I wander America on a Harley Davidson motorcycle, sleep on couches and in fifty-dollar motel rooms, eat at Waffle House and Main Street cafes, and have conversations with people whose politics I might not agree with. These are our stories.
The Pit
After my driver’s license was suspended, I started hanging out nights at the Pit & Paddock. The Pit was a 3.2 joint on Snelling Avenue in St. Paul. It was deep and narrow with a black door, black walls, black ceiling, fluorescent lights hanging on chains, the...
Shade
Sunny, mid-80s, a break in the shade in the middle of Iowa farm country…
Ivory
It was 96 degrees yesterday in Montgomery, Alabama. I sat in the shade under the canopy of The Legacy Museum and had a conversation with the security guard. Her name is Ivory. We talked for an hour. She’s sixty-two and remembers as a child helping her...
Big Peach
This morning in Montgomery, Alabama, I had breakfast at Waffle House. The employees wore name tags: Bluelexis, The Goat, Tessa, Big Peach and Jason.
Naked
The Terrace Motel in Natchez, Mississippi costs forty-five dollars a night. Cash. No credit cards. I stayed two nights. Wayne lives at the Terrace Motel. He’s a concrete finisher. Standing behind him waiting to check in, I thought he was drunk, weaving and bracing...
Home of the Brave
Randy’s not tall, 5’6” or so. His left shoulder was badly hurt in an incident and is hunched and lower than his right shoulder causing him to lead with his left when he walks, like a boxer, the good shoulder back and cocked like he’s about to throw a haymaker. One...
The East St. Louis Monitor
Cairo, Illinois is an abandoned town. Closed buildings, one or two stories tall and built mostly of brick, abut the sidewalks on both sides of Washington Avenue, the main street through town. Besides an occasional aged car ducking in or out of a side street or a...
Judgement
For many years, I knew that there were culinary gems to be found in small town America. And for many years after that, I knew that there were no culinary gems to be found in small town America. I’m in Bluefield, West Virginia. Dinner at Jah’ Kater Kitchen is the gem...
WTF Motel
Two nights ago, my motel in Huntington, West Virginia overlooked a fast, busy, one-way, two lane thoroughfare. The speed limit was thirty-five, people were in a hurry, there was a lot of traffic, it was dusk. I was sitting on the balcony watching flatbed semis hauling...
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