FAYETTEVILLE, ARKANSAS – We left Dripping Springs, Texas
yesterday morning and headed for Fayetteville, Arkansas. We just put
“Fayetteville, AK” into our Garmin and let “Suzie,” as we call her, tell us how
to get there. It’s a long trip, we knew, about nine hours.
We looped around Austin to the west and were soon on the way
to Waco, and then into the heart of Dallas. Dallas is now huge, with glittering
skyscrapers that match Houston’s. The highways to the south of Dallas, where we
were, are all being rebuilt, and we were soon downtown in the center of
construction sites wondering how many of the detours and reroutes were known to
Suzie.
Cece is a skillful driver and Gus a fair navigator, and
somehow we made it through Dallas to the north of the city where all the ring
roads and interstates and other highways have not only been redone but designer
decorated—four and five stories of highways passing and swerving over each
other painted in a decorous red and green with stars. This is, William Ruckelshaus
once quipped of another road project, what God would do if he had money.
About this time we noticed that the radio was carrying ads
for Steinway pianos. Steinway ads on the radio! Who ever heard of such a thing!
So Rick Perry is right to rattle on about Texas prosperity. Go to the Philly
area for infrastructure crisis, but not Texas. And it is clear that what
America does when it gets money is to build a strip mall. This strip mall in
Texas stretches from Waco to almost the Oklahoma border. One struggles to find
a mile or two of open space. Consumerism, materialism, call it what you will,
it’s what we have in America instead of living in solidarity with each other.
We mentioned in an earlier post the feeling of change when
we moved across the border between Louisiana and Texas, but that was a subtle
shift, perhaps largely the work of our imaginations. But the shift between
Texas and Oklahoma is as sharp as a knife-edge. In the space of 25 miles one
moves from Texas prosperity to a region of beer and tobacco joints, non-branded
roadside eateries, used-equipment dealers and junkyards, sub-par housing and
trailer parks, and blank billboards The Oklahoma countryside, though, was quite
lovely and green and was a relief to see.
Soon we found ourselves in the most risky period of our
trip. Just as we entered a region of huge dam-created lakes, the Lake Eufaula
complex, with confining bridges, the skies darkened, car lights came on, and a
blinding, endless downpour commenced. Some motorists pulled over to wait it
out, but the 18-wheelers splashed on. We put on the hazard blinkers and crept
forward, as the big trucks came roaring by, dousing us.
Well, we are still here, so that worked out OK. Cece does
not let things like that bother her. Gus, however, was glued to the windshield trying to
figure out what disaster awaited us in the gloom ahead.
The region of Oklahoma north and west of the lakes is
totally different—big, successful looking cattle ranches, with extensive,
rolling pastures and gorgeous trees. We read about the drought in Oklahoma, but
that must be west of where we were. Eastern Oklahoma was wet and green. And,
once again, a bright, bright, sun-shiny day! We decided that we liked Oklahoma.
We know some great people from there. How such a place elects the biggest idiot
in the Senate is beyond us.
We headed east into Arkansas, relieved that Suzie had not
forgotten where to take us. The Oklahoma-Arkansas border near Fort Smith is as
inconsequential as most other US state borders.
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| Hi, Libby! |
We turned north near Fort Smith and headed for Fayetteville,
home of the Razorbacks. Later we would have a very fine Thai dinner in downtown
Fayetteville on Center Street near the town square. But to get there we had to
cross a region of mountains, the first mountains of our road trip, honest mountains
of which even Vermont would be proud. These mountains, which are called the
Boston Mountains, perhaps for some good reason, are the most western part of
the Ozarks. Spring has just come to the Ozarks, and the trees still sport all
shades of the color green—salad days in the forest. A handful of rivers launch
downhill in the Bostons, including the Buffalo, where we are headed.
We made it! We feel we’ve travelled through several not time
but cultural zones. America’s defining feature of the future, though, clearly
belongs to the strip mall—an endless recycling of the same eateries, lodgings,
convenience stores, boutiques, outlets, yard and garden centers, filling
stations, and big box stores—what a delight!
You may know already that here in NW Arkansas we are at the
heart of the new country. Tyson Chicken is in nearby Springdale and the
neighboring town north of Springdale is Bentonville, the home of Walmart.
You will enjoy a young Merle Haggard (1969) singing “Okie
from Muskogee” on You Tube. (Last minute edit: The New York Times reports today that the social values praised by Haggard have pretty much crumbled in Muskogee.) We went by Muskogee headed to Fort Smith. He
recorded it right after his release from San Quentin and was high on freedom.
And by all means don’t miss Emmy Lou and Willie singing
about Texas wildflowers and love. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIXjgSgSoTs
Thanks, Martha and Jim.
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