A thousand years ago, back around 1994, I was a traveling' round the states killing time and brain cells. While engaged in countless nefarious doings and happenings, I got to see and do some real cool shit. Everything from traveling under an alias across the west coast while avoiding prosecution in my home state, to hanging with hippies in the swamps of Florida. One of the first things I learned was that there is a lot of pain and misery on this planet. I've seen some of the worst USA has to offer. It is all far, far out weighed by the really good people you meet when you are lost in the deepest sludge at the bottom of the pits of despair.
I've had people give me their last quarter. People who were no better off than me, giving up their next 2 meals. We all lived on Raman then, so at 10 cents a pack, a quarter could go a long way. Some of the best times were had at the worst of times. My wife and I met up with a trucker in Iowa once named Wendell. He drove us across a bit of the midwest and dropped us at a truckstop in Desmoines or some such armpit of a place.
Wendell was the personification of a 'good-ol-boy'. He didn't have any motives at all. He was just doing a nice thing for a couple of kids who needed a ride to wherever. He talked about his family and his job. He listened to our stories and was simply a hell of a guy. I think he was from Missouri. Along the way, Dawn played a couple songs on a harmonica, and Wendell loved them all. He said that he had always wanted to learn to play the harmonica.
When we got to a point where he was turning toward home, and we were continuing east, he looked for a safe place to let us out. As we came in to a truckstop, he put out a call on his CB in hopes of seeing us get a ride he could feel good about. Most of the replies were from those fuckertrucker types. You know the ones. The sleazeball assholes who drive cross country spreading STDs all the way home to their wives. Finally a sane and stable voice came over the speaker. We met the guy and he seemed OK. Before we left him, Dawn gave Wendell her harmonica.
The guy we rode with next got us all the was to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. His name was Renegade. That's all we knew him as. He was another Wendell type guy. A friend for life in ten minutes, and his a story in his own right.
Later.
BE NICE TO EACH OTHER FUCKERS.
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3 comments:
WOW...that takes me way, WAY back! Good Times, baby...Good Times.
awww.... Ok, so justdawn is your wife! hehe... slow here!
That's awesome, I wish I could remmeber I time that I would trust myself to pick up hitchhikers, or feel confident enough to take a ride with a stranger. Times have changed and I don't think I could do either.
Ya know Moo, I feel alot the same way now days. If I'm alone, I'll give Manson a ride; but if my kids are along, I'd probably drive past Ghandi. It was not that different then, we were just oblivious to the danger of hitching across the country,
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