Out of Paradise - Ch. 4 - Kansas City Here I Come

Kansas City Here I Come

I spend the rest of the afternoon and into the night cruising down Interstate 70, past farmland after farmland after silo after barn, Country Western radio stations fading in and out of range, towering across Kansas in my regal shotgun perch atop Bob's 18 wheel Kenworth and over the miniature sedans and station wagons we pass along the way.

It's getting late - been dark a long time now - must be at least the third or fourth Country Western radio station Bob's tuned into. He pumps his brakes with a loud hisss, downshifts the rig with a double clutched rev and pulls off into an I70 truck stop somewhere this side of Kansas City. He fills it up, that takes about 20 minutes or more, and we go into the truck stop's diner. Great, I hadn't eaten since Colby and I’m famished. After a hearty truck stop burger and fries, Bob orders a truck stop room for the night and asks if I need a place to crash. You know me...

The room has 1 double bed, just enough space on the floor between it and the door to spread my North Face sleeping bag out, a small table, a chair and a toilet and shower. No sooner had I started unraveling my North Face sleeping bag out on the floor between the bed and the door, when Bob beckons come-on-ingly toward the bed with a nod of his head and a slight rise of his eyebrows. I roll my eyes back in their sockets with an, "Oh no, not again" expression, shake my head back and forth and continue unraveling my North Face sleeping bag out on the floor between the bed and the door.

Bob gets more persistent, coaxing me with, "Come on, there's plenty of room," and I, even more persistently and vigorously shake my head side to side going, "No, no, no. This is fine, this is fine, I'm cool, I'm cool."

Bob gets up from the corner of the bed, takes a step toward me, I stop unraveling my North Face sleeping bag out on the floor between the bed and the door, throw my hands up defensively in front of me going, "Yo dude, chill."

Bob takes another step toward me. I push his outstretched arms away in a defensive swipe, dodge his oncoming charge and push him away in a judoesque follow through sending him crashing to the floor. I retract my half unraveled North Face sleeping bag up off the floor between the bed and the door, grab the shoulder harness of my backpack sitting at my feet, sling it on my shoulder and bolt out the door faster than Ben Johnson on steroids (oh, wait a minute, he was on steroids).

Terrific. Here I am, after midnight, with a half unraveled North Face sleeping bag in my hand and a backpack slung over my shoulder standing outside a gay truck driver's motel room door at an I70 truck stop somewhere this side of Kansas City. Fucking terrific. I find a dark, secluded recess within the truck stop's perimeter, drop my pack and my half unraveled North Face sleeping bag on the ground, sit down, fish around inside my pack for yesterday's issue of the Denver Post, a packet of Zigzags and roll a joint. The next morning at the first sign of light, amid the pungent odor and purring rumble of idling diesel engines humming in the parking lot beside me, I raise my head off the hard asphalt mattress that served as my bed for the night, roll my North Face sleeping bag up, tie it to its place at the bottom of my pack and go inside the diner for a cup of coffee, looking over my shoulder, making sure to avoid Bob at all costs. I finish my coffee, pay the waitress her ten cents and go out to the truck stop's on ramp to I70 heading east.

Not much later, a Kenworth pulls out of the lot and approaches in my direction. Oh, fuck, that can't be...? Hisss, Chooo, Earkkk. The rig comes to a stop next to me and the passenger seat door swings open. Thank God, it's a woman. "On my way to Chicago, if you like," she says, bent over the passenger seat looking down at me on the curb. "Chicago it is," I say as I grab the hand rail of the rig, sling my pack inside the cab and hoist myself aboard.

She’s a no nonsense, heavyset, brick house of a woman named Barb with a Chicago Bulls cap pulled down over a pony tail sticking out the back, a handkerchief tied around her neck and handled her rig like The Hulk handling Tinker Toys. I'm telling her about my mission to the Matterhorn and she's telling me how she got into trucking with her husband, Floyd - and we roll down I70 and through the heart of America. The hours pass, Kansas City, St. Louis and Springfield all become distant blurs on the western horizon as the Chicago skyline comes into view. Not wanting to get caught up in its throng and mayhem, I bid Barb adieu and hitch my way around its outskirts. My last ride of the day drops me just outside of Gary, Indiana. It's nighttime now and a cold November rain is leaking through my waterproof poncho. I talk the manager at the first Motel 6 I see down to 5 dollars for a room - the first night I've actually paid for a bed since my outset. The next day blurs by as does Toledo and Cleveland and Pittsburgh. The following night finds me spread out in my North Face sleeping bag in the bed of a Dodge pick-up truck traversing Pennsylvania and into New York State.