Wanderlust : Joni Mitchell tribute #1

  

I've got it. I've always had it. My father has it. Perhaps it was an inheritance? Nevertheless, having itchy feet means I get to travel and go places I've never been before, or visit landscapes and towns that call me back. Have you ever gotten the urge to just take off and go somewhere without a clear destination in mind? To JUST GO. Hop in your car and hit the road. See what's out there. Where does that dirt road lead to? You drive and drive and then, well, there you are. In New Mexico. Again.
I'm drawn to the desert. I like warm weather and cactus. I am known to run away to Arizona on a whim.
I'm pretty sure Joni Mitchell has travel fever. She writes and sings songs about it on her album HEJIRA (a journey). Those songs were written during a road trip she had taken cross country. A spiritual journey. One song in particular, Amelia, she sings:
I pulled into the Cactus Tree Motel to shower off the dust
and I slept on the  strange pillows of  my wanderlust.

When I was a teenager, I spent hours in my bedroom, listening  to Joni Mitchell  records. Reading the lyrics on the record sleeve, singing along, dreaming of far away places and hanging  out with the "ladies of the canyon". I was living what she was singing. I still listen to her music. Those songs still speak to me. Every once in a while, if I'm feeling out of sorts, and a tad restless, my husband, without saying a word, will put on a Joni Mitchell album, kiss me goodbye, letting me wallow in it all. He knows that Joni's music is medicine for my soul.
Do you listen to Joni Mitchell?