Ramblings

Notes from an inept traveler

2009-10-12T11:38:00.000-07:00

He fills the cooler with drinks and eats. Bacon, his favorite campsite treat, is tucked beneath a bag of ice next to a half-rack of cheap beer. He checks the car, remembering he had the oil changed a week ago, and the inept traveler gases up the little red Subaru called Alberta (sweet baby ain’t never let him down) and sets his sights on the desert solitude of Hart Mountain National Antelope Refuge, in eastern Oregon, where pronghorn antelope, bighorn sheep, and mule deer roam.
Highway 66 winds up out of Ashland and then traverses over forests of pine and fir until it falls down and runs into U.S. 140, which cuts through prairies of hay disrupted by lakes and irrigation ditches and grazing cattle, overshadowed by mountains in every direction. Onward to Lakeview, a quiet village where people talk straight and look you in the eye. And from there, the path cuts north on U.S. 195, then another turn north and by this time, the greenery and water fully gives way to sage and the high desert. And about this time, the traveler is feeling like the last man on earth. Massive brown chunks of earth tower over the desert and one can’t help but reach for his camera to take pictures of these amazing monuments.
And then the traveler hears a pop and a clank and looks up to see smoke swirling in the rearview mirror and every horror story of breakdown floods his head. Quickly, the car—sweet Alberta—is stopped and a quick check under shows oil pouring out and collecting in a pool on the white and tan and brown desert rocks that line that lost highway.
The weary traveler—the change from amazed to weary took less than a minute—begins to contemplate life. He paces the length of the car and wonders what would happen if he fired it up. A foolish idea. He changes tactics and reaches for reliable cell phone. No service in this remote area. He stands out in the middle of the road. He checks how much water he brought. He looks up, then sees no shade trees anywhere, and thinks, ‘You, sun, are my enemy.’ He dreams of a tiny apartment with stained, worn brown carpet he calls home and he loves that apartment. He dreams of overcrowded cities. He listens to the wind whistle through the sage brush and damns the romance he saw in this beautiful desolation. He is anxious and jittery.
Then he thinks of those people in stories he’s read. Edward Abbey used to hike miles through deserts just for the fun of it. The men who escaped Siberian work camp in The Long Walk trudged thousands of miles south to freedom, much of it through the Gobi Desert. He feels like the character in the brilliant Tobias Wolff short story, “Desert Breakdown, 1968,” whose car broke down in the middle of the Arizona desert, except that character had a wife and child with him. And he thinks, ‘You, inept traveler, are a wuss, softened by a life of air conditioning, running water, and sewage systems.’ He says to himself, “You’re not tough.”
And he ponders the idea of filling a backpack with jugs of water and how long he should wait before he starts out when a white mini-van appears and the driver stops and offers a ride to the store in the town of Plush a few miles down the road.
“I was wondering who’d be broken down. All the oil I saw on the road,” the driver says.
“People break down all the time out here?” the traveler asks.
“Oh, yeah. Happens all the time,” says the thirty-something mother. “You’re lucky you’re not one of these who’ve hit cows the last couple weeks.” In the backseat, a baby is slumped, peacefully asleep in his carseat.
He is dropped off at the Plush store, where he calls a tow truck from Lakeview and waits, watching cable news with the store employee, who is quiet, like the traveler, yet nice enough. The inept traveler is silently embarrassed about his jitters. He was not near death; he only had an inconvenience that will cost him close to $300 in towing fees and an unhealthy blood pressure surge.
A few hours later in Lakeview, he is told it was only an oil pan plug that had fallen out, and the mechanic finds a plug, fills the car’s oil reserves, and after looking and listening to the engine, determines that it is sound.
The traveler ponders another attempt at the refuge, but he decides that the lost highway is cursed for the day, and he puts his tail between his legs and drives home, cursing the shop who last changed his oil before the trip.
It is dark as he drives home, a crescent moon lighting his way through the forests cut by Highway 66. Late in the night, he pulls up in front of his residence, unloads and trudges into the apartment, where he lights a fire under his cast iron skillet and cooks up a mess of bacon, pops a beer, and reads a brochure and flyer about the refuge. He again plans a trip, one day, to Hart Mountain National Antelope Refuge.

More Jeffers

2009-08-06T12:51:00.000-07:00

A short rant: Too many people are overly concerned with happiness. Are you happy? Have you found your bliss? Bullshit. Happiness is just one piece of life, no more important than any other. Beauty encompasses all of the slivers of life, including happiness.
Let me ask you this: Have you found your frustration? your joy? your depression? anticipation? sadness? guilt? hope? faith? redemption? peace? rage? Throw it all into one big bowl, mix it up, and call yourself a human.

An excerpt from "Invasion" by Robinson Jeffers (with apologies because the full lines don't fit on the little blogger screen):

… I believe that the beauty and nothing else is what
things are formed for. Certainly the world
Was not constructed for happiness nor love nor wisdom. No, nor for pain,
hatred and folly. All these
Have their seasons; and in the long year they balance each other, they
cancel out. But the beauty stands.

Robinson Jeffers

2009-07-23T09:50:00.000-07:00

Natural Music
By Robinson Jeffers

The old voice of the oceans, the bird-chatter of little rivers
(Winter has given them gold for silver
To stain their water and bladed green for brown to line their banks)
From different throats intone one language.
So I believe if we were strong enough to listen without
Divisions of desire and terror
To the storm of sick nations, the rage of the hunger-smitten cities,
Those voices also would be found
Clean as a child's; or like some girl's breathing who dances alone
By the ocean-shore, dreaming of lovers.

An interview with Jay Farrar

2009-07-22T18:51:00.000-07:00

The following article first appeared in the July 2009 issue of the Medford Sneak Preview.

Back to the basics: An interview with Son Volt’s Jay Farrar
By Vince Tweddell

Son Volt lead singer Jay Farrar says he tried to get back to the fundamentals on the band’s new record, American Central Dust, a very literate, sometimes introspective, other times rocking, twelve songs.

Indeed, this new album—which will be released July 7—signals a return, or at least a nod to, the band’s early releases, most notably the mid-1990s album Trace, which has to be listed in the top ten of any alternative country music junky.

Pedal steel, lap steel, pianos and violins all inhabit and enrich much of this powerful new album, something that Farrar said in a phone interview with The Sneak Preview was very different than the last album. He said while recording the last album, The Search, the band attempted to stretch out with their instrumentation, including the use of horns and backward guitar loops.

The new album is stripped down, bared for the world to see. Provocative lyrics, acoustic guitars, simple melodies and Farrar’s signature low drone of a voice leave a listener with no choice but to push repeat again and again, trying to understand how this band makes music that’s as much of an art as it is a commentary celebrating the daily lives of working men and women, past and present.

The haunting, piano-led “Sultana” tells the story of the steamboat Sultana, which on April 27, 1865, tragically sunk in the Mississippi River after one of its boilers blew. Some counts estimated the death total at 1,800, about three-quarters of the total passengers. The boat was overloaded six times its legal limit.

Farrar, who lives in St. Louis, said his interest was piqued in this tragedy by the sight of the “debris and carcasses of old ships when the river gets low.” When he heard the story of the Sultana, he was struck and motivated by the name Sultana, “a sadly, powerful name.”

The song “Cocaine and Ashes” is a tribute to Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards. Richards once said he snorted his father’s ashes mixed with cocaine. While many were outraged with that story (Richards later recanted, saying it was a joke), Farrar was struck by the “idiosyncratic demonstration for the love of his deceased father”—as if Richards knows drugs and he was paying tribute in his own way.

Another piano-led song, it starts off, “I’ve had strychnine/I thought I was dead/I snorted my father and I’m still alive.” The sad violin that accompanies the piano reinforces Farrar’s intention that this is an empathetic look at an often outrageous man. “Body and soul/Cocaine and ashes/We’ll get to that place in time/Tears and blow on my mind.”

Other highlights include a pedal steel solo in the song “Dust of Daylight” that will bring a smile to anyone’s face who happens to believe that any song is improved with the addition of a pedal steel (as I am). In this song, Farrar sings of the confusion of love—an old standby that can’t be sung about enough. “The dust of daylight pulls you down and you must wait/Love is a fog and you stumble every step you make.”

Farrar said he was thinking about young bands just starting out on tour that had gas expenses greater than their pay per gig when writing “When the Wheels Don’t Move.” He wrote the guitar heavy song during the summer of 2008 when gas prices reached the $4 a gallon mark. “Who makes the decision/To feed the tanks and not the mouths/When the wheels don’t move.”

Farrar, who has recorded three solo albums sandwiched between six Son Volt offerings, said he’s satisfied now working within the structure of a band. “The band concept seems to be winning out,” he said. “There’s always a collective goal in mind that everyone feeds off.”

He said he learned much from his solo work, specifically what his limitations are.

Asked what those limitations are, he chuckled. “There’s many,” he said, adding that he dabbles with many instruments, but is not an expert with them.

His songs have at times reported on the ills that can plague this nation. That’s something he learned from listening to the greats who have come before him, a la Bob Dylan and Neil Young. “If there is any element in being a reporter, I learned it from them,” he said.

His style is a mixture, the fusion if you will, of rock, folk, and country elements picked up from the aforementioned artists and the old honky-tonk type music he still listens to. It’s something sadly unrepresented in today’s Nashville, something he has mentioned in past interviews that irks him. “They (Nashville) produce what sells. They’re going to continue to do it.”

Is that a commentary on us the consumers? “To some degree,” he answered.

We don’t know what Nashville or other musical pretenders will produce. What we know is that Farrar will continue to write the songs that mean something to him, searching, haunting songs that speak to the whole of the American landscape and we the people who live, work and move through it.
*
Son Volt plays the Britt Festival July 18 with The Cowboy Junkies.
For more information: www.sonvolt.net and www.shorefire.com/clients/sonvolt

The Ashes of Uncle Tupelo

2009-07-21T08:17:00.000-07:00

This essay first appeared in the June issue of the Medford Sneak Preview.

The Ashes of Uncle Tupelo: A personal essay
Son Volt and Wilco both to headline at Britt this summer
By Vince Tweddell

“Mister tell me, fifty years in this town’s done for you
except to earn your name and place on a bar stool?
Spent your whole life in this county, you never been out of state,
You say you’re gonna make it out before it’s too late.”
--“Looking for a Way Out” by Uncle Tupelo

The first time I heard of the band Wilco I was agonizing through college, in the latter part of last decade, when I attended the band’s concert in Lexington, Ky. Wilco, still a young band, was touring in support of its double-length album, Being There, now a classic. I don’t remember much from the night, for I was still more worried about getting really drunk before a show than actually going solely to hear the music. But what I do remember is lead singer Jeff Tweedy’s scratchy voice as he poured out the final lines of the song “Misunderstood.” Part of an artist’s job is to make the simple seem profound, to turn a past moment of ugliness or frustration into something that is beautiful. Much of that can be produced through the delivery, and there, that night in central Kentucky, beer swilling through my head, I heard and saw Tweedy on stage singing these words:
“I’d like to thank you all for nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing at all. Nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing at all.”

Tweedy wasn’t singing about anything new—rock ‘n roll and country music were formed from the stories of loss and frustration, emotions his pained expression and intensity clearly showed me. Loss and frustration were things I was just beginning to recognize in myself, and Tweedy sang in a way that meant something to a drunk twenty-one-year old, with little clue as to where his life would go and only a hint of where he had been and from what he had come.
Soon after discovering Wilco, I found Son Volt—a band that has released at least two of my favorite albums, Trace and Straightways, headed by Jay Farrar. And soon after, I found the CDs of the defunct Uncle Tupelo, a band that included both Tweedy and Farrar. All three bands have been with me since.
With them, I struggled through my twenties. But I learned I wasn’t alone in this frustration, this sense of loss, this seemingly unending search for something better.
“There was a time when nothing seemed to make much sense/That's turned more intense/And all the crutches you've kept around, now are nowhere to be found.” –“Looking for a Way Out” by Uncle Tupelo
*
There was a time when I worked my first job as a newspaper reporter and I had no friends in the small Western Kentucky town where I lived. Nights, I spent mostly alone in my shag-carpeted, brown-paneled apartment, a bottle of whisky opened some of the time, twelve packs of beer pounded the others, only to wake mid-morning and head out the door to report the cops and crime—meth and crack heads and those trying to arrest them—in Madisonville, Ky., a place that bills itself as the Best Town on Earth. Hardly, I thought then.
“A long way from happiness/In a three-hour-away town/Whiskey bottle over Jesus/Not forever, just for now/Not forever, just for now” –“Whiskey Bottle” by Uncle Tupelo

*
Maybe those of us who’ve moved from the middle part of America will always have a small chip on his shoulder, as if always trying to prove that something great can come from the farmlands and humidity we know. Both Farrar and Tweedy grew up in Belleville, Ill., a post-industrial town on the Mississippi River twenty-five miles from St. Louis. It was a town trying to keep afloat in a changing economy, more churches than bars, but barely, with not much to do but drink. It’s in the same corner of the world as my own hometown of Henderson, Ky., and though its economy may be stronger—and I’m not sure—it is similar. Tucked away on the Ohio River, my Henderson has limited opportunities for recreation: a bar called Rookies, boating on the river in the summer, fishing in its sloughs, a few nice restaurants, church on Sundays, if that’s your care. And work is not always easy to find, but there are numerous factories a person can jump to right from high school.
So much of what Uncle Tupelo was seems to have come from the place of their raising, a place that helped to form both Farrar and Tweedy and a place they seemed to have both loved and reviled at the same time. And from my own youth, I remember those nights in the Best Town on Earth and in Henderson, dreaming of the places I was yet to see, when loneliness and desperation would be gone forever.
“Now and then it keeps you running/never seems to die/The trail's spent with fear/Not enough living on the outside/Never seem to get far enough/Staying in between the lines/Hold on to what you can/Waiting for the end/Not knowing when
May the wind take your troubles away/May the wind take your troubles away/Both feet on the floor, two hands on the wheel/May the wind take your troubles away” –“Windfall” by Son Volt

*
Uncle Tupelo fused punk and country into a blend of rock ‘n roll almost untried by most others in the band’s lifespan—the late eighties and early nineties. One song they’re rollicking through riffs that can rock your ass off, the next they’re picking through the sad story of a broken man. It’s a kind of music that harkens back to old country—the stuff Hank and Johnny sang about: heartache, drunkenness, loss, redemption. And hope—lots of hope.
One of their early songs—the Carter family cover “No Depression”—came to be used widely as the nomenclature for this genre of bottle-breaking music. The No Depression movement included the likes of The Jayhawks, Whiskeytown, Ryan Adams, Alejandro Escovedo. A magazine that covered the scene even took the name No Depression.
The movement is mostly gone now. The magazine has folded. Uncle Tupelo broke up in the mid-nineties. Tweedy formed Wilco, and Farrar formed Son Volt, each taking their music in different directions from Uncle Tupelo. Wilco has moved into almost an experimental pop rock, with a large cast of musicians and arrangements far from your classic intro-verse-refrain-bridge-refrain. Son Volt and Farrar have also done some experimentation in new styles, but have tended to stay closer to the tendencies of the No Depression era.
But I am no critic. I am just a fan. I look forward to each new record, especially what will be released this summer. Wilco (the album) is set to be released on June 30, the day of their show at the Britt. Son Volt’s American Central Dust is scheduled to be released a week later. Like the others, I’ll buy it, stick into my CD player, and push repeat.
*
While living in the Best Town on Earth, I fell for a girl, and the Best Town on Earth wasn’t so bad anymore. Wilco:
“All I can see/is black and white/and white and pink/with blades of blue/that lay between/the words I think/on a page/I was meaning/to send to you/I couldn’t tell/if it would/bring my heart/the way I wanted/when I started/writing this letter to you/but if I could/you know I would/just hold your hand/and you’d understand/I’m the man who loves you.” –"I’m the Man Who Loves You"

Then I moved to Alaska one summer. Wilco:
“Picking apples for the kings and queens of things/I’ve never seen/ distance has no way of making love/understandable/distance has no way of making love/understandable.” –“Radio Cure”

She came to visit me in Alaska. Son Volt:

“Walking down Main Street/Getting to know the concrete/Looking for a purpose from a neon sign/I would meet you anywhere the western sun meets the air/We'll hit the road, never looking behind/Can you deny, there's nothing greater/Nothing more than the traveling hands of time?”--"Tear Stained Eye”

She went back home and soon we broke up. Son Volt:
“Living for the moment/Flashes and fades and takes you down/familiar deserted byways/Shelf-stored memories/Lead you where you been/and no longer go/But guess who’s guessing now?
Let me back into your world/Blink of an eye/No uncertain terms/Let me back into your world.” –“Back Into Your World”

I moved back to Kentucky and tried to make things right. Son Volt:

“After all this confusion is put aside/After all, we’re finally gonna make it right” —Picking Up the Signal

And so, a pattern was established in life then that still seems to be holding: Work low-wage jobs, struggle to pay rent, find a woman to help shake the frustration, break up with woman, fall apart with anguish, put myself back together again, and move on—while always dreaming of something better.
*
There’s a clip of Uncle Tupelo’s first television appearance on youtube.com that shows a young band, sounding a bit off and looking a bit awkward on stage. The clip has all the under-production of a local TV station—grainy picture, choppy fades, piercing sound. It is the direct opposite from all the slickly produced bands with marshmallow lyrics and white bread sounds that have moved through our airwaves. And in that clip, there’s Uncle Tupelo on stage, singing stuff that means something. Young and dreaming, they couldn’t have had any idea what was in store for their band and life then: the break-ups, rehab, Grammy awards, sell-out concerts and world-wide tours that lay in store. They didn’t know they’d find a way out.
But what I want to believe is that when they got out and moved on with separate bands, a little of Uncle Tupelo stayed within. The lyrics and heart are still with Wilco and Son Volt. Tweedy and Farrar still speak to me. Getting out of Belleville may have been the goal, but Belleville will always remain inside the heart, as does my Henderson. People are a sum total of their struggles, and too often we try to forget just what it was that helped to mold us. Oh how I sometimes dream of those long gone days in the Best Town on Earth when I learned to live on hope. I want to hold them.
“Remember when you didn’t have to look ahead or behind you/There was always something right there to do/But now it’s life in some kind of trap looking for a way out/We keep moving on, that’s what it’s all about” –Looking for a Way Out by Uncle Tupelo

*

Wilco plays the Britt Festival on June 30. Son Volt plays the Britt Festival on July 18.

One definition of grace

2009-03-28T16:23:00.001-07:00

"...grace is having a commitment--or at least an acceptance of--being ineffective and foolish."

--Anne Lamott in Traveling Mercies

Laugh at and with yourself. Others, too.

Letters

2009-01-27T07:09:00.000-08:00

I'm still an old-fashioned lout about some things.

Listen to this:
I, like so many, have succumbed to the technology that is Internet. Web sites offer all sorts of information and entertainment, constant updates about everything political and, if you want, personal. You've got e-mail, which is old news by now. You've got, like this here medium, blogs, in which a writer or wannabe writer can basically self-publish for the wide world to read. And then you've got the Great Satan, Facebook. I believe now its intended use is for people to become online friends so that Person A, say a girl named Chelsea, can know every detail about Person B, say a girl named Allison, while someone barely known to either of them but who is an online friend, Person C, say a dude named Bill, can also know what's going on and offer comments meant in some way to form some sort of online spark so one of the girls will realize that this dude named Bill really is a keeper.

6:13 p.m. "I wonder what Chelsea is up to," Allison thinks. "I'll log in to Facebook."

http://www.facebook.com/

6:16 Chelsea is watching Celebrity Rehab and making a cheesecake for Amy's baby shower :>

Allison thinks, "I need to respond to that."

6:19 p.m. LOL, Chels. I hate cheesecake but love Dr. Drew and those B-list celebrities. It only proves my life isn't so bad!!! :~)

6:21 (from west Texas, Bill chimes in) How can anyone hate cheesecake? You hate cheese cake but love Celebrity Rehab. You need rehab.

6:23 (back to Chelsea) I will need rehab after I eat all of this cheesecake. Or maybe I'll go on the Biggest Loser. LOL :~)!!!!!

6:26 (Allison) Well, sometimes I like cheesecake if you put cherries on top. I'll bring the cherries to Amy's shower. LOL :#)!!

Infinity!

I must admit that I subscribe to the Great Satan. An addict, I need rehab.

But here's where the old-fashioned part of me comes in:

There is something much more satisfying than communication consumed on Facebook. Letters. What you do is sit down at your favorite desk and pick up a pen or pencil and write down your thoughts to a friend.

Let me tell you, there's not many feelings (well, some) that are better than when you open up your mailbox and find a letter.

This is why I have been working a plan this year: 52 weeks, 52 letters.

I leave you with this: a challenge to take part. Take back thoughtful communication! Start a letter-writing revolution! Write to me and I'll write back. All four of you who read this blog. Send me your address and I'll write you a letter or a postcard.

This is the end of my rant for now. To see it in its entirety, go to my Facebook page.

Year in Review

2008-12-30T11:45:00.000-08:00

Write this as fast as you can because this year went by like a blur and so this post must go by just as fast. I was thinking this morning that 2008 was kind of a bummer for me, but then I started to think, “Why the hell is that thought in your head? Only because of the aloneness--mostly self-imposed--that has enveloped around you for the past several months. Nonsense, you fool!”
On Dec. 31 of last year, a bunch of us – I with girlfriend then, a light-skinned Brazilian who wore a white dress mid-thigh level that night – went to a hick New Year’s party at the Holiday Inn outside Lexington. Was there a band there? No, I don’t think so. A DJ spinning the hits of the day, mostly country hits, as I recall, which forced me into a drunken stupor. We danced to them, by God, because this was New Year’s and we were a bunch of Brazilians who wanted nothing more than to celebrate a northern hemisphere New Year’s Eve party. We met Wendell, a retired schoolteacher from a nearby town, who was at the party alone. I bought him a bourbon. He tried to hit on one of the unattached Brazilian babes. At least, he had that going for him. I bought him another bourbon. He bought me one. My ex-girlfriend, brown eyes the size of moon pies, didn’t get mad when I got too drunk. The next day we watched football and talked about Wendell.
A few days later, I drove to Murray, defended my master’s thesis successfully. Then Monday at work at the State Journal in Frankfort, Ky., I handed in my notice. Soon, I had planned a trip to Central America and was on a plane flying to San Pedro Sula, where a woman I didn’t know picked me up and took me to the inn where I would stay for a few hours until she could run some errands before taking me to Copan Ruinas, where the mother of my childhood best friend owns a hacienda. I stayed at the Hacienda a couple nights, and the rest of the time, in the spare bedroom of my friend’s mom’s apartment. Part of the deal for the lodging was that I’d help out with the hacienda, though there was little to do. But what I could do was drive home the employees at the end of the night. I took to the job. 10 p.m. I was driving a truck up and down the hills of Copan, carrying three or four girls home, not understanding a word they spoke. The job lasted three days. I wrecked the truck, scraping its side on a driveway entrance tunnel that ran underneath her apartment complex. I was the only one in the truck. No one was hurt. My friend’s mom didn’t ask me to do anything anymore. I got drunk that night on beer and whiskey. Soon, I took a trip to Guatemala. I went to an active volcano and could spit in the lava flowing by it was so close. I went to the Tikal ruins in northern Guatemala and somewhere around there contracted a hell of a case of diarrhea that left me drained and defeated. A walking corpse with brown socks. I went back to Honduras and soon caught a flight back to the U.S.A.
I lived with the girlfriend then for almost a month, maybe a little less. Then, I packed up all my stuff and moved to Oregon. I cried three times. Once, a couple days before I was leaving, when I finally realized we were going to be done, the night before, and when I physically left. I still remember her wave as I drove off. My heart was heavy. The tears in her eyes made them look bigger than normal. And then I was driving and I wouldn’t let myself think of the past, not until I got out to Oregon, and then I thought about it a lot and I was mad that I’d been so hasty for my dreams of open road and secular adventure.
The trip to Oregon took me four days. I drove up to Wisconsin to visit a friend I had lived with in Germany, when we were professional football players, or at least semi-pro, and the world was ours to have and hold and take and grab and conquer and destroy. We were older now. He was married to a German girl and they were planning to move back to Germany. I wished him luck. He told me to come visit. I wondered if I would. Then I got in my car and drove down to Iowa, through Nebraska, on to Colorado, then Utah, and Nevada and Oregon. It was sunny the day I arrived. Nathaniel, my friend who convinced me to give the state a try, and I walked around town in shirtsleeves. It was sometime in mid-April. The next day we all drove to the Oregon coast and I loved the Oregon coast then and I love it now and I should go again as soon as possible because it is as fine of a place there is. But there’s other fine places in this area. There’s Crater Lake, and the Rogue River, the great Redwoods, and plenty of mountain lakes from which to pull trout, and I did and I ate them and thanked the great white light that shone down for the meal.
I started working. I was a freelance writer. Still do that some. And I worked as a clerk in an outdoor store all spring and summer and some in the fall. I was lucky enough to get on as a part-time writing and journalism instructor at the nearby community college and was pleased to know that some of my students learned something and some believed that I was a good teacher, and I felt that I was on to something.
In May, my niece, Eliza, was born. I celebrated her birth with friends in Oregon.
In July, my nephew and Godson, Henry, turned two. I flew home to celebrate at his party.
In September, my grandfather, Leslie, died. I flew home to honor him and to be with my family.
I am a writer. I have been a writer since the summer of 2000, when I wrote my first short story, a story which was long and treacherous and had no continuity or validity, but it was a story, and then I thought I was on my way to some sort of Hemingway-esque existence. I’ve tried. I’ve been a lot of different places and seen a lot of different people and had a few little adventures. I’m no Hemingway, though. My stories are better now, but they aren’t great and I wonder how can I forgive myself for being mediocre? I am scared of mediocrity and failure. I sludge on through the grind of daily writing and thought, ready to fail or succeed, whatever’s in store. There are other things I could be great at. And I remind myself that the world is diverse and I don’t have to write. I could do anything. I write, though.
But teaching is good. I like it. I can be great at that.
I realize I don’t know much about a whole lot of things. I’m amazed everyday, slackjaw in awe, at how much I don’t know. How do people get so smart?
I’ve begun to fill out applications for teaching jobs. I wonder where I’ll be next. This is where I am now, wondering what’s in store for me. This is where I’ve been for almost ten years. In all the places I’ve gone and all the women I’ve loved and all the jobs I’ve done, I’ve always wondered what’s next, what woman will I love next, what job I’ll try next. When will I be content? This writing you’re reading now has devolved into too much dreaminess and that’s not what I wanted when I started to write this an hour ago. I am tired of wondering. Tomorrow night is New Year’s Eve and then a new year begins again and I can only wonder what it holds for me.

The day after Thanksgiving

2008-11-28T08:46:00.000-08:00

The following is what I read at the during prayers at the visitation for my grandfather, Leslie Jennings, Jr. He died September 14, 2008. The first was written by my brother, Joshua, who lives in Brazil with his wife, Waleska. He sent it via email.
I wrote only a little of the second section, which I squeezed around a passage from the Wendell Berry story, Stand By Me. I added another paragraph from what I read – I think it helps to illuminate the theme better. I’ve meant to post this sooner for those at the showing who wanted to read it, and also because it’s worthy of posting.

Josh:
Dear Loved Ones,
I apologize, especially to Grandmother, for not being able to be present in Henderson now and for the funeral to celebrate the life of the great man who was my grandfather. I write the following words in remembrance of one of the most important influences in my life. I told Grandmother, before I left, that I wanted Waleska and I to have a marriage like Granddad and her (as well as that of my parents and my aunts and uncle), full of everlasting love.
Faith, Hope and Love. The most important of these is Love. Sixty-four years of love between Sarah and Leslie Jennings is and forever shall be the example that we are to follow. In popular culture, marriage and love are made to look like romantic impossibilities. We have our own personal and familial example in Granddad and Grandmother Jennings. In spite of Granddad's death, the love continues because it is that which transcends all space and time. All of the love that he showed us through his actions is to continue through us and is to be carried out in our actions.
When I think of Granddad Jennings, I cannot help but to think of St. Joseph the Worker. Joseph has no citation attributed to him in any historical or religious text, so we assume he was a man of few words. However, he was a man of immense love and service to his family by always providing for them. We assume that he was dedicated to his carpentry so that he could provide for his family. Leslie Jennings was a man of few words (as am I), but he was dedicated to his wife and to his family through his work and service to them. He was a blue-collar worker like Joseph, and he loved his family immensely like Joseph.
The fondest memories that I have a Grandad are of him picking us up from school to go through the drive-thru at Hardee's, and then taking us to his house where we would wait for Mom to come pick us up while we watched sports (Cubs). Every Christmas, we looked forward to drinking Irish creme made by Granddad to please our palates. We looked forward to his presence at Easter as well. He was at all of our birthday parties. He always went to our athletic events to support us. He was at our graduations. And he was at Mass everyday praying for us. He was present at all of these functions because he loved us. Thank you, Granddad!
Let us carry on Granddad's example of love!

Me:
I’ve been thinking about this short passage for the past several days. I happened upon it over the weekend quite by accident and immediately re-read it. It’s a couple of paragraphs taken from a story by the Kentucky writer Wendell Berry, and I first read it earlier this summer and highlighted it then. It was and is something that pushes me to think about those who I love and have died, and those who will.

What gets you is the knowledge, that sometimes can fall on you in a clap, that the dead are gone absolutely from this world. As has been said around here over and over again, you are not going to see them anymore, ever. Whatever was done or said before is done or said for good. Any questions you think you ought to’ve asked while you had a chance are never going to be answered. The dead know, and you don’t.

And yet their absence puts them with you in a way they never were before. You even maybe know them better than you did before. They stay with you, and in a way you go with them. They
don’t live on in your heart, but your heart knows them. As your heart gets bigger on the inside, the world gets bigger on the outside. If the dead were alive only in this world, you would forget them, looks like as soon as they die. But you remember them, because they were always living in the other, bigger world while they lived in this little one, and this one and the other one are the same. You can’t see this with your eyes looking straight ahead. It’s with your side vision, so to speak, that you see it. The longer I live, and the better acquainted I am among the dead, the better I see it. I am telling what I know.
--Wendell Berry, from Stand By Me

Granddad’s gone to a better and bigger place, but he’s in our place, too. He lives in our memories. Our hearts know him. All of our hearts are bigger. He is in the other, bigger world, but he is in our world, too. He is a part of our lives and will influence each of our lives and because of that, he will influence those around us, and this is, I think, how one good man leaves his world better. I, too, am like my brother – I will try to be like my granddad.

Deer season

2008-10-04T16:08:00.000-07:00

I woke this morning and when I stepped from the door of my small backyard cabin, I took a few steps, looked up, and "Woah, there's a buck. In the backyard. Chilling." I took a step back and stared. He stared back, this four-pointer. Then I made a few quick, silly hand movements in order to scare him away. The buck rose, but he didn't move much. After a while, I decided to go back inside and re-think my plan.

My newspaper lay out front, the buck in the path to get there. But there's a back gate, and a few minutes later, instead of butting heads with the buck, I slipped out the back gate, walked around to the front, then returned to the back gate, drawing only a stare and nose-sniff.

I thought he would leave sometime during the morning. I looked out every half-hour or so, and each time, he was lying down or up, chomping on grass. Later, I slipped out the back again and after watching the Kentucky football game, I have not yet returned to my place.

I was thinking that this buck doesn't know where he's supposed to be, certainly not in some backyard in the middle of the city. But then I realized he's probably smarter than I give him credit: He's seeking refuge -- today is the first day of deer season.

Perfect coffee

2008-09-12T11:01:00.001-07:00

One of the tricks of being a writer is fooling yourself into being ready to write. To write perfectly, one must be perfectly ready, at least this is what I say to myself, and so I’ve begun to fool myself into writing by first – each morning – attempting to make the perfect cup of coffee. But probably, it’s more of a procrastination technique.
The picture you see is an image of my most recent technique. I place two Mellitas and number four cone filters on top of the other. Each is filled with two scoops of finely ground coffee bean. The current bean is Café Equitas Peruvian shade grown. It’s a strong, bold bean, but not too dark. Boiling water is poured through the top Mellita, which then falls into the bottom Mellita, before dripping into my cup. So far, this procedure has produced mixed results. Some days it’s strong and others weak and the amount of scoops have been raised and lowered the next day to compensate.
Another attempt at perfect coffee involves one Mellita and two containers – a large Mason jar and a coffee mug. In this experiment, the water is first poured into the Mellita resting on top of the Mason jar. The Mellita, with its freshly used coffee ground still inside, is then moved on top of the coffee mug. Then the brown, one-run coffee is poured from the Mason jar over the once-used grounds for a double soak and into the mug. I’ve found this method gives a more consistent result.
I’ve also dabbled with a French press, but it’s a more time consuming method and cleaning the press is annoying. Also, I have an electric coffeemaker, of course. I sometimes use it, especially when I set the timer to wake early in the morning, but for the most part, there is no romance in the electric coffeemaker. The electric coffeemaker is a skyscraper and the two-Mellita technique is a log cabin. Depends on who you are, I guess.

Grants Pass Downs

2008-08-17T12:34:00.001-07:00

(Blogger's note: This is an unfinished entry. I hope to convert this into an essay sometime in the future.)

I’m quite certain a postcard picture of Lexington's Keeneland would look much different from the racetrack I attended in late June: Grants Pass Downs in Grants Pass, Oregon.
The highways we took from Ashland to Grants Pass follow the majestic Rogue River, where local anglers feed on fierce and strong steelhead salmon making their way from the ocean to spawn and give rise to a new generation. Several mountain ranges rise, forming the valleys and plains of this place, covered with evergreen trees. Several rivers cut through this sometimes harsh and beautiful landscape. The scent of evergreen filters through the air. This area is nice, and there’s much to brag about.
Maybe what this place won’t brag of is its horse racing track. It looks like a converted high school football stadium, complete with a scoreboard that reminds me of the one from the stadium at North Junior High School in Henderson, Ky., where I played sixth grade football. The infield of Grants Pass Downs is no longer used for football. Now, it’s a motocross track. The seats are those on which mothers and fathers all across the land sat for hours, watching children play football or soccer or march in the band. Bring a seat cushion or prepare to adjust your rear all day. Grants Pass Downs looks – in a word – amateurish.
But don’t for a minute believe this track wasn’t worth the forty-five minute drive. From the previous paragraph, one might think I'm snobby about my racetracks. Not so.

The top picture is the winner's circle at Grants Pass Downs. The bottom is action of the June 28 $10,000 John Deere Bonus Challenge, a 350-yard sprint won by six-year-old Hannibal Lector.

Crater Lake

2008-08-07T07:17:00.000-07:00

Crater Lake National Park, Oregon, Aug. 5, 2008 --

On Tuesday -- it was supposed to be in the morning but ended up afternoon -- the Dynamic Trio packed up and drove the two-hour drive north to Crater Lake. The Dynamic Trio consists of Gregory and his special lady friend, Suzanne, and myself, Third-Wheel Tweddell. We hiked to the top of a nearby mountain, Mount Scott. The second picture is one of the lake from the top of the mountain, evening sun pouring down to the water from heaven. The other two are pics from a viewing area as we drove back down to the camping spot after the hike.

I don't have much of a story about the short trip -- we built a fire, made hobo stew, and drank a few beers at the campsite -- but what I can say is that seeing Crater Lake, like the Grand Canyon, has been on my list for some time. I was in awe from the first sight. Could it be called a religious experience? Maybe some would. I don't know. All that I know is that I felt pretty good about this world and myself in it.

Mutton and John Prine

2008-07-27T13:25:00.000-07:00

When I was back home in Kentucky, several people told me that they like reading my blog and that I should update it more often. Of course, they could just be saying that, stroking my writer’s ego. But I’ll err on the idea that they were telling the truth.
Yet, because not much has struck me as blog-worthy, this is what you get:

I’ve been cooking with garlic a lot more lately. Right now, carrots and onions and rice, along with a hefty amount of chopped garlic simmer in a pot. It’s just starting to boil. Like my blood pressure. I recently found out – through several self-administered tests in my grandmother’s kitchen – that I have high blood pressure. Or at least I do currently. I did once before, too, when I was working on a spicy article about a state legislator. That story could have ruined the dude’s career. My manic mind thought he’d send some of his henchmen after me once the story hit the streets. Break my kneecaps or something. The story was cut by the publisher, probably fearing a lawsuit, and another liar’s career was saved. He’ll probably get re-elected. I still sometimes wish that story would have made the papers. Of course, only if my kneecaps were spared. Anyway, I thought my blood pressure would have gone down after that, but if Grammy T’s blood pressure-checker is accurate, it hasn’t. Someone told me that garlic helps to lower blood pressure. So I cook more with garlic. Probably some study will come out tomorrow saying garlic raises blood pressure. Then my last few days of garlic cooking will be for naught and I’ll have to intensify my efforts to try the next thing that is said to lower blood pressure: quitting drinking. Grammy T, in her wisdom, told me, “You can’t have five or six drinks. That’s too much. Maybe one or two when you go out with those people you go out with.” Something like that. This town that I currently find myself in, small as it may be, can be a party waiting to happen. I say ‘can.’ Not always. But the threat is there on any night because those people I go out with enjoy what this place offers.
Drinking report card-- Friday night: Three light beers and one micro-brew and when the server – a friend of mine – came by to ask if I wanted another, I declined and asked for a club soda with lime. She smirked me. “It’s this blood pressure thing,” I said. B-
Saturday night: Two bourbons and three beers. (But Grammy, this was over a few hours and a healthy, large salmon and stir fry dinner.) C+
The main problem I have with quitting drinking, or at least just having one or two, is that beer, bourbon, and wine tastes good. I like it.

I’ve been listening to John Prine today. I wouldn’t call my state of mind homesickness. Though, I just got back from Kentucky, and the tug for my birthplace – sort of like the tug for the first girl you ever fell for (where are you now Mary Anders?) – will always be a part of me, I feel, no matter where I end up. And, sure, maybe that’s just me. I’m a sentimental turd. John Prine, though, has Kentucky roots, and I think about Kentucky sometimes when I listen to him. Also, corn bread, the view from my grandmother’s house on the Ohio River, Murray State U., finding the golden egg on Easter, tomato sandwiches (now without salt), and mutton.
I ate some mutton a couple days before I left. Probably not a blood pressure lowering food. Good for the soul, though. Certainly good for the soul.

Garden

2008-06-28T09:56:00.001-07:00

The pole beans have sprouted, and the tomato plants are showing the little yellow flowers that signal oncoming fruit. It’s warm here in Oregon, some days hot, but not Kentucky hot, and I look forward to what kind of tomatoes I’ll get. A bunch of tomatoes, a loaf of bread, and mayonnaise will feed a man for a week, maybe more. Tomato sandwiches are one of the greatest pleasures of summer, right up there with beer pulled from an icy cooler, bikinis, and fishing from the bank. I haven’t been cursed with the short fits of depression I used to have since I’ve been in Oregon, and I don’t know why, but I’m not second-guessing it, leave well enough alone. In time, the shoots of the Kentucky Wonder pole beans – that’s right, Kentucky Wonder, you think I wouldn’t buy them when they stared me down at the co-op – will run up the trellis, and the yellow flowers will turn into green and then red fruit, and I’ll slap them on some bread with mayo and a little salt, and then I’ll smile like a god damn fool who’s got it made.

Blind hope

2008-06-19T07:26:00.000-07:00

Casting it out, reeling it in, living on blind hope again.
-Son Volt, “Blind Hope”

That’s what we writers live on. Blind hope. And so I rise each morning, sometimes with a throbbing head, the coffee already brewed and waiting, made the night before, the programmed coffeemaker set for six-something. The desk was made by myself and my uncle, Buddy. On top of it, I sit my laptop, and I begin to crank it out or edit what I’ve written. When the words won’t come, I slide my chair over to the card table I got at Goodwill and begin anew on my electric typewriter. Sometimes just the sound of that thing – slinging letters up on a crisp white sheet – can push a man to think he’s destined for something more than what he has, like others who struggled and endured before him. After the typewriter’s turned off, it leaves a scent of oil mixed with the gears of a moving machine. It hangs in the little cabin. It smells like work.

Fishermen

2008-05-23T13:43:00.000-07:00

We caught fish. That was the thing we had wanted to do on five previous excursions, but they hadn't taken our bait, or lure, or fly, and we thought we were Oregon's most inept avid fishermen. Even at a miniature stocked pond on the first day of trout season, where drunken fools and little girls pulled them in, we had no luck.

And so we set out again, another opportunity in the mountains of southern Oregon at Hyatt Lake.

The first night, having just arrived an hour earlier, Nathaniel and I were fishing from the docks, dusk starting to capture the night. He had just thrown out a treble hook loaded with power bait and sat his rod down when a monster took in the hook, causing a thunder-strike. Nathaniel pulled the eighteen-inch whale of a trout to shore. I filleted it and we cooked it up in foil over hot coals, cold Hamms in hand while we watched.

The night grew cool and Hamms had become our defense to the cold. How to deal with the mountain air growing colder. "Just get into my sleeping bag . . . and hope I've had enough Hamms," Gnat said. He slept down by the lake. My southern soul sacked next to the hot coals.

In the morning, I woke and went back to the docks. Casting with my fly rod, I caught my first of the year on that sometimes-puzzling contraption. But that was only an introduction to what would come that evening. Back in the same spot hours later, I was getting hits from trout on my fly rod but hadn't been able to pull any in. Then after numerous tangles that left me curse-mouthed, I switched to my spinning rod. Threw out a yellow rooster tail. There was one trout. Get over here, Gnat, and pull these in, I said. And he was there, pulling another in a minute later. A few minutes later, I had done the same. It was a good run and thirty minutes more, we ended with seven between us. Trout for dinner, fried up with onions and garlic in morning's bacon grease. And we drank more Hamms.

Early the next morning, I woke early and went back. Two more trout. Bacon, potatoes, and trout for breakfast. Strong coffee to get the Hamms cobwebs out.

There were more fish. We caught more, like we knew what we were doing. Those two days, we were Oregon fishermen.

Eliza

2008-05-21T11:25:00.000-07:00

My niece was born last week with a head full of dark hair and, as we are apt to say, a button nose. My mother says she looks like my sister -- her mother Elizabeth -- did when she was a baby girl. She's a pretty, precious baby, I can tell from the pictures that have been sent to me, so far away in Oregon.

Maybe also like her mother, this baby girl will one day grow into a gymnast, handspringing her way through the neighborhood, or a cheerleader with a favorite cheer of "H -- H -D-D-D!" Or maybe like her father, Otha, she'll love the outdoors and the peace of a wooded pond.

It's early, for sure, but I'm happy and hopeful and wondering --thousands of miles away -- about a little girl named Eliza.

Derby Day in Oregon

2008-05-07T10:02:00.000-07:00

We woke and drove to the larger town fifteen miles away and placed our bets at a bowling alley. In the off-track betting parlor within the alley, the undercard -- already on the sixth race -- was running, shown up on several big-screen high-definition televisions and as I watched, I saw the camera flash to the stands and saw the hats and pretty ladies and horses in the paddock, controlled among the throngs of people, and I thought of my derbies past, in Kentucky. But this was no day for sentimentality, and I quickly pushed the thoughts away and looked forward to what it would bring. Mint juleps, for one, and I prepared my palette for the sweet juice.

No gutter balls at the bowling alley, except for the ten-dollar to win bet I placed on Monba, the Todd Pletcher-trained horse that finished last, fifty-nine lengths off the pace. I’m thinking Easter Sky, the pacer trained by my great-grandfather Samuel Hamilton so revered in our family, could have kept pace with Monda, hobbles and all. Pletcher will probably win one someday, one would think, and it’ll pay off then. Just not with Monba. That pick ended a two-year streak and last three out of four picking Derby winners. 2004: Smarty Jones, 2006: Barbaro, 2007: Street Sense. In 2005, I picked Afleet Alex, a fine horse, who showed at the Derby. Later, he won the Preakness and Belmont. Don’t reckon that’ll happen with Monba.

We drove back home, where we ate Kentucky hot browns. Fine dining. Then on to numerous games of washers and the Derby telecast on NBC – all of this washed down with mint juleps. On to Nathaniel’s uncle’s house later in the afternoon for a Derby evening of dominoes and badminton and burgoo – all of this washed down with mint juleps.

This day was not so different than a Derby day in Kentucky. Then someone rigged up a game, placing one fork sideways on top of another fork, as if a tiny catapult, then placing a beer bottle cap on the fork’s prongs and launching it into the direction of a wine glass placed in the center of the table. It caught on and we sat around the kitchen table for maybe two hours, launching the bottle cap in the direction of the wine glass. This was washed down with beer. After a rule change, a larger coffee-type mug was substituted for the wine glass and quickly the game-winner was scored.

On to the bar, where the night begins to haze. An old-time country band, fronted by a lovely blonde. Dancing. Saying stupid things. Leaving your credit card at the bar. Falling off your bicycle on the ride home. Kentucky Derby 2008.

This Oregon Trail: Part Three

2008-04-28T22:57:00.000-07:00

Lakeview, Ore., April 16, 2008 – Arrived in Lakeview somewhere around nine at night. Now, just a short three-hour trip to Ashland, the final destination (for now).

Driving on U.S. 140 from northern Nevada into southeast Oregon, the scenery is high desert: dusty brush, wind whistling, a brown mountain in the distance. I stopped somewhere at a rest stop, consisting of black top parking lot, hole-in-ground toilet facilities with signage begging you not to throw trash into the toilet, and a couple benches under a couple shelters, and walked out into the surrounding countryside. I’ve seen two cars in an hour. Earlier on the cell phone, my friend Nathaniel said, “You’re in no-man’s land.” Seems quite true, except for cell phone reception. The wind rattles the scrub bush at my feet. I look out at the open space, the mountain, millions of scrub bushes. How many people are within fifty miles of me right now, I think. Not many. Population density of one. Me. It’s an anxious delight that overcomes me, looking at the handsome desolation of northern Nevada. I’m alone and I love it and I don’t. I get back in Alberta, head on to civilization.

First stop: Denio, Nevada, right on the Oregon border. Population: a handful. Half of that hand drinking beer at the wooden-beamed and stuffed deerhead roadhouse where I stop. Nice enough people to the outsider. I order the largest hamburger I’ve eaten in years and a cup of joe, eat as fast as I can, piss, and hit the road again, back through the high desert for a few more hours, driving around and down tight, winding mountain roads with steep grades that slightly frighten Alberta. It’s all right, baby, I say. We’ll just downshift and I’ll ride the brake. Take it easy and keep your lights on the road.

In Lakeview, I pull up to the first hotel I come to. Best Western. And the Song of the Trip has been decided: Richard Shindell’s “The Next Best Western.” The Lord has delivered me to the next Best Western, as lyrics in the song hope for, but the fucker costs me eighty-three bucks a night. Get my money’s worth. TV going. Jump on the bed naked. Run around the room. It’s a helluva big hotel room so I tire quickly. Walk to the grocery for a six-pack. Leave the four I don’t drink in the fridge in the morning when I’m off to Ashland. Curse when I realize what I've done, but I'm too far gone now to return. Maybe there'll be a drunk maid somewhere by the time I hit Ashland.

This Oregon Trail: Part Two

2008-04-27T11:16:00.000-07:00

April 16, Lakeview, Ore. – Eleven hours on the road today. Dean Moriarty doesn’t have anything on me, except that maybe he and Sal Paradise took turns during their crazy drives from Denver to the West Coast. Hell, if I had a compatriot to drive with, I could go straight from Kentucky to the West Coast in one single shot. Maybe. Doubtful. Yesterday, I pulled a nine and a half hour shift in Alberta, my little red-headed beauty of a Subaru, driving from Boulder, Colo., to Springville, Utah.
Thus far: 45 hours on the road. $390.15 spent on gas. 2,750 miles.
In Boulder, the temperature was seventy-plus, the first of three very distinct weather conditions for the day. Into the Rockies, the wind came on strong, blowing Alberta all over the road. So strong at one point I puttered up a mountain at forty miles per hour. Going down the other side, Alberta picked back up to seventy. A true response to the old joke what kind of car do you drive. A Rolls Can 'Ardly. Rolls down one hill, can hardly get up the next. No, no, not Alberta. She’s a tough and pretty old pack mule, taking her time across this land, speed be damned.
Once in Utah, the wind blew more fiercely, which even more than Colorado’s Rockies, disrupts the full-speed throttle of Alberta. I had thought to stop to camp in Utah, somewhere near Moab, but I estimate the wind would pick me and my tent up and blow me up onto one of the majestic buttes that jag up from southern Utah’s desert. Alberta, too. I stop once past the Moab exit at a scenic viewing area. Sure, it’s scenic – through the sandstorm. I peel an orange. The peel blows away. Bits of sand stick to the orange. Can’t even eat a goddam orange. Climbed back in the car with clenched-jaw determination to drive through the night. Get the hell out of this desert hurricane.
Stop at a sandy service station in Green River, Utah, where the fair-haired handicapped attendant peers from behind the counter, sitting in a wheelchair. He warns a couple on their way to Las Vegas, “The highway signs aren’t lying: there are no service stations along this highway for another 110 miles.” I hand him my debit card. He stutters my name. “Twee-dell.” The way my grandfather used to pronounce it. I correct him to the way my father says it. “Twuh-dell."
“Is that Welsh?” he asks.
“Scotch-Irish.”
“Interesting.” Then he tells me the best route to Salt Lake City and I’m back in Alberta, heading north up 191 toward the Great Salt Lake, some five hours away. Halfway, snow falls onto the mountains I have driven into. They are high and majestic, maybe not so much as the Rockies, but awe-inspiring nonetheless. At the end of the day – I couldn’t make it through the night – I stop at a Cracker Barrel south of Provo, where for a few minutes, I don’t think clearly, my head still moving at sixty-five miles per hour through a windstorm, now displaced in the generic slow pace of America’s down-home front porch restaurant. Head clears. Thinking right now: Give me some greens and vinegar. Fried apples. Pot roast. Decaf. Later, a server asked me where I’m from. Kentucky. He replied he’s been to Kentucky – Louisville – and it’s so pretty there. I agreed. Then he said, “Unlike Utah. It’s so drab.” I disagreed. Look out the window, fool, at the snow-covered peaks smacking you in the face. Can even the beautiful familiar lose its attraction to a daily eye? Maybe one cause for a fifty-percent divorce rate. I’ll be with Alberta till she dies.

This Oregon Trail: Part One

2008-04-25T10:27:00.000-07:00

April 10, 2008
Last day in Kentucky. A day: sleep, wake, leave. Don’t think. Don’t analyze your head to mush. Only cause the head to spin. Keep it simple, stupid.

April 14, 2008
Grand Island, NE – Of course, there aren’t any islands in Nebraska, the lady at the front desk of Comfort Inn tells me. An answer to a bleary-eyed question after ten hours of hungover driving through the cornfields of Iowa and the plains of Nebraska. How’d it get its name? Her answer: Three rivers converge in the area, surrounding a piece of land, or something like that.

There seemed to be a number of hotel billboards on the way in. I ask her if this is a touristy area. “This is Nebraska,” she replies. You get used to smug responses to stupid questions when you’re a journalist (ex-journalist?). But she is laughing and not rude, like others we pen-pushers deal with, like say past Gov. Ernie Fletcher’s former director of (mis)communications.

Not halfway to Oregon, I’ve spent $199.04 on gas. The trip to Wisconsin to start the trip in order to visit old friend F. Scott (formerly silly when he drank, like the writer, who earned the nickname after a few blacked-out nights, real name: Eric) and wife Melanie, an out-of-the-way detour contributing to the higher than expected gasoline total. Though, it was a good weekend visit. We drank like we did when we were footballers in Germany eight years ago, when I was young and had designs for greatness in my drinking career. As it is, I now fall into the very banal “social drinker” category, something that often leaves me with hangover worse than the last worst one. However, the hangover that sticks with me across Iowa isn’t too terrible, just a low drone of a pain and a few rumblings of gut. Not enough to take away from the amazement of Iowa. You think I’m kidding. I’m not. It’s vast, like Nebraska, like the rest of the U.S. will prove to be. All these little towns dotting the plains, snuggled into the mountains, standing alone in the high desert. All these people living in these towns. All with their own story. I wonder what life is like in Grand Island. Maybe it’s somewhat like good old Henderson, Ky., where the kids growing up can’t wait for college to get to Louisville, Bowling Green, Lexington, and then after, move on to Atlanta, Nashville, even New York City. Do the kids in Grand Island dream of college in Lincoln and Omaha, then on to Dallas or Denver, even Los Angeles?

April 15, 2008
Boulder, CO – Taking U.S. 76 into Colorado, the low western hills of Nebraska continue with what I call a scrub grass cover. The grass is burnt brown, seemingly dried out from the wind that daily sweeps the plains. I keep repeating the Annie Proulx short story title, “The Bunchgrass Edge of the World.” Don’t know why. Most of the story is set in Wyoming, and Wyoming is nearby, and probably it has the same scrub or bunchgrass. I say this damn title maybe one hundred times. Seems appropriate.

Pulling up to Fort Morgan, I caught my first peek of the Rockies, distant through the baby blue sky. I say out loud, “Hell yeah” though no one can hear me, like I’m talking to Gary Louris or Radiohead or Richard Schindell, who’ve all taken turns at the microphone throughout the trip. In fact, Louris and Schindell have both been nominated for Best Song of the Trip: Louris with “Vagabonds” and Schindell with “The Next Best Western.” A contest that won't be decided until the last night on the road in Oregon.

Seven hours on the road today. Short in comparison to the day before. And I’m well-rested. Comfort Inn was comfortable enough. As the mountains come closer, a woman is on my mind. Big brown eyes. Soft skin. An accent not my own. But I’ve got miles to go the opposite direction, and it’s not good to think like that in these situations. When you’ve quit a job and left a woman just to wander the country, wander to a place you’ve never seen, just because you’ve never been there, and you’re a little bit scared of the unknown, thoughts of your old Kentucky home are hindrances. These are times when it’s not good to think of woman: holding you, rubbing your back, falling asleep next to you, treating you better than you deserve – it might cause you to turn around. Think about Utah. Utah is tomorrow and you’ve never seen Utah.

Buck up (Edited from a journal entry)

2008-04-01T06:38:00.000-07:00

ANTIGUA, GUATEMALA, March 15, 2008 -- Solo travel is getting to me. Come on, man, buck up and live! However, loneliness is not so easily cured as to say to yourself, "Buck up and live!" If that were true, you'd hear thousands of souls uttering "Buck up and live" on street corners everywhere.

The past three days of diarrheal nightmare weigh in on my psyche. Fractured. My stomach rumbles and I pray for solid stool. I've only been away three weeks, yet I long to return. Just yesterday, I left, and tomorrow, I'll return. Then, I can sit on the couch and watch B-grade movies on the USA network -- what I wish for tonight. Oh, how discomfort can make the familiar (and boring) seem the best times of a life. (Are they?)

But wanting home is legitimate. The diarrhea and loneliness. To push on to another site to see another beautiful sunset on another beautiful lake just to say I did it doesn't seem like much of a reason. Those things we yearn to see are sometimes only pictures in books unless they can be shared. But still, at least try to buck up and live.

Vince Versus the Volcano

2008-03-25T05:29:00.000-07:00

PACAYA VOLCANO, GUATEMALA, March 10, 2008 -- It was a foolish thing to do, as was repeated by some Brits afterwards, but as I sat watching others walk over a dried up lava path -- under which a lava stream flowed -- I, as a part of this clandestine group of intrepid tourists who had paid to hike up a mountain to get as close to an active volcano as humanly possible, thought that I must fully experience the moment.

Before continuing, I must make the point that for a quarter-hour I watched others take the path, dancing and shuffling over the steam to get a better and closer view of the flowing lava. I don't need to see that, I'm close enough, I told myself. Maybe twenty-five to thirty feet away. That's close.

But others continued to brave the path. Then others. Then all who hadn't yet could be counted on a hand, and I was one.

I danced over the path. The heat rose and felt like it was blistering my legs and melting the soles of my running shoes. As I got to the viewing area, I heard a shriek, "Go, go!" Others who had come before me rushed back past to safe ground. I took one good, quick look at the lava ten or twelve feet away and scurried back on the path, hot coals on my soles.

The rush, I learned later, came after fellow hiker, Jerod from Seattle, heard a cracking noise. Our normally easy-going group leader took on a frantic face. He was the one yelling "Go." As in run for your life.

I made it back to higher, safer ground, as did everyone else. Minutes later -- was it two or three or four? -- the path of dried lava on which we all had walked cracked and slowly formed into slabs that jagged up and down like an old concrete sidewalk. Lava oozed around it.

I contemplated death by lava, loss of leg by lava, disfigurement by lava. Like the Brits who said it before me, it had been a foolish thing to do. Yet, not too foolish. Nothing happened except a good story.

American wisdom

2008-03-24T06:06:00.000-07:00

On the road to ANTIGUA, GUATEMALA, March 9, 2008 -- Overheard conversation between two Americans on a tourist shuttle:
Person 1: "Cowboy hats make sense down here."
Person 2: "Yeah, they really do."

Eddie and the Cruiser

2008-03-18T17:41:00.000-07:00

COPAN RUINAS, HONDURAS, March 18, 2008 -- Returned to Honduras from an eight-day trip to Guatemala today. Shuttle bus driver Eddie and myself, riding shotgun, jammed out to Mexican singers Gali Galeono and Vicente Fernandez while cruising south--up, over, around, and down mountains and through a thick sun that left a salt-crusted forearm even with windows flung open. The rest of the ten others packed into mini-bus turismo seemingly slept through the fun. I looked back a few times, but their eyes were closed, dreaming through the fun.

Meanwhile, Eddie flew by slower vehicles, passing on curves, darting back into the right lane seconds before oncoming cars reached us. On the side of the road, women in traditional skirts carried gathered sticks and limbs. Small women, smaller than American shrunken-grandma size. Chickens clucked. Eddie almost hit a dog that looked like it was living its last day. One man rode a horse toward us, brown mountain as his backdrop, shirt unbuttoned to his belly-button. Eddie missed him. Dust hung in the air.

Eddie kept the beat to the music on the steering wheel. I tried to talk to him over Fernandez's crooning, but my Spanish is literally useless unless asking for a beer, then thanking for a beer, and so our blunted conversations ended always with 'Esta bien.' Eyes back to the road, ears back to the music, where they belong. Conversation unneeded. I laughed.

After a Thursday, Friday, and Saturday when the thought most often in my head was where is the toilet, then a Sunday and Monday when I backed up, I found strong coffee and a perch this morning at a truck stop Eddie pulled into shortly after seven. Relief. Pipes are back running normal, steady flow.

At the Honduran border, border patrol lady for some reason didn't understand why I was staying in Honduras. She was mad, couldn't understand my useless Spanish and I couldn't order a beer then. So I yelled to make her understand. Like your great aunt at a Chinese restaurant. Finally, I found the right words and she let me back in. But I don't think she wanted to.

Back to the mini-bus turismo and Eddie's cursing because we have a flat tire. "Necesitas ayuda?" (Do you need help) I ask Eddie but I think he tells me it's a one-man job. He's a professional, I tell you. He drives the rest of the way arms and hands greased up, the beat on the steering wheel still in time, guiding us safely back to the cobblestone streets of Copan Ruinas.