Allana
8:45 am | 253 miles away
I wake up in Pittsburgh. This is not Philly. Agh, must return, must return!
9:30 am | 252 miles away
I meet up with an old roommate and present day friend for a bagel and a farmerâs market meander. We sit outside and chat until the cold drives us apart. He mentions visiting Philly with his wife sometime in the new year. This city is never far from my mind!
1:00 pm | 248 miles away
Weâre inching our way closer. Iâm out here with my partner visiting some friends who left Philly in August. Weâre all sad about it. Pittsburgh is lovely though. I went to grad school here, a decision made entirely for the school and without a thought about the actual location. I could have ended up anywhere. And then this school, being in Pennsylvania, had a career fair where my current company, also being in Pennsylvania, showed up. Itâs entirely chance that I found myself in Philly and truth be told, I came planning to leave. Now I donât think I ever will.
Before we head out we stop at a local bakery (fuel for a long drive!) and a feverish and chaotic ball kick-around in a slightly muddy, vaguely shit-stenched park (energy for a long drive!).
2:00 pm | 238 miles away
Weâre finally on the road! Do you know it takes roughly $80 to pay all the tolls from Pittsburgh to Philly? One-way?! Donât quote me, I didnât verify that fact. But I will be indignant about it!
2:40 pm | A couple hundreds of miles away
My partner and I drove out here Friday night in the middle of a snowstorm.
When I was six I got stuck in a blizzard on an Oklahoma highway with my family. We sat unmoving for ten hours as the snow piled up around us, my mom and aunt occasionally getting out to brush the snow off the front windshield so we could continue watching the gridlock continue to not change. Maybe it is disingenuous to call Fridayâs largely uninterrupted drive a snowstorm. But snow! Watery precipitation! A little baby hydroplaning! Driving into fat snow drops like we were zooming into a vortex or a Dune sandwormâs mouth!
Iâm a winter hater but I yearn for a good Philly blizzard and weeklong city shutdown a la winter 2021. Today, though, the weather is delightful. We have acquired an extra in a friend who decided he also wanted to get back to Philly ASAP. Itâs cold but the sun is out and the hills we cruise through are casting these incredible shadows on the fall-toasted tree tops. Itâs the kind of pretty you want to draw.
4ish? pm | 175 miles away
Service plazas are such a unique Pennsylvania/Northeast experience. Iâm from Texas. We have Bucceeâs, which is a trip, but a tiny food court with little common area tables? A little data viz display showing where I am relative to all PA service plazas? Airport-style museum displays extolling the history of the Pennsylvania turnpike and glossing over the destruction it caused? Fascinating. I want to be a service plaza anthropologist.
A time in between | A handful of miles less than before away
Are you shackled by lust? The billboard reads.
Yes! We scream. Philly, gird your loins!
Maybe 20 minutes after that | Another fewer handful of miles away
We talk about upcoming concerts. My partner and I missed out on Adrienne Lenker tickets when they were a reasonable $40. Now they are pushing $160 and we are tempted but rational. We will keep checking prices until the concert starts and we will not end up going. January though! LâImperatrice and Soccer Mommy are coming to town. I pitch Joy Oladokun in February.
Iâm trying to go to every music venue in Philly, my notes app an unofficial passport of spots I know about and artists Iâve seen. I love TLA and the Fillmore, Union Transfer and Unitarian Church, the Ukie Club and Johnny Brendas and Kung Fu Necktie. I know my list has major holes. I have a friend who goes to ânoiseâ shows at places I have never heard of. The sum total of my music taste comes from Spotifyâs algorithm council so I will never learn of these bands but for serendipity and just showing up to random venues to see whatâs happening and who is on.
5:32 pm | 89 miles away
I donât have as many good things to say about the food options at a service plaza.
My partner buys pepperoni pretzel bites from Auntie Anneâs. They taste like theyâre 3 days old, no disrespect to Auntie. Our friend finds an infinity-shaped onion ring from Burger King. We all agree this is a good omen.
I only know what time it is precisely here because I troll FB marketplace while Iâm in the bathroom (we all have vices) and send my partner a portable pottery wheel we wonât buy. I love Philadelphiaâs Facebook marketplace, itâs where all my coolest shit is sourced. I am constantly sending my friends gemsââsexy blue eyed Jesus art needle point,â âhuman dog bed,â âvintage velvet painting devil,â âsteel short cuirass,â â15 foot fake topiary giraffe.â
6:45 pm | 5 miles away
A traffic jam on 76, Philadelphiaâs Olâ Faithful. We are rerouted and end up in an area of Philly (Bela Cynwyd) I have never been. We pass a Saks Fifth Avenue and the Philadelphia Insurance Companies office. This area has dark energy and I vow to never return.
7:30 pm | 3 miles away
Technically I am back in Philly (praise be!) so my mile accounting is a little junky here. We head to deposit our friend in Fishtown. I peer out my window trying to spot doorknockers for my niche and extremely excellent instagram account @doorknockersofphilly. I donât spot any I havenât already chronicled (Fishtown is way behind the knocker game) but I do spot a duo putting up their Christmas tree from the top of the curve on the Delaware Expressway. My apartment is too small for a tree so I rely on the city for all my holiday cheer. Our friend says he is going to buy his tree under an overpass bridge which is how I learn they sell Christmas trees under overpass bridges.
7:52 pm | 0 miles away (aka Philly)
My partner rolls up to the corner of my block. I load myself down with more bags than anyone rightly needs for a 48 hour trip and toddle up my stoop to my blue front door. I am home. I say hello to my cat, unpack and decompress. I enjoy a little trip. But I love being home.
Allana was born and raised in Texas but she hopes you donât hold it against her. You can find her wandering aimlessly around Philly and on Instagram at @doorknockersofphilly.
