Until I Came To Hope
As if you didn't already know this, there was no bacon at the Deluxe Continental Breakfast at the luxury business suites motel somewhere near Nashville. There was however a covered tureen full of sausage gravy that had its own silver ladle and a stand for it and looked pretty alright, pristine even, at 5:30 a.m. with only me and that other grumpy malcontented Boomhauer mumbling early rising guy slopping gravy over our dry biscuits, but I would not want to be at the later end of that breakfast because oh Lord the disgusting things that would run through my mind just looking at that sausage gravy-caked ladle after 5 hours of use, and the gravy would be splattered all over everything because people staying here are taking a vacation from raising their children. Also I had a sweet roll and some apple juice. No coffee. I already had coffee in the room. I was going to leave but instead got up the nerve to try the do-it-yourself Belgian Waffle maker. I read the directions while pouring the Styrofoam cup of mix over the hot griddle. It sizzled. Close the griddle, check. Spin the griddle upside down and wait two minutes, check. An imbecile could make these waffles. I tore off and folded large pieces of the butter and syrup soaked grilled dough and poked them into my wide open mouth with a white plastic fork. I had another apple juice, picked up an orange for the road, and beat it for the already packed Jeep out front.
I took the loop around Nashville and about midway to Memphis stopped for gas. While standing there I could see off in the distance a billboard that said I Love You and it was signed by Jesus Christ. I contemplated briefly the legal ramifications of signing somebody's name without their permission. Under I Love You it said Come To Know Me. I thought that was a little provocative but good advice just the same. I took a picture of the sign. There was a MacDonalds attached to this gas station and a sign in the window that said free wifi. I pulled around back and posted the picture. Then I drove towards Memphis with its ill-conceived and notably bad interruption of Interstate 40. The Peabody Hotel was visible in the distance, from the elevated interstate. I saw the ducks on TV once. A glass pyramid on the river is also visible. Half way over the Mississippi River bridge leaving Memphis you enter Arkansas.
In Little Rock there is a very big Pentecostal church.
I ate the last of my toasted peanut butter crackers from the Lance Corp. And a slice of orange. A chunk of beef jerky. A sip of water. And a Dentyne Ice. I stopped being on mountain roads somewhere after Nashville, I noticed somewhere near the exit for Hot Springs, Arkansas.
I headed off for Hot Springs but then turned around and got back on Interstate 30, frightened by the audacity of my decision making.
On the XM radio I moved between Bluesville and Fred. Fred was for a while featuring the year 1978, which was the last year before I took to dropping out earnestly. I remember a lot of buzz about the Talking Heads back then. When not listening to those two I was at 164 listening to old time radio. The Lone Ranger, Gunsmoke, Dr. Kildaire, Sam Spade, a Ray Bradbury story, stuff like that.
I thought I might just make it to Dallas and be there a day early and I would eat Mexican food but then I decided on Texarkana which was a solid goal until I came to Hope and that is where I stopped.
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