Onward

At the beginning of this adventure, Win and I committed to a few different things. We said we wouldn’t travel on the interstate. We wouldn’t stay at any chains or eat in any corporate restaurants. No hitchhikers, no weapons, no fried food and we wouldn’t spend more than $500 apiece. We said it was mainly supposed to be about the journey, and that we’d search for moments of grace and spiritual enlightenment along the way.

I find it’s time to confess that a few of those rules got bent, if not exactly shattered. While we haven’t kept a precise log, we know we’ve traveled over 2,500 miles, and that about a hundred of those were out of necessity on an Interstate. We picked up a mouse from one of our fleabags in Arkansas, and carried him around with us long enough for him to eat a hole through the Kashi Go Lean cereal bag and our chocolate coffee. I kept pepper spray in the tent with us in a couple of the campgrounds, and Winnie’s eaten deep-fried catfish and shrimp while I have consumed more than my fair share of bacon. And after our long, despicable night in Tupelo’s Dead Cricket Lodge, and the flat tire which forced us into a g@#!&*! Walmart, we blew 75 bucks and stayed in a Comfort Inn in Oxford.

But we’ve learned a few things on this journey of multiple lessons. We’ve learned that living life fully involves breaking a few rules, spending a little more than you’d planned on and indulging in some grease once in a while. We’ve had to raise and lower our expectations like a drawbridge over an alligator-infested moat – on impulse, without warning. While we tended to speed on past any obvious places for spiritual renewal, we’ve found grace in the most surprising of seats (like fruit stands and diners and Elvis’s birthplace). My most intense, celestial encounter with the divine came while sipping a watermelon smoothie on the side of the road about ten miles south of Vicksburg. While Winnie shopped for fig jam and peaches that (she told me) “smelled like sunshine in the summer in the south,” I blissfully meditated in a blue and yellow room. The Putamayo American Blues CD was playing, a squeaky fan blew the hot air around, and a window decorated with beaded suncatchers looked out onto a cornfield where I am absolutely certain God resides.

It’s true that a journey is about the journey, not the destinations, but it’s also about the people you meet. It’s about the moments of clarity you experience, about glimpsing yourself in unadulterated light and liking what you see. It’s about having your assumptions crushed, your stereotypes blasted, your lies revealed and your truths laid bare.

And if you do it right, it costs about $700 per person.

Busted Flat in Paris

I woke up in Tupelo to Winnie jabbing me in the back at 6:58 in the morning. “Come on. We gotta get outta here.” It pained me to recall the place we were in, but the dead crickets on the floor were undeniable. We shot out of that parking lot dragging our gloom behind us, figuring in no time we’d be sipping coffee and filling up on grits and being joyful again.

But apparently in Tupelo it’s hard to find a cup of coffee on a Saturday morning if you’re not staying at the Holiday Inn. We drove around for what felt like hours as the caffeine withdrawal started to pinch our brains. (It was only about 30 minutes, but surely if you use your imagination you can feel the agony of us poor, cranky women.)

Then suddenly we were in a booth at Cindy’s, and plates of eggs and bowls of grits and even a few strips of perfectly crunchy bacon for me lay before us. An old man with an oxygen tank sat nearby and the steady intake of his machine was like a mantra, reminding us to breathe. He also reminded us we couldn’t leave Tupelo without visiting Elvis’s birthplace, so that was the next stop.

I can’t decide what was most remarkable about the little 3-room house around which a museum, fountain and chapel have sprung in the last 30 years. Was it the impossibly large, Aquanet-laced comb-over of the gal working the museum’s register? Was it the soothing atmosphere of the chapel, where you can sit as long as you like, listening to Elvis sing spirituals on continuous loop? Or was it the sign on the bona fide church across the street, reminding you to WORSHIP THE REAL KING & SEE ELVIS IN HEAVEN?

We were buying Dr. Peppers at the General Store in Paris, MS by noon, our moods sufficiently uplifted, our sense of humor back on track, our delight about the stone WELCOME TO PARIS, MS sign being overgrown with – well – not kudzu, just crabgrass – making us giggle. At the Paris Village Things You Love shop, we met Carol and Cynthia and June, three ladies making a go of selling antiques and old stuff in a town nobody’s even heard of 13 miles from there.

“We were wondering about the name. How did it get its name?” Win asked.

“Whadn’t it some guy name Paris came here and called it that?” Cynthia asked June.

And the history of the town? June drawled, “Yeah, there’s some history here all right. There’s some history.” That’s about all the history we were going to get, apparently, other than the fact that they’d had other visitors who were seeing all the Parises. One was a journalist from some New York magazine who’d come through on a motorcycle a few years back. Another was a young couple of newlyweds who’d started in Paris, France and come home to do all the Parises. “I’d like to know how they could afford it,” Carol said.

We drove to the cemetery for a teensy peek into some more history when we discovered the flat. I thought I was going to finally, for the first time in my life, become a woman who knew how to change a tire, and was really excited about the prospect of Winnie teaching me. But by the time we had all the camping gear out of the trunk and the donut extracted, a father-and-son pair of angels from Water Valley had taken over and even used the air compressor they carried in their truck to top us off. “Only place to get that tire fixed is Walmart up in Oxford,” the dad regretted to inform us.

And that’s where we finished out our day. There was certainly a cosmic, spiritual lesson to getting busted flat in the last Paris of the Southern Tour and winding up in a place I’ve boycotted for more than 8 years, a place with such a ruthless monopoly on America in general and Oxford, MS in particular that it took over 4 hours to put a $10 patch on a tire so these road-weary women could get themselves back on the journey. But I was damned if I was going to find it.

Then a merry-eyed belle from Jackson strolled in with a beatific smile on her face. “How long y’all been waitin’?” she asked.

“Four hours,” I answered through clenched teeth.

“Oh, lawd,” she said and her laugh was a long, melodious titter. She threw her head back and glanced at her husband. “Wade, you better get comfortable.”

We swapped our blow-out stories and our how-we-got-here-from-where-we’re-froms. She listened to ours with her mouth hanging open and a certain measure of awe. “I’m tryin’ to think of a girlfriend I’ve got who’d travel with me like that. But they’d all want to be home before 5:00 traffic.”

The entire day turned around and all this angel had to do was open her mouth and introduce herself. She said she was Mamie Couch: “Mamie like Eisenhower, Couch like you sit on.” We about had her convinced to fly to Zihuatanejo but she was afraid they wouldn’t understand her down there. “I was in Paris, France once, trying to get my husband’s payants prayessed. And they even spoke English! And I was tryin’ to show them” – she pantomimed ironing – “but they just looked at each other. And one of ‘em asked the other one ‘What language is she speakin’?’”

Tupelo Honey

It's hard to believe just yesterday we were cruising around Henry County, GA in a 1958 Thunderbird having the times of our lives and tonight we're sleeping in what surely must be the shittiest of shitholes in Tupelo, Mississippi. (Broken light fixtures. Mismatched furniture. Punched-out wicker on the backs of the dingy chairs. Carpet stains I can't even begin to contemplate...) But that's what happens when you sleep in late, go out for a slow breakfast, don't get on the road till noon and wind up in Rome when you were trying to get to Palestine.

Win drove across Alabama in one long day, hating almost every stinking minute of it. We tried to find the love, but it was buried in kudzu. Poor Alabama became the scapegoat for all our forgotten troubles and strife. It had no reason for being on this excellent adventure, lacking loved ones to visit or a Paris on the map. But there was no way around it, so we had to cut through.

I have seen a lot of kudzu on this journey, but never the likes of Alabama's. It's choking the very life out of everything on Route 278. Kudzu engulfed trailer homes and automobiles, parking lots and ravines. As the sun sank so low in the west not even the convertible's visors could shade our eyes from it, we considered camping. But the thought of kudzu strangling us in our sleep kept the pedal to the floor.

In Henderson, AL we were faced with a decision - the last room in the Econolodge for a ridiculous $75 or a king bed at their Seediest Inn for 40? The bouffant-headed lady with the prim lips at the Econolodge said there was a Christian Convention in town and that's why rooms were at a premium. When Win tried to appeal to the woman's humanity, referring to our tiny budget and our big dreams, the woman took a rather un-Christian hardline and said If You Don't Like It, You Can Go To Tupelo ...

It was already dark and we were already exhausted but you don't get all up in the Ya-ya's faces and expect us to patronize your establishment, even if you do have the last room in Hamilton. Or Henderson. Or whatever the hell your inhospitable little Alabama town is called. We filled up the tank, bought some Diet Cokes with vitamins in 'em, and hit Route 78. Win said, "Let's play a game. I'm going to Tupelo with an armadillo ..."

Here's what we played to keep ourselves lucid, pausing just long enough to let out a cheer when we crossed the state line:

I'm going to Tupelo with an Armadillo, a Bee sting kit, a Cigar, a Dinosaur, an Elvis presley impersonator, Frogmore stew, Griddlecakes, Honey, Iodine, a Jumprope, Kampground Karl's Karaoke machine, a License to kill, Moneybags, a Neutron bomb, an Omelette, a Pistol, de Queen, Rascally Rabbits, Swisher Sweets, a Torpedo, a University sweater, a Victrola, a Washing machine, X-ray vision goggles, You, and Zinedine Zidane.

So now we're in the birthplace of the King, listening to drag racers on the strip. Crickets are doing everything in their power to invade our shabby room. We're sleeping fully clothed with the lights on and promising ourselves pedicures, a first-run movie and at least a $60 motel room tomorrow night somewhere south of Paris. Mississippi's bound to treat us better than Alabama ever did.

Georgia On My Mind

Today a bee stung my toe as I walked down to a crick overflowing with muddy water in Henry County, Georgia. I packed tobacco around the bite and kept strolling with the women, and later on I chased the pain with two different types of moonshine in the garage of car collectors who own no less than fourteen vehicles, none of which gets better than 10 miles per gallon. Patty, the wife of Mike, the auto aficionado, said (after mentioning the recent free vintage truck that wound up in the barn out back), “Some people have foster children. We have foster cars.” I chased the pumpkin mash with a Coors Light while riding around in a titty pink 1958 Thunderbird, followed that up with a Zima, ate some hors d’ouvres with a dirty martini, and am still somehow upright and feeling superfine.

As I posed next to the Comet with the rebel flag draped over the hood, I mentioned, “I’m a hippie liberal formerly from San Francisco. This is going to ruin my political career.”

I love how people can surprise you with the beauty and wonder of their unique lives. On the surface, for example, Winnie’s in-laws are your typical All-American Family – but it’s in the details of their particular passions that you find there’s nothing typical about them. Patty knew we were coming in last night off of Route 23, so she ordered sushi and put out a spread of vegetables from her garden: sliced red and yellow tomatoes on French bread with olive oil and fresh basil; salad topped with beets, pickled eggs, pickled okra and green olives. We were planning to leave for Paris, Mississippi in the morning, but after breakfast of scrambled eggs, raisin toast, grits the perfect, crunchable texture found in a Route 66 diner and coffee brewed in a stovetop percolator, we digressed. With her love of cooking, her particularly artful presentation and decorating style, Pat Curtis ought to be running a high-end B&B. Lucky for us, she isn’t (yet).

First there was the calm, meditative wholeness of the home Mike and Pat and their three kids have created. I spent hours the first morning writing in a spiritual trance. Then there was the washing machine, eager to embrace our exploding backpacks of filthy, campfire-smoke-scented attire. There was the stroll along the crick, the lunch of fettuccine with white beans and clams, broiled, crab-stuffed whitefish and al dente, homegrown green beans with toasted pecans and cashews. And Georgia Sweet Muscadine wine and mint-flavored, unsweet tea. And my first sip of moonshine ever in my life. And a ride in ’58 TITTY PINK (is that the official color?) T-bird. And the opportunity to meet Mary Ellen, my new hero.

Mary Ellen is Pat’s sister and truly deserves the hero label for two reasons. She’s my age (41) and has taught special ed for almost 20 years. For the past two she’s rallied hard on behalf of teenagers with the kinds of behavioral problems that preclude them from any future other than prison. She’s knocked on enough doors and raised enough hell (along with dollars) to procure a fine building in which she’ll open a school this October that’ll customize education for at least 40 and up to 200 otherwise given-up-on kids. We met this afternoon over peach-flavored Zimas and I got inspired. You don’t meet people every day who are really making a difference and This. Woman. Is.

Not only that, Mary Ellen was recently painting her house – her WHOLE house – when she fell off the ladder and broke both her arms. It didn’t even slow her down. When she woke up from the surgery and the nurses asked her what music they could play to soothe her, she yelled, “Lynyrd Skynyrd! Put on some Skynyrd!” Until they finally acquiesced. Can somebody please cue Free Bird on the MP3?

Meanwhile Mike is back there quietly working in his garage, surrounded by vintage Mustangs, a 1955 Crown Victoria, his grandfather’s ‘32 Ford (in which moonshine was hauled across Kansas back in the day), a ‘24 Model-T, a 1950 Farmall tractor, and a 1964 F.E.D. (Front End Dragster for the uninitiated), among other wheels of history. I kept thinking “Man, would my Dad love this.” Mike’s the kind of guy you’d like to sit around the garage and smoke cigars with all afternoon, sipping moonshine out of a Mason jar. He tells good stories and has a tough kindness about him that makes you feel comfortable.

I saw my life flash before my eyes on my first sip of woody, earthy Georgia mash. You just can’t predict what’s gonna move you in life. Pat’s ’58 T-bird, for instance. “Can we please just keep going?” I asked this afternoon as she turned back into her drive.

I practically begged.

Rounding the Corner

I could tell Winnie was really hungry. We were in Waynesboro, Georgia and rain was pouring down, and we were doing that thing you should never do on an alternate highway road trip through the South, which is waiting until you’re famished before simultaneously seeking the next highway junction and a place to eat that isn’t a chain. Win had passed by the oxymoronic Gourmet Cajun at my insistence and was circling round the square when I said, “Turn left up there.” Instead of doing what she normally does, which is to trust my navigation implicitly, she gave me a taciturn “WHY?” which came out a drawling, southern Whah?

I answered sulkily, “Cuz there’s not gonna be anyplace to eat down there, that’s whah.”

But I was wrong.

There was the Good Day Café, sitting right next to the barber shop (which had a real barber pole turning slowly). We found ourselves out on the pavement reading the café hours on a locked door, which were different for each day but mostly closing at 3:00. “What day is it?” Winnie asked me. I was sincerely stumped. I couldn’t even guess the time.

As we stood there contemplating these deep and philosophical questions, a young man in a chef’s shirt came to the door and invited us in. I said, “Well, if you’re closed …” but he insisted that they’d only locked the door because things had been slow. Soon we were eating an artichoke spinach panini (me) and a crab cake with remoulade sauce (Win) and grunting out little moans of pleasure. Win’s fruit salad was full of flavor, and the slaw that came with my panini had little sweet peas and tiny pieces of broccoli in it. Travis, the charming chef, talked nice and slow and made us both feel soothed. Our anthem “American Woman” started playing as we strolled out the front door. Between the café and the barber shop was an old lucky fortune scale and when I put my penny in I got a weight I won’t tell you and this fortune: “You are turning the corner of life. Watch your step.”

This had some weight because just that morning I’d pulled out the daily card and it said “Make a Choice. You will need resolve, nerve and willfulness. Life is just a series of trying to make up your mind.” We were freshly back on the road after a couple days’ respite on the Carolina coast. After striking out in Paris, SC we’d felt deflated and discussed heading west, but in the end, neither of us believed it was time yet. So even though the next Paris was located in Mississippi, we blasted through South Carolina on Route 21 to a campground on Hunting Island. As soon as I smelled the briny Atlantic I knew we’d made the right choice. I was literally stripping down to my bathing suit as I ran across the sand. It felt so good to be salty again.

The break from the road was a true illustration of the South Carolina motto: Friendly faces, beautiful places. For two days we camped among the mix of tall palm and pine trees, walking the beaches and frolicking in the waves. We had a raccoon bust into our cooler and steal a sub sandwich in the night. The next morning, a young buck strolled into our campsite and posed for photos. We violated the Cardinal Rule of Ya-Ya Road-tripping and hung out with a friendly family dominated by boys. We rented a p.o.s. surfboard and I taught the enthusiastic fellas how to surf. We picked up fresh-caught shrimp at a local shack and boiled it with coconut and carrots and bell peppers for dinner. On the last morning, after a tent-drenching downpour, we climbed the 175 steps to the top of the island’s historic lighthouse. “This is better than the Eiffel Tower,” Winnie sighed, looking out at the vast Atlantic.

Almost every day of the journey we’ve had occasion to quote the line “Forward ever, backward never.” There on an island on the edge of America we longed for a way to keep going. The pull was magnetic, irresistible. We hadn’t shot anyone or robbed any convenience stores, but we both understood for the first time ever why Thelma and Louise drove off that cliff. Even our comparatively ordinary, happy lives have corners we’re not exactly jumping at the opportunity to turn. But when you pause to think about it, the only way to keep on going is to keep on rounding corners and watching your step.

Faced with that choice and feeling full again, we turned that corner and headed west.

Trying to Find Paris, SC

We needed to find the Colville Bridge because it was a covered bridge and Win had never seen one. She’d never even seen “The Bridges of Madison County." (Back in 1994 while living in Colorado I’d been inspired enough by the book and movie to road-trip it to Madison County, Iowa and photograph all the covered bridges myself while simultaneously searching for a Clint Eastwood look-a-like in a beat-up pickup truck. But I digress.)

We took Route 1893 out of Millersburg and rolled along through the Kentucky farmlands. Wildflowers were in bloom like it was springtime and black barns lined the roads. When we got to the bridge, a marker informed us that the Colville was the last remaining covered bridge in Bourbon county and that “it is of Burr truss construction, which is the multiple king post type.” (And if anyone reading knows what that means, please, I’m begging you, leave a comment.)

We just thought it was pretty.

After that we put the top down and began our journey south on Route 89. It took us through a section of Daniel Boone National Forest that was mountainous and winding, densely forested and dotted with churches and mobile homes. Around one bend, a hand-lettered sign indicated that just beyond our view we’d find the Drip Rock Holiness Church. We were both consumed by the sense that we might burst into flames if we ventured anywhere near such a place, so we continued onward. My favorite church marquis warned DUSTY BIBLES LEAD TO DIRTY LIVES.

For about ten miles the road was single lane, and Winnie drove it like a NASCAR racer, one hand on the stick, one on the wheel. We blasted Jimi Hendrix “American Woman” and Tom Petty “Free Falling” and Winnie let me sing along at the top of my lungs. Somewhere on the southeastern edge of the forest, a gloomy pall permeated the atmosphere. One shirtless guy smoking a cigarette, another with hair and beard like Jeremiah Johnson, and a couple of pear-shaped ATV-riders doing 10 miles an hour on the highway (absolutely determined not to let us pass) doesn’t justify the overwhelming feeling that we might be driving through Deliverance country, but that’s what it felt like. We didn’t so much as slow down until we were well out of those woods, and then it was to eat on the town square in Pineville, at another restaurant called La Esperanza (unrelated to the one in Paris). Our waiter was so moved by Winnie’s large Virgin de Guadalupe bracelet that he unbuttoned his shirt to show us his tattoo of her.

That night we set up camp in the Cumberland Gap in Virginia, hiked up to a cave calling each other Becky Thatcher and let a truck driver from Florida build us a roaring campfire just because he couldn’t stand for us “to not have anything to look at.” In the morning we took down the tent, drank our chocolate-flavored coffee without milk and drove across a thin finger of Tennessee, through a sliver of the Cherokee National Forest and into Asheville, North Carolina. About 35 minutes after I said, “I could sure use some health food – like a veggie burger or a sandwich piled high with raw vegetables or a big salad topped with beets” we pulled into Nick’s Grille, where Win was able to order a veggie gyro and I got spanakopita and a Greek salad for $5.99. There was even grilled tofu on the menu. Can somebody give me an Amen?

An hour later we were in South Carolina (fourth state in four hours) and began our search for Paris, SC. We found Paris Mountain State Park easily enough, but were too late to get a campsite. Sitting at an intersection, we were reduced to an uncontrollable fit of giggles as an ice cream truck playing Scott Joplin’s “The Entertainer” on steroids came careening around a corner doing about 60. It was like a police chase where the bad guys were escaping in an ice cream truck. Had the freezers stopped working and the ice cream man was about to lose his load? Or as I imagined: “Jesus, it’s 4:30 and Vacation Bible School’s about to let out! I’d better hurry!”

Driving through an endless array of strip malls and four-lane expressways, we began to get the blues (cue Billie Holiday and Sarah Vaughn on the MP3). Paris no longer existed. The ruthless march of progress had swallowed her up, I fear, for where my atlas told us we’d find Paris we only found an endless stream of subdivisions, Pizza Huts and Starbucks. Not even a town limits sign.

Our first strike-out. Time marches on.

Paris, KY on Stoner Creek

Paris, Kentucky was the first place I’ve been to in the United States that actually dates back to the Revolutionary War – it was settled in 1776. It’s got the oldest tavern in the U.S.A. (since 1788) and Daniel Boone used to slake his thirst there. Unfortunately it’s not open unless you call ahead, and we’re just not on the making-reservations-ahead-of-time tour of America. Alas.

Paris, KY is probably the prettiest Paris we’ve seen in America. It’s truly committed to preserving its historic buildings and town square. At the County Courthouse we found the Eiffel Tower, which is a candleholder hanging on a wall inside the Chamber of Commerce. As the wine from our Equus Run wine tasting wore off, I got hungry (we’d skipped lunch), and slumped in the seat next to Win. She went into the Farmer’s Market and bought me some apples, inquiring about a place to stay. Apart from the Best Western, there wasn’t much except high end B&Bs, which the owner was kind enough to call around about.

When he reached Pat Conley, proprietor of the Treehouse at Stoner Creek, and told him two ladies from Texas were looking for lodging, Pat said No, he didn’t have any rooms left, but send those ladies down here anyway and I’ll give ‘em a boatride on the creek. As I bit into a tart little apple and Winnie explained all this to me, I resisted saying, “We’re going to go riding around on the river with some guy we don’t even know who doesn’t even have a place for us to sleep tonight? And it’s already 5:00 p.m.? And we’re doing this why, exactly?” I just munched my apple and kept my mouth shut.

The Treehouse at Stoner Creek was the kind of place that made you wish you were the kind of people who made reservations (just a little bit). Tall and piney and smelling like fresh-cut wood, it had class. Pat Conley whisked us into his living room, poured us glasses of unsweet tea, and had us perched in the bow of his pontoon boat within 20 minutes. As we pottered along the creek he pointed out Kentucky standard bred horse farms, a tavern we could row his canoe to for dinner, some kids doing flips off the dam in the creek and turtles and great blue herons. He put a CD on (hip-hop music by a band from Bowling Green), pointed out the stormclouds that were roiling around and collecting above us, and kept trying to think of a way for us to stay.

We wound up barely getting off the creek before the clouds opened up and dumped down. While Winnie helped make up a vat of salsa on the marble counter in the kitchen, and Pat talked about the amazing gourmet quiche he planned to make in the morning, and Fiona the terrier shivered with each crack of thunder, I checked weatherchannel.com and confirmed that camping was out of the question. Pat called a buddy with a fishing cabin nearby, and his side of the conversation sounded something like this:

“Hey Buddy. I got a couple of American foxes stranded here looking for a place to stay. Naw, man, they’re girl scouts.” Pat covered the mouthpiece and told us, “He says a mess inside.” We shrugged an It-Doesn’t-Matter and he went back to Buddy. “They don’t care, they’re on a budget and have camping gear. How much would you charge ‘em? Yeah, man, Becky Thatcher types. All right. Okay.” Click. To us: “He’s got too much pride. Can’t rent it to you dirty. Sorry about that.”

As consolation he cracked open a bottle of Spanish wine he’d been saving for a special occasion. We about had him convinced to let us put out our bedrolls on his screened in porch when his wife intervened. Apparently, she had the good business sense to consider how it might look to their paying customers if a couple of stray cowgirls were camped out in the morning waiting for quiche. We hightailed it out of there and went straight to La Esperanza, a Mexican taqueria run by Nicaraguans on Main Street in Paris, Kentucky. I spoke Spanish fluidly and got us some vegetarian tostadas. We were sprawled in a lodge at the last battlefield of the American Revolution before midnight.

Next to “Southern hospitality” in the dictionary, there oughtta be a picture of Pat Conley.