not to get caught up in the community spirit because these people exuded such love and pride in their community and their jobs.

We talked to two young people who had been raised in Wimberley, moved away for a time, but had returned. We talked to a storeowner who was from Dallas, but had moved to Wimberley with her husband to start a new life. We talked to a young black man who had lived in Dallas, Houston and Austin, but had chosen to move to Wimberley to live and work.

We had a wonderful lunch and cocktails at the Longleaf Craft Kitchen & Bar. While we were there, we had a conversation with the owner, who along with her husband also owns The Old Mill Store next door to the Longleaf. We learned that the owners had previously operated an art gallery in the building that now houses the restaurant, but had made the decision to close the gallery and open the craft kitchen in its place. When we asked her why, she said, “Millennials don’t buy art, but they eat and drink craft food and cocktails.” She explained that changing times meant that she and her husband needed to make some changes to their business plan. She said they made the adjustments to keep people interested in living and working in Wimberley and to continue to attract visitors. They closed the art gallery, moved some of the art to The Old Mill Store, built a kitchen, and opened Longleaf.

As I hear more and more about the demise of small towns across the country, I wonder if these towns would also be thriving if their leaders were more adaptable to changes.

While I more often than not do embrace detours, I’ve also been known to ignore them. As we were driving back to Dallas from Wimberley, traffic alerts popped up on both Mary Ann’s vehicle navigation system and the Apple maps on my iPhone. The alerts indicated a traffic delay a few miles ahead of us. Because traffic seemed to be moving at normal speeds and we couldn’t see any slowed vehicles in front of us, we made the decision to proceed on the same course and not exit where our devices were indicating. A half a mile past the exit, the road curved and we saw the line of brake lights. At that point, we couldn’t turn around and go back to the exit we had passed. It was late, and we were tired. But, we both realized no “gnashing of teeth,” complaining or blaming was going to speed up our arrival in Dallas. We just had to go forward at the snail’s pace to get around the crash. So, as we crept along, we noticed moments of awe around us – the stormy skies to the east and the orange/yellow sunset to the west, and I enjoyed 45 extra minutes with a good friend.

I recently saw an advertisement for Land Rover that said, “It’s not about getting to the finish line – it’s about respecting and enjoying the journey.” I believe that how we choose to navigate the journey, including the detours in our life, as well as the ones we don’t take is important.

I’m choosing to embrace the detours, accept responsibility for the ones not taken, and do the best I can to enjoy the journey.