What If We Just Kept Driving?
For one family connected to Pathways Hospice, Baja is more than a destination. It’s a place woven into their story.
For nearly 15 years, they traveled there together at least once a year — creating memories in the desert landscape, surrounded by cacti, sunshine, and time together as a family. It became one of their favorite places, especially for a father who cherished those trips.
Recently, as this family made an emotional drive to Pathways’ Inpatient Care Center, those memories came rushing back.
During the ride, his wife asked a simple but heartfelt question:
“What if we just kept driving south? Do you think we could make it to Baja?”
He answered with a bit of humor and honesty.
“We’d need a truckload of oxygen.”
Their daughter, an artist, later turned that moment into a drawing. In the illustration, a truck carries a towering stack of oxygen tanks as it heads toward Baja through a desert landscape. The tanks represent exactly what her father joked about — the oxygen it would take to make the trip.
But the image represents much more than that.
It captures the crossroads families often face at the end of life — the longing to keep going, the memories that shape us, and the love that surrounds difficult decisions. The road to Baja becomes a symbol of possibility, memory, and the life that came before the moment of saying goodbye.
For the Pathways team, the artwork is a powerful reminder of the humanity within hospice care. Every patient brings a lifetime of stories, places they love, and moments that define them.
Hospice is about honoring those stories. It’s about making space for families to reflect, to remember, and to choose the path that feels right for them.
We are deeply grateful to this family for sharing such a personal piece of their journey. Through one drawing and one conversation in a car, they captured something universal — the deep love that carries families through life’s hardest moments.