My Life-Changing Road Trip

To this day, whenever Alease Frieson hears the album, “Synchronicity,” by the U.K. band, The Police, she thinks of the Nevada desert. For the Tacoma native, the songs on that LP remind her of a significant family road trip in the summer of 1994 that changed her life and the way she thinks about herself and the world at large. A mere days before the Christmas holiday in 1993, Alease was weeks away from turning 10 years old. Sadly, her father had just passed away after a long battle with cancer (on Dec. 10, 1993).

To help the family cope, Alease’s mother planned a road trip down the West Coast for Alease, her younger sister and older cousin. During a time when sadness could have easily overtaken them, the chance to see the country and later connect with family in Los Angeles provided the catharsis and the metaphorical medicine needed to get past the family tragedy.