Do I Turn Here????

The best way to get to Boyle, Mississippi from Houston, Texas will drive you ‘nuts,’ if you are a big fan of the Interstate freeway system. There’s no getting on The “5”, drive like hell until you get to your destination…ain’t gonna happen.

Once you get onto the Beltway in Houston and head north, you soon discover the Beltway isn’t quite finished. So you get through all the stoplights and finally get to the ‘59’, the Fun has just begun.

But, hey, let’s just leap forward 7 hours to travel 350 miles so far… to where you make the cutoff from I-20 onto Highway 165 outside of Monroe, Louisiana. Here you head northeast towards Arkansas, one red light after another awaits you for the first 15 miles.

Apparently, each one-mile stretch between lights is a NASCAR training ground and if you aren’t prepared to “floor it”, be ready for Bubba to drive his Ford 250 into your tail pipe. Stopping on this stretch of the Talladega for fuel will require a 4-wheel drift into the local Shell, accompanied by an air horn blast from a semi with a “How’s my driving?” bumper sticker on his “reefer” unit.

Getting gas, of course, is half the reason for the stop and one can only hope, the restrooms are, well, if not clean, actually not a testing ground for the Disease Control Center.

A few years back, my good friend, Howard and I drove from Charleston, South Carolina to Los Angeles. It was on this trip, I discovered that the Big Truck Stops are not the place to find an undiscovered hidden gem for fine cuisine and clean restrooms. I actually convinced myself a few more miles on the road were certainly better than using these ‘state of the art facilities.’

Well, regardless, 165 consist of a series of small towns, then wide-open stretches and then more small towns. Cruise Control is an option that you don’t get to use much. Just outside of Bonita is a ‘flashing sign’ that says “Speed Trap Ahead”…not a little sign, but a big billboard. Apparently, somebody is really annoyed with the local police or this is a very clever ploy by the local village to discourage “Yankees” from blowing through town. Worked for me.

When you get into Arkansas, you enter the land of catfish farms, rice fields and road construction. The Southern term “fixin to go” as it turns out must apply to all the roadwork in the South. Males in matching outfits do much of this work, not so much Nomex, as stripped pants and shirts. In Arkansas, these matching outfits come in black and white stripes; while in Mississippi, they are more of a green and white tone. Mississippi is more fashion aware it would seem.

The thing about rice farms is they seem to attract bugs... very large bugs with wings that seem to enjoy ending their short lives by dive-bombing onto your windshield. I believe you can pick up around 75 pounds of these little critters on your grill.

Ok, then…so we cross the Mississippi River on a 2-lane steel bridge that was built roughly around the Civil War or so it would seem. There is no way to get across this narrow, wobbly thing without a Semi suddenly appearing from the other direction. I am convinced there is a spotter and his sole job is to send Big Rigs in your direction at the narrowest point of the bridge. I always think of the movie “Duel” when crossing this bridge.

We finally make it to Greenville, Mississippi. We are now in the official home of NO Starbucks and drinking water is only that in name. We decide to stop at the local Kroger’s to stock up on some supplies. As we get there, we notice a local TV film crew and opt out of stopping and proceed onto Boyle.

We decide to hit the super duper, really freaking BIG Wal-Mart in Cleveland to get the essentials we will need. On the way back to Boyle, we decide to refuel and look for a carwash. There are 2 stations in town that have “Drive Thru” carwashes, the Exxon and the Shell stations.

Unfortunately, during one night, someone had stolen every piece of the carwash, except the building, at the Exxon. I suspect the Shell folks on this one.

We fill up our car and enter the car wash to remove the dead bugs. As the Vortex blowers shake rattle and roll the vehicle, I notice that we need to exit the carwash down a red clay, dirt road. Genius marketing plan! It’s not like you can use the carwash at the Exxon to rinse off the newly acquired dirt. As I said, I suspect the Shell folks of the aforementioned larceny of the Exxon Carwash.

So we get to our destination and settle down. After a fine meal, we watch the local news. It seems that the local Delta news hour has a segment that is a bit of investigative news reporting.

Instead of “60 Minutes,” it is more like 60 seconds. The name of the piece is “What’s That, You Say?”

Cut to the local Kroger’s in Greenville where the “Mike Wallace” of the Delta is doing a story on folks who merely drive across parking lots and don’t use the clearly marked lanes. Unbelievably, they simply drive over empty parking spots and make u-turns at random… if you look closely, you can see a black SUV with Texas plates pulling a clearly illegal u-turn …

To my Girls

Lately I have been doing a great deal of thinking in regards to the changes and choices we face in our lives. Maybe for some it is the mixed feeling of moving on from something they have done all their life and now a new chance beckons. Perhaps watching parents as they age and begin that last walk has gotten my attention, dignity is all I pray for them. I think about so many friends I have seen go through changes in their lives and I am amazed at their courage. I think about the joy for life my oldest daughter has given me and the "awesome" gift she has given with my grandchildren. I often think the beautiful woman, who is my wife, will sober up and show me the door. But mostly I find myself thinking about the choices we make and the roads we travel down and I’m not sure better words were ever written then those by Bruce Springsteen.

The Price You Pay:
Bruce Springsteen


You make up your mind, you choose the chance you take
You ride to where the highway ends and the desert breaks
Out on to an open road you ride until the day
You learn to sleep at night with the price you pay

Now with their hands held high, they reached out for the open skies
And in one last breath they built the roads they'd ride to their death
Driving on through the night, unable to break away
From the restless pull of the price you pay

CHORUS
Oh, the price you pay, oh, the price you pay
Now you can't walk away from the price you pay

Now they'd come so far and they'd waited so long
Just to end up caught in a dream where everything goes wrong
Where the dark of night holds back the light of day
And you've gotta stand and fight for the price you pay

CHORUS

Little girl down on the strand
With that pretty little baby in your hands
Do you remember the story of the promised land
How he crossed the desert sands
And could not enter the chosen land
On the banks of the river he stayed
To face the price you pay

So let the games start, you better run you little wild heart
You can run through all the nights and all the days
But just across the county line, a stranger passing through put up a sign
That counts the men fallen away to the price you pay,
and girl before the end of the day,
I'm gonna tear it down and throw it away

Covered in the Manual

“A wink is as good as a nod to a blind horse”…… Rod Stewart


The Congress, House of Representatives and Senate, are a group of people from all over the country whose sole purpose is to represent the people from their District and to maintain a civil and honorable reputation to the country they serve. There are no concerns for party lines since this would defeat the overall good of the nation. Misconduct or accepting influence from outside groups will not be tolerated, and can result in disciplinary actions up to and including termination.

Ok, then, who is really that shocked to find a “Text Messaging Pedophile” in Congress? Can we see a show of hands?
Thanks.

Mark Foley is an idiot at best and the other options are not much better. I would argue that Foley is not the “issue” as much a system that allowed him to exist. As the saying goes “any team is only as good as its weakest player”.

Well, thank God that only happened in this one isolated case, not like it could happen anywhere else. I mean seriously now… what a nightmare this might be.

Try to imagine working with someone you "kinda" know has some ‘weird’ little quirks. The occasional ‘off colored’ story, a slightly askew view of people from varying ethnic backgrounds or perhaps even that extremely rare “social gift”… which clearly is not likely in today’s climate.

I’m sure all of us would jump and make that person face the consequences of their behavior. Lord knows that person would be dealt with swiftly and so on.

Rest assured there are policies written, discussions given on this very subject, and should something actually happen…and let’s be honest here, they rarely do. Things would be dealt with appropriately. Or are they? Not like we are simply going to ignore this issue or just take the person aside and give them a friendly “heads up” on the rumored behavior.

Of course, another known fact is that bad behavior is almost always only found in the lower ranks in many places. It is an unwritten law, a bit like a “Man Law” that once you reach a certain level in your job (whatever your job might be) you behave better with each promotion. It’s true. Why would I make that up?

It’s not like someone in Congress knew about Foley’s action and merely said in an accepting tone, “Oh, that’s just Mark.”

Nice Hat

We went up to the Delta, in Mississippi, again last week. It was my third time in less than 7 months. This now equals the total trips I have made to the region in the previous 15 years. Going up there now is not as interesting as the first trip to the home of the Blues. It’s a bit like the 3rd or 4th date and some of the quirks begin to move from interesting to odd or even annoying.

I think that is the reason you should always think twice about moving to that favorite vacation spot. Visiting is one thing; but, everyday might prove to be a different story.

Regardless, it was a trip filled with good visits and excellent food; albeit, the “Zone” diet can only be described as the area of the house you eat all the food. My mother-in-law is a wizard in the kitchen (her Chinese kitchen is in on the other side of the carport from the house and makes me think of Emeril on ‘speed’). She can have 2 turkeys in the oven, 4 pots boiling on the stove and her wok in full gear, all the while as she grabs fresh vegetables from her expansive garden next to the kitchen.

Momma grew up in a small village in Southeast China; she did not come from wealth and survived the Japanese invasion and brutality prior to WWII. She takes very little for granted and nothing is assumed.

My in-laws are the classic American success story. With hardly a penny to their name, they built a grocery store business in the Mississippi Delta. And with blood, sweat, and patience, made ‘something’ out of what would seem like an impossible formula for many of us.

PBS once did a special on the ‘Delta Chinese’ and my wife’s family was very much the corner stone of this story. As my wife and I drove through the small town she grew up in, a town that now holds the distinction of “the highest murder rate in Mississippi”; we passed the hubcap store, the rows and rows of abandoned storefronts and the Quickstop Gas station that seems to serve as the social spot for most of the town’s youths. You would think twice about stopping for gas.

I told my wife I thought her the bravest woman I have ever known. Coming from what has the feel of an area in America that time has forgotten to where she is now, took more courage than I could ever imagine.

All that being said, there is one thing I always marvel at when it comes to my mother-in-law; nothing and I mean absolutely nothing, goes to waste. Over the years, a gate on the fence adjacent to the kitchen had blown down. Momma had made ‘do’ with what she had…propped it back up and attached it to the remaining fence and with an assortment of stakes and bricks to keep it in place. A tough job for most, even tougher when you are 5’ tall, weighing 100 pounds soaking wet and are pushing 80.

It didn’t seem like a big problem to her. I decided to fix the fence last week and it took me a better part of the morning just removing the wires, stakes, nails and garbage bag ties that held the gate in place. As I took this puzzle apart, Momma was right behind me picking up the “junk” pieces and carefully folding and saving each and every piece for her next project. Later in the day, I would see Momma cooking away, her hair covered by a carefully folded brown paper bag from Kroger’s to preserve her ‘hairdo’. Like I said, nothing goes to waste.

After working on the fence, I showered and found some Advil for my aching back. I went outside to have a cigarette only to discover Momma pushing my father-in-law in his wheel chair up and down the 1/4-mile driveway to make sure he got his fresh air. Apparently, she can push a wheel chair at a pace faster than I would care to walk… even without pushing something.