Days Two-Hundred-Forty-One, Obiwan Kenobi

Find me at the Travelers Inn in Okeebochee, Florida.  I should feel guilty but I do not.  I was well overdue for a rinse.  And the TV is not very big.  It does not have remote control. 

Which may in the end be the saving of me.  That is what keeps me up nights.  Flipping up and down through the channels, looking for something to watch.  It's the impulse which glues us to slot machines.  We pin our hopes on the next spin.  It's the force that keeps me moving around.  It's why I get up in the morning.

Or the afternoon, as the case may be.  Time is a relative thing.  I was up fairly early today.  I hit the road with low expectations.  Some days are easy.  Some days are hard.  I never know how it will go.  But I had a bad feeling and I was covered with grit.  I dared not hope for the best.

Which shows what I know.  The miles flew by.  It was no easier than yesterday.  But I had a lot more progress to show.  This is an awfully big country.  And it won't walk itself.  I'm happiest when I put some miles behind me.

I stopped for breakfast a mile or two in, at a roadside service station.  Two sandwiches, not bad but not big, and a few jugs of CocaCola.  Calories are what I'm after.  Nutrition can see to itself.  Soon enough this walk will end.  I'll celebrate with vegetables.

I wasn't there long, an hour or so.  I met a few interesting people.  The Sri Lankan fellow who runs the place and an old biker from West Virginia.  But I wasn't ready to set up housekeeping.  I had a long way to go.

To Okeechobee and I hoped a laundromat.  And as it turned out a motel.  Traffic was heavier than yesterday.  Some truckers get Sundays off.   Twenty-two miles through wilderness.  The developers have not got here yet.  There are woods and the odd cattle ranch, what I think was a dairy farm. 

This was all ranchland a few years back.  You don't expect that from Florida.  But aside frombthe palm trees it looks like Montana, only a great deal greener.  Soggy, you might say, and humid at that.  It still wasn't so bad for walking.  My clothes were so dirty I didn't care.  I thought some sweat might do them good.

Some ten miles in I found another gas station.  They promised a restaurant too.  It didn't look likely bt I can't say for sure.  I was not allowed inside.  Turfed out, sent packing, turned away at the door.  They didn't want my kind there.  That has never happened before.  I must say it hurt my feelings.

I assume it is because I look like a hobo.  But hoboes, as a rule, skulk.  I walk tall and proud.  I limp just a little.  It wasn't too too far from town.  If it were I would have had to explain myself, to earn my right to spend money.  But I was free to turn and leave, I hope with my dignity.

I wish I could say I left quietly, that I turned the other cheek.  But I am but human.  I didn't hit anyone.  I did not overturn a display.  But I did share two words and gestured with two hands to make sure I'd made my point.

Kwai Chang Caine would have just looked down.  He was not burdened by pride.  But I find it easier to be like Jesus when people are nice to me.  I would have much liked to punch that guy.  That's a dark part of my heart.  I hope a real hobo comes by and burns his place to the ground.

It's the hobo thing that offends people.  I do my best to put them at their ease.  But there are the few who express their fear with scorn and by picking on me.  And that offends me too.  I resent the assumption that I won't pound them into mush.  Of all the ways I could react, that is right there on the list.  Only one or two notches below "cry like little girl."

Hurt my feelings, will you, you bastards.  You'd think I would shave my beard.  So you could see the gentleman scholar beneath.  I'd just as soon let it grow.  I earned it.  I am a man of the road.  Let folks make their own assumptions.  I'll shave it off when I get to Key West.  I'll have tan lines on my face.

I'll have earned those too.  I should have something to show for Walking Across America.  They don't give prizes for this.  I think they should.  Pizza coupons or something.  A commemorative T-shirt and a new yellow hat, in case I want to do this again.

I arrived in town with daylight left.  I could have gone five more miles.  But I needed a shower.  I earned that, as well.  I needed to get laundry done.  And get fed, but I did not do that.  I'm having cash flow problems.  Tomorrow may turn out just a bit better.  Here's hoping that I get fed. 

Goodnight.

I SAW a big turtle in the canal.  Any movement there catches my eye.  He was green-black and smooth-shelled.  He looked a like some doughboy's army helmet, but bigger by just a bit.  As if Charlie Brown had served in the Great War.  I know for a fact Snoopy did.

I MET too an armadiller.  I walked over to say hi.  And got to withing six inches of him.  He would not be frightened off.  I could have picked him up if I'd wanted.  I didn't want.  They might bite.

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Day Two-Hundred-Forty, Yeehaw

I didn't accomplish much today.  It was a failure of imagination.  Many failures are.  I came up with a plan and stuck to it loyally.  Long after it turned out to be stupid.  Many of my plans are.

The idea was to hike up to Yeehaw Junction and install myself at a truckstop.  I'd have a shower and then maybe breakfast.  I'd get some washing done. And get back on the road by noon or so and put in some token miles.  Fifteen, maybe twenty of them, depending on how well I felt.  As it was I walked a dozen, and did very little else.

There was no truckstop at Yeehaw Junction.  It's a few more miles up the road.  And out of my way.  I had no reason to stick around as long as I did.  But I was there until two, sipping soda and watching the cars roll by.

And the bikes.  In a lot of ways it was like being in Montana again.  A crossroads in the middle of nowhere, defined by one ancient saloon.  The Desert Inn started life as a whorehouse in 1880 or so.  Now it is a restaurant and bar.  They will give you breakfast cheap.  And lunch, it turns out.  In the interim I was at the gas station.  Out front at a filthy picnic table, winning friends and making people nervous.

Had I come a week later I'd have been just in time for the bluegrass festival.  You know I'm nutty for banjo music, but it just wasn't to be.  I was befriended by Cricket, who works inside.  I chatted with the Bob the Sheriff.  Who did not let his professional curiosity prevent him from being kind.

"Be careful when you get to Miami."  I get that one a lot.  It seems that once I get there I'll have every chance of being killed.  Surely the dangers are exaggerated.  No, not at all, said Bob.

I spent all morning studying my map without reaching any good conclusions.  I invite you all once again to call up Google Earth.  Have a look at Dade County.  And tell me how I can get through there without being in the thick of things.  If I go wide left into the Everglades there is no way I can keep fed.  Though there is every chance I'll be eaten by gators.

"It's the snakes you've got to watch out for."

Great.

Indiana Jones was afraid of snakes.  So are most chimpanzees.  So it's not as if I'm alone in this.  I am in good company.  It's well for you, safe in your armchair.  I'm the one knee-deep in vipers.  Or sociopathic gangsters or ravening hogs.  The gators remain a concern.  And the skeeters are chewing on me.  It's not easy being James.

And therein you see my heroism, unlikely though it may be.  It's not hard to Walk Across America, but it is hard for me.  I'm unathletic.  Lazy, you might say.  Beset by girlish fears.  But I'm still out here, aren't I?  Far better men would have quit.

So Miami, hell.  I'll figure it out.  In the end I always do.  And if I'm eaten or constricted or stabbed the joke will be on you.  I'll die as a kind of parable.  I'll remind people not to try.  Look what happened to James, you'll all say.  We'd better just stay home.

Miami.  What a mess.  And I really could have done with a shower.  I'm working on one hell of a stink.  I'm not a fastdious person.  But I do like to bathe regularly; I'm just silly that way.  And I'm running low on socks.  And I'm fast running out of shorts.

Okeechobee is twenty miles off.  I may have messed up some there.  Unless I really haul ass tomorrow I'll be too late to get laundry done.  Maybe I'll get lucky and have a rotten day.  Maybe I'll stop short of town.  But I also have got to get fed.  I did buy a sandwich for tommorow.

It was delicious.

Find me now on the edge of Highway 441.  You could see my tent if you tried.  But I'm on the far side of a deep canal.  I like to think of it as my moat.  The night is warm.  The stars are beautiful and I'm protected by crocodiles.

I SAW another one of those feral hogs, again thoroughly dead.  You should see the teeth on them critters.  I hope I don't meet a live one.

I SAW TOO my first armadiller.  I have seen thousands of them.  Literal thousands, but this one was alive.  He was smaller than most.  About the size of a football and of about the same shape.  Rather a cute little feller.  He ran in little hops like a lamb.  I like armadillers.

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Day One-Hundred-Forty-Five, Fo Fum

Find me in a Subway--in a Walmart, no less--sheltering from the storm. Or at least the cold. I've been here a while. It may or may not be raining. But you know you've taken some wrong turns in life when such as this becomes your Oasis.

I woke up I guess at seven or so. I couldn't be sure of the time. My little computer was so low on juice I didn't dare turn it on. And there was no sun to go by. The sun has gone south, a lot faster than I can travel. Squinting in the gloom I studied my map and reached no very cheerful conclusions.

I did too have a look at my shoes. They were worse than I thought. They had suffered a catastrophic failure and were about to fall off my feet. I could tape them up and hope for the best. Or I could hike back into town. Or I could see what Walmart could do. I decided to give them a shot.

I got hiking boots for thirty-five bucks. You'd think I would be better pleased. It is a fraction of what I have been paying. But them high-dollar shoes have not always been kind. I am hoping these will be worse. Because if I don't suffer, and suffer indeed, I'll know that I've been paying too much.

They don't have to take me further than Cape Girardeau, the next good-sized town on my road. I'll be damned if I know how I'm going to get there. I'm pretty sure it will be cold. But this is the price I pay, I know, for goofing around in Montana.

I wasn't really goofing around. I was doing my very best. It is just that my best was pitiful. I'll do a lot better next time. A few more twenty-five mile days early on, and I'd be sunning it on the gulf coast. I hear the hotels are cheap down there. Because of all the tar.

I bought too a few more pairs of socks. It was that or find a laundry. And one of those magical undershirts that are supposed to keep you dry in the cold. It didn't cost fifty bucks, it only cost ten, plus a two-dollar premium. For being of abnormal size. I'm a towering giant down here.

Fear me.

I got some underpants of the same material, if I may say "underpants" here. Underpants, underpants. Underpants, Ha! I'm tired of censoring myself. Bear with my off-color outbursts. This is a grown-up blog. But I will not describe the particular chafing which compelled me to buy new shorts.

So in the end I spent as much as I would to sleep in a motel. Which is a shame. It's awful cold. I'd like to sleep indoors. Though I did stay warm enough last night. I'll credit my teddy bear pants. Handmade by my dear friend Marne. Thank-you. You are a hero.

But it will be colder still tonight, and evil cold tomorrow. Well below freezing. Cryogenic. Cry, cry again. It will be a nice test of my resolve, and of my sleeping bag. It is made out of ground-up ducks. Let's hope they did not die in vain.

So it's ten-thirty now and all I've accomplished is to walk a mile and a half. The wrong way. But I bought new boots, Walmart boots, and breakfasted at the in-house Subway. I had some sort of breakfasty concoction, and between you and me, it wasn't bad. Now I'm drinking cup after cup of their coffee and dreading whatever's to come.

That's the morning report, at any rate. Peace.

*****************

It's four-thirty now. For the last lonesome hour I've been at a gas station. In Loose Creek, Missouri. My road has narrowed somewhat. There is here an Ozarky vibe. I feel foreign and city slick. Everyone looks like Randy Quaid. Whom I've always admired, but still, but still. I'm the only one who ain't kin.

I've been wearing my raincoat to break the wind. Underneath my fleece shirt is sopping. GORE-TEX®. GORE-TEX®, pshaw. It's a conspiracy. They are trying to give me the sniffles.

It has not topped forty-five today. I'm beginning to think it might not. Nor will it for a couple more days. Hot diggity damn but it's cold. Every time I smell wood smoke I think of fires I've known and shed a lonesome tear.

So here's the plan: I walk on to Linn and stop just short of town. Then if I am feverish tomorrow I can check into a motel. If not I'll do laundry and eat hash browns and climb back out on the road. Though I rather wish I could have a shower. Don't love me less, but I stink.

Good news, good news. My little computer has upped it's prediction for tomorrow. It has dipped as low as twenty-eight. Now it's at thirty-four. We'll see, we'll see. It's a lesson to young walkers. Don't dilly-dally in Montana.

******************

Now it's back down to thirty again. Poop.

*******************

I hiked six or seven miles into Linn. It was daylight but it was dark. My road is narrow and traffic moves fast. I was ready to dive for the ditch. But the trees are pretty and I like these steep hills. They take my mind off the cold.

I could not find a good place to camp. "Oh, darn," I thought to myself. "Now I'll have to get a room and take three or four hot baths. And eat pizza and watch TV and sleep in a proper bed. With the baseboard heater going full blast and the cooler running on low."

But that misfortune did not befall me. I found a nice place for my tent. Not five-hundred yards from the edge of town, in amongst the trees. If it were less perfect I could have ignored it, but I've got my hobo pride. I put on dry clothes and climbed into my sack. Who knows but I might survive.

I did not make too much progress today, maybe seventeen forward miles. I was busy backtracking and buying shoes and trying in vain to get warm. My new shoes rather sliced up my feet but I am well used to that.

Tomorrow I'll get some washing done. Linn has a McDonald's. I can all but see it through the trees. That means it's a pretty big town. And so will have a laundromat. I'll blow two hours there. Which will make tomorrow another short day. I'm too cold to care.

I SAW ANOTHER one of those furry rugby ball beasties. I think they might be woodchucks. They are slow and clumsy and look kind of dumb. They are my woodland brothers.

FOR TWO OR THREE days I have seen a new beast, crushed on the side of the road. So well crushed I could not guess what they once were. My best guess was dinosaurs. But I think, and I know I'm awful far north, they might be armadillers. Or really big turtles with long tails. Or dinosaurs.

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