Ode to the Road

Roads fascinate me. American interstates in particular seem endless, lined with unlimited potential. I love the subtle thrum of the road’s rhythm up my back as I drive, the soothing hum of miles passing beneath my feet. It’s the safest space I know. I can sing, scream, cry, listen to the radio or a story or just embrace the sound of the powerhouse beneath the hood. The temperature changes at my whim. Sometimes I alternate: heat, air conditioning, heat, air conditioning, just because I can. The world’s restaurants parade by like a continent-sized food-court, and no one will know if my diet was broken or not. Junk food seems excusable and guilt-free. At home I have responsibilities, at my destination I have tasks, but the road in between lies in a place with neither duty or identity, where only freedom lives.

I love to drive at night. It feels like getting away with something. Long stretches of Midwestern highway are unremarkable in the dark. Except for the occasional barnyard light, you would start to think that you were stationary, unmoving as the velvety darkness swept over you. In the early morning hours, truckers are my only companions on the road. All the vacationers and people moving have pulled into the Motel 6’s and Super 8’s for the night. Their huddled cars and dark windows are quickly swept into the rearview mirror. I slip past them, anonymous, invisible. I could be anyone, no one, just a bit of flotsam floating along on the great stream of highway. I can make great time on the dark, empty roads.

I enjoy looking at the big semis, the Peterbilts and Kenworths in the daytime. They are often beautifully painted, with little decals on the door telling me what state they’re based in. Many have adorned their big mud flaps with chrome women or cartoon characters. But at night they really come alive. Some trucks have more lights than a carnival, a spectacular show going down the road. When they get together in a convoy, it looks like the circus is coming to town. Such gatherings seem like islands of gaiety when you’re traveling down the dark road.

Truck stops seem miraculous in the night. Every glowing sign signals a magical oasis that smells like gas fumes and cigarette smoke. I like to wander the aisles, look at the leather purses and CB radios, listen to the shower announcements and glance into the grubby truckers’ lounges. The truckers themselves, all coffee stains and tanned left elbows, half-squashed cigarette packs rolled up in their sleeves, squint at me like gruff but kindly uncles. Theirs is a community to which I feel a certain kinship. I wander off to study the state-shaped magnets and sarcastic bumper stickers.

I could be anyone. The attendants don’t know me. Sometimes I tell them outrageous stories or buy random collections of one-dose medicines with furtive glances around me. Sometimes I have an accent, asking for directions in Pidgin English, studying the county phone book. Sometimes I limp. I wonder: how would a serial killer walk? A battered woman, fleeing an abusive husband, would she study the clerk’s nametag or keep her eyes on the counter? Would a runaway kid buy Mountain Dew or Yoo-hoo? Would a wealthy, kept woman buy anything? I could be any of these people. Sometimes I pretend I am. I’m sure they have all passed through this brightly lit, glassed-in oasis at various times. Then I’m off again, pulling onto the on-ramp, fading away into the darkness.

Sometimes I dance in my seat, throwing my hair around, mouthing the words, so that the family wandering down the slow lane in the mini-van can look and laugh at me. Sometimes I play Mary had a Little Lamb on the rumble strip at the edge of the road by changing my speed to alter the note. I make faces at the little kids looking out their back window at me, and bark at dogs sitting in the back seat. I turn up the tunes and let ACDC and my subwoofer roll right over the rap thumping out of that ratty little Volvo. I ridicule the boxy little hybrids and runt enviro-cars, laughing obnoxiously with the biggest gestures I can manage. The drivers of these ugly little death traps should know that they are being mocked. The road is about power, and they disgrace it.

I have had people ask me whether I’m afraid to drive long distances by myself, or whether I get bored, and the answer is ‘absolutely not.’ I have often had the thought, ‘hey, if I leave now, I could be in Tennessee by morning.’ A half-hour later, I’m on the road for an eleven-hour drive. A truck and a highway create the purest form of freedom I know. It’s hard to imagine anything less scary. There’s no chance of getting bored. It’s not like sitting in a room watching TV.

The road holds a certain magic, and I am not the only one to have thought so. America has some wonderful roadside tributes. If you ever pass that way, I recommend the Traffic-cone building in Whites Creek, Tennessee, and the Ozymandias legs in Amarillo Texas. While you’re there, check out the Floating Mesa. There’s also the Disco Chicken of Charlotte, North Carolina and the Tee Pee Curious on Route 66 in Tucumcari, New Mexico. Cadillac Ranch, where ten graffitied Cadillacs are buried nose-down in packed Texas clay, is practically a site of pilgrimage. How could anyone believe the road is boring?

I wonder if people have become afraid of freedom. They need the reassurance of confining rooms, the regular pablum of the television set. They want the imprisonment of consistent commutes, fearing what they would do on an open road. They may vaguely want the destination, but they think of the road as ‘scary’ and ‘boring.’ They might be forced to raise their eyes and see the world. Maybe they are right to be afraid. Some images live with you forever.

I have this persistent fantasy. When I get close to my destination, whether I’ve been driving for 15 minutes or 11 hours, I want to keep driving. I think about passing my exit, driving on and on. I think about traveling highways that I’ve never seen. Sometimes it’s an hour or two before I manage to turn around and go back to my destination. I want to keep going, to live in a constantly mobile world of truck stops and pavement, to drive into a bright future without limits. I wonder that the hardships of travelling are so much easier than the routines of home.