spontaneous caravan

Here's a memory that just popped into my head:

This goes way back to when I was going to college in San Luis Obispo, California. I was traveling down there from the Bay Area, a drive of about 4 hours or so. At the time, the car I had was a 4-door Mercury Comet (our family car, a Comet is similar to the Ford Maverick, if you are familiar with those); on the way, maybe starting about half-way down, there was another 4-door Comet just like the one I was driving only it was white and had Texas license plates. It was being driven by a student-aged woman - I can still sort of picture her having just beyond shoulder-length brown hair.

Without so much as gesturing or really acknowledging each other, we started taking turns pulling ahead and letting the other follow and alternating like that. We didn't follow that closely either, just a nice comfortable pace and distance, something we subtly agreed to do. Every fifteen miles or so (I really have no idea how often) we'd pass each other in the left lane and take the next turn at leading. It was really neat, especially being that we were pretty much the only two cars on the road for that while. As I recall, it was nearing dusk as we arrived in San Luis Obispo.

I don't remember who pulled off one of the exits first - the picture I have is she drove off the first exit towards the dorms (I had the feeling while we were driving all that while that she was also a student and was driving towards the university) and I went ahead and drove to my exit further down.

Who knows how much she even noticed or paid attention to this spontaneous caravan we formed... but I've occasionally wondered about who she was; I wonder how she is now.