notes from middle america

Oct 06

I’ve put this off waaay too long, and it doesn’t really have the meaning anymore that it did when we made the trip late in August from Colorado to Pennsylvania, but dammit I made notes! And took pictures! While driving! So you’re just going to have to bear with me on this one. Besides, I can’t think of anything else just now to blog about. So there.

Colorado.

It was immensely sad leaving and heading what seemed surely to be the Wrong Direction, east, away from the mountains which had been our guides, our watchers-over, and our confidantes, but there it was. Not far out of Denver things look lonely and sad and bleak, which is exactly how I felt.

Kansas.

I was determined to get into Kansas our first day, but couldn’t for the life of me understand why except that we had a late start, had over 1800 miles to drive, and had 4 days in which to do it. So that was a reason.

I was enormously surprised and pleased by Kansas. Despite its bleakness, especially in the west (and the windiness! this must have been well-known, because I noticed that the convenience stores had chained the trash cans to the building, and not I suppose because someone might march off with them, but from the wind, which even in August was amazing, my hair whipping around my face and the temperature suddenly dropping), Kansas felt surprisingly homelike.

And you know what? Kansas isn’t flat. Doesn’t everyone always say how flat it is? Nope, it’s gorgeous, with rocky outcroppings here and there, each plateau rising into another. Beautiful!

But the best part was the sky: shockingly blue, studded with enormous fluffy white clouds that I just know had I reached my hand out the window, and I so wanted to, I could have touched. THIS is what a sky should look like!

The only disappointment? No wheat. The sign greeting us at the Colorado border promised acres of wheat, referring to Kansas as the Wheat State, but I saw no wheat at all (unless I have no idea what exactly wheat looks like when still on the hoof, which is entirely possible), just that testament to Monsanto, corn.

Missouri.

Immediately upon entering Missouri, there was a noticeable change. For one thing, apparently there is a law there that requires the installation of one or more billboards every 40 feet, or 2 billboards per person, whichever is the higher number. Most of them advertised fireworks and casinos, which together probably bring in more revenue than lottery tickets. And the state bird is actually a locust, because they were audibly buzzing in the trees, protesting the marked increase in humidity compared to Kansas and Colorado.

Illinois.

The billboards here have sadly been abandoned, most of them completely empty and covered with peeling white paint, except for a hand-painted telephone number in case you had any casinos or fireworks to advertise.

It was here that I saw these things:

1. a white-trash-looking trailer home alongside the interstate, with a rickety rusting swing set.

2. a sign advertising the National Outhouse Festival, near Mulberry Grove.

3. an enormous cross, at least 4 stories tall.

Indiana.

This was a mind-numbing panorama of trees alongside two lanes of black expanse stretching toward infinity under an overcast sky.

For amusement, however, there was an apparent clown-car convention somewhere up ahead, as passing me were a fleet of 7 Mini Coopers, each with an Elmo stuck in the back hatch door, halfway in and halfway out, legs evidently paralyzed as they flailed about in the wake of the speeding clowns.

Not to be outdone, near Indianapolis there is a gigantic bowling pin, tilted crazily at an angle, in suspended animation and forever threatening to fall on unsuspecting passersby.

Ohio.

Ohio was about rain, which clearly was an admonishment. I could not help thinking constantly of the helpful warning inside the rented U-Haul truck: “Vehicle is water resistant, not water proof.” Oh. Now you mention it. We’re doomed.

Pennsylvania.

The was a familiar stretch of territory mostly. It’s here that I first saw a plywood cutout painted to look like the backside of a fat farmer’s wife bending over. It’s here that people hang plastic eggs from trees at Easter. And it’s here that people display inflatable seasonal decorations, from 20-foot tall Santas and snowmen to Elmo humping a stack of pumpkins (I kid you not — this one is prominently displayed at the local feed store).

Oh, and the Creepy Dead Forest, off the PA Turnpike near Somerset. Ew.

The Drive.

For me, mind-numbing, but my amusement was attempting to keep Michael, in the U-Haul, in sight in my rear-view mirror, even though he had maps, even though we basically took ONE ROAD the whole way, and even though we were both equipped with cell phones in case of emergency.

Aside from that, I ran down the battery of my iPod daily, made phone calls, scribbled notes about the ridiculous things I saw, and took pictures. Fun!

For Michael, these were Four Days of Chiropractic Torture. We found out afterward that there may have been something wrong with the U-Haul, an alignment problem or something, which caused the truck-trailer combination to shimmy uncontrollably at times and threaten to go off the road. Fun, eh? So we each had our own kind of fun then.