Dave Johnson's Storyville

Leaving the nest unattended

2011-12-15T11:12:00.000-08:00

After 50 hours in New York City — to get out of the neighborhood and take in a couple of plays — my wife and I returned home, where we had left our nineteen-year-old son Cale to his own devices. His older sister thought us crazy. And so began our second journey, an investigation, sniffing for clues as to what happened in our absence. Hmm… clue number one: a strange car sits in the drive.

Clue two: We get blasted by an overwhelming odor as we open the front door. Room freshener. ”Oust” Surface Disinfectant & Air Sanitizer. OK, Cale and his bros tried. Must have used five cans of the stuff. This explains the one, slightly ominous text I received from Cale in NYC the night before: “Dad, when will you be home?”

I did not text or otherwise attempt to contact Cale in the two nights we were out of town. No news is good news. No calls to my cell from the cops, the mayor, some attorney, a reporter, the emergency room, one of the neighbors. Cale is nineteen, soon to begin his sophomore year in college. His bros are eighteen, nineteen, twenty. For all intents and purposes, unless catastrophe strikes, they are beyond lectures. And if I had put in a call to Cale, I would have gotten jive. “Yo, Cale, how’s it going?” “C’mon dad, it’s all good. We’re just chillin’. What’d you think we’d be doing? Peace.”

Clue three: All my framed photographs are missing from the living room and dining room. Responsible thinking. The way was cleared for bro wrestling, dancing, boogie down productions, whatever.

Clue three: As soon as we arrive back home Anthony stumbles up from the basement like something out of the Night of the Living Dead. The Man Cave down there, a tight circle of Adirondack chairs, beach chairs, plastic white lawn chairs, a bare light bulb hanging from the wooden rafters, and an ancient church pew strewn with hip hop and rock CDs, is a semi-partitioned dump, concrete floor, assorted frayed wires and plumbing piping running along the exposed ceiling. It is about ten feet wide by fifteen feet deep. Concrete block walls. Someone forgot to spray “Oust” in the Man Cave.

Clue three: A man/boy’s body is stretched across a bed in one of the bedrooms. He died with his boots on, and all his clothes. Out cold. He does have a pulse.

Clue four: What are a couple of 12-inch screwdrivers doing in the kitchen and dining room? Turns out one of the bros locked himself in the bathroom, and they tried to pry him out with pliers.

Clue five: both our dogs are still alive. And I find no dog poop on the carpet.

More than once I’ve wondered: why is our 1950s ranch house bro central? Cale has bros who live in McMansions with built-in pools, patios, family room basements, landscaped acres of yard, entertainment rooms, home theatres. I think I know the attraction. At our place all the bros jam in around the flat screen or down in the Man Cave. They are more nostalgic than I think. For something retro, something that I cannot put a finger on.

Clue six: What is the turtle and his large, heavy tank doing in our back bedroom? Cale says later he needed to clear some space out. For a PlayStation convention? Smackdown wrestling?

Clue seven: An unopened box of Flex Odor Control Unscented Tall Kitchen garbage bags sits on the dining room table. Well, it’s the thought that counts.

Clue eight: Furniture still upright. DVD players still work.

Clue nine. Martha doesn’t rush over our first morning back to grab my wife and say, “You really oughta know what happened…” No evil stares from the neighbors. No reports our house was lit up like a riverboat casino. No reports of three o’clock in the morning backyard grinding and bumping and cigar smoking.

Clue ten: No tire tracks in the front yard.

We rolled the dice and got away with one here. Nothing happened. Something sure as hell could’ve. Why risk it? Most of Cale’s crew are good guys we’ve known since grade school. And it’s time to break away and let go. Nineteen years old is a weird age, somewhere between “What’s for dinner, mom?” and possibly hunting down the Taliban. I can say this: I have no interest in winning “coolest parent” honors. Like William Tecumseh Sherman, if nominated I will not run; if elected I will not serve.

Me and my footprint

2011-12-15T07:13:00.000-08:00

Brrriinnggg!!!

Brrriinnggg!!!

“Hello?

“Who’s calling? What’s that? The Society for a Sustainable Future?

“Well god bless you. What can I do for you?

“Do I have a few minutes for a poll? How can I say no to a Sustainable Future? Fire away.

“What’s that? Do I believe changes in individual behaviors and attitudes will make the biggest impact on a sustainable future? You bet. I love the environment, love it.

“Do I recycle? Of course. What could be easier? Trash in the red barrel. Plastic, glass and newspapers in the blue barrel. They teach this is pre-school, you know.

“What’s that? What is my thermostat set at right now? Wait a minute….

“80 degrees.

“That’s right, 80.

“Why so high? It’s December, you know. You’re calling north of the Mason-Dixon line. But in the summer it’s air conditioning 24/7 baby. OK. OK. Don’t worry, I’ll turn it down tonight.

“To what? I don’t know. Maybe 75. I like to feel toasty. Especially with the electric blanket on. Don’t worry. It’s got dual controls. That’s being energy-efficient, right?
“What’s that? What electric appliances do I run most often?

“Well, you have to understand, I’m one of those people, soon as I get home, the television goes on. Has to. I can’t stand a quiet house. Freaks me out. So the television is on basically whenever I’m home. At least I don’t sleep with it on. I knew a guy, couldn’t go to sleep at night without the TV on. Strange, huh?

“Then I might go in the kitchen and turn on NPR. No, I’m not really listening or watching. The news is too depressing. Have you watched it lately? Then, let’s see. I might pop something in the microwave.

“How often do I use the microwave? Ma’am, you know the world we live in. I’m microwaving every night. There’s no time.

“How far do I commute to work? Hah. Got ya there. I work at home. How many points do I get for that?

“Can I walk to where I shop for food.? What a concept, walk to shop. Just kidding. I could but I don’t. Why? I’d have the carry the stuff home. And those water bottles are heavy.

“How many water bottles do I consume in a day? I got to admit, I’m a little obsessive about my water bottles. It’s like I’m addicted. What? How many are in my frig right now? We’re getting a little personal, aren’t we? Just kidding. Wait…

“Ah, I guess there are about 20 or 30 in there. Hey, calm down. They’re eight-ounce Deer Parks. Of course, then I’ve got my giant tubular bottles of Smartwater. Can’t beat Smartwater. Oh, and then we have the easy pour three-quart jug of Deer Park for making coffee.

“What’s that you say? I’ve got enough plastic to cover an infield during a rain delay? I dunno, I never thought of it that way. C’mon, you gotta give me some points for recycling it all.

Diet and driving
“You want to talk more about diet? OK. How much beef do I eat? What’s that got to do with anything? What’s that you say? Raising livestock for human consumption creates 51% of GHG emissions, and pollutes rives and lakes. Well, I’m good for a couple of burgers a week, that’s about it. I’m not a big beef guy. I get points for that, right?

“What? What do I think about the cruelty of factory farming? To who? I know, I know, the farmers’ got it rough. The cattle? C’mon, they don’t even know where they are. They have pea brains. Just kidding. Alright. Alright. Jeez, I didn’t know this was a sore spot with you. This is where sustainability gets a little touchy feely for me. But don’t deduct any points, OK?

“My driving habits? OK. Well, I don’t have any points right now. I’m a good driver. “What’s that? How often do I drive somewhere where I could walk instead? Never. Listen, I live in the suburbs. We have sidewalks that lead to nowhere. Seriously, they just suddenly end, like they ran out of cement. Makes no sense. You know the suburbs, nothing is close to anything. The school’s too far to walk. Church, library, too far. Now did you ever once hear of anyone walking to a McDonald’s? Or Wal-Mart. Imagine someone actually walking to Wal-Mart. You could pull a hammy just crossing the parking lot.

“How many cars do I own? Let’s see. Five. What can I say, I like cars. And that’s not including the kids’ cars. When they’re home the front yard look like a moonshine runners’ convention what with all the cars all over.

“Would I consider purchasing a small, more fuel-efficient car, or a hybrid? The hybrid’s a little pricey for me, nice idea and all. You know, the economy isn’t exactly cooking along. We could still be in a recession. Who knows. And ah, small cars, they make me claustrophic. I don’t need those huge tail fins, we’ve outgrown them at least. And all the chrome. Nice, but you gotta move on…. Still, you know, this is America, not China. We’re a car nation.

Housing
“Would I consider downsizing into a smaller, more energy-efficient home? Like in England and Germany? But they’re row homes, aren’t they? Nothing against people who live in row homes. To each their own. But I’ve worked my career for my castle here. I’m kidding. This ain’t no McMansion. Don’t dock me too many points. But this is America, you know. We gotta express ourselves.

“What’s that you say? Am I willing to make meaningful reductions in my lifestyle for a sustainable future? What’s a meaningful reduction? You mean go back to something more simple? You mean give back? Not exactly the American way, but I guess I could go without so many water bottles. I don’t know if the family needs eight computers. But some of ‘em are old. I’d love to get rid of the kids’ cell phones, but that train left the station a long time ago. I don’t have an e-book or an iPad; I’ve got to get some points for that, huh? Let’s see, more reductions? Well, I guess I don’t have to use my underground sprinkler system every night on the grass. And to be honest with you, I could probably cut back on my 104-inch flat screen. It kind of takes over the room, you know?

“So that’s it? How did I score? What’s that? I’ve got a footprint the size of Crater Lake. You’re putting me on. Now exactly what is a footprint?

Who, me anxious?

2011-12-15T07:05:00.000-08:00

A March 2011 survey by the American Psychological Association on “Stress in the Workplace” saw the glass half (or one-third) empty — emphasizing that 36 percent of workers said they typically feel tense or stressed out during their workday.

That leaves more than 60 percent not feeling particularly tense or stressed out during the day.

Call it the silent majority of the comfortably satisfied. Or acceptably challenged by their work.

Of course psychologists would be staring at empty waiting rooms in a world without stress, which is why APA places its emphasis where it does in its survey.

And we all know that “good news” doesn’t sell magazines and newspapers. Imagine a Time cover story: “Why Most Americans Don’t Feel Particularly Anxious About Anything.”

Well, here’s some good news for you:

77 percent of employees report having a positive relationship with their boss, according to the APA survey.

85 percent enjoy positive relations with their co-workers.

66 percent say they are motivated to do their very best for their employer.

(APA phrases it “only two-thirds” but in any office I’ve ever worked in, if two-thirds were trying “to do their very best” that’d be a pretty damn productive office. Many people hang on to the 80/20 rule, you know, 80 percent of the work is done by 20 percent of the people. So 66 percent seems good to me.

All in all, I’d say these percentages point to a fairly non-threatening, accomodating work environment.

The Penn State scandal: Eyes wide open

2011-12-15T06:59:00.000-08:00

The term willful blindness refers to an individual who could have known the facts of a situation, and should have known the facts, but deliberately blinded himself to the existence of the facts.

It will be a long time before all the facts come out, if they ever do, about the charges up in Happy Valley, Pennsylvania that former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky sexually abused at least eight young boys 40 times during a span of 15 years, some of which allegedly took place at the football complex.

Recently fired legendary football coach Joe Paterno has been accused of willful blindness. It’s argued that Penn State, a huge university with more than 40,000 students on the main campus and an annual budget of $4 billion, suffers from a case of institutional willful blindness.

JoePa regrets now that he did not “do more” after learning of an alleged incident involving Sandusky and a youth in football complex shower room in 2002. Sandusky was first investigated by campus police in 1998 after a alleged incident. After retiring in 1999, he retained “privileges”: he was invited to games to which he sometimes brought boys; on one bowl trip he took a young boy along. Sandusky maintained an office and had keys to the athletic facilities to workout and shower. I don’t call this willful blindness; it’s an open invitation.

Sandusky says there is nothing to be blind about; he is innocent, and has claimed to be since day one.

This tragedy is all too reminiscent of workplace safety horror stories. Who knew what and when did they know it?

Who knew the risks at the Texas City refinery, the Upper Big Branch mine, the Deepwater Horizon operation? When were they uncovered? Were they investigated as thoroughly as they ought to have been? Who made the decision that these risks were somehow acceptable? Why didn’t others speak up?

It has been said people are resistant to seeing the truth if it runs counter to what they have an economic stake in.

I’m sorry, but I don’t believe people are blind when there is money involved. You can’t be blind and manage huge sums of money.

And money is at the root of most every workplace safety debacle. Resistance to spend money to correct hazards or improve maintenance. Rushing to get the thing done to save money. Cutting corners to save money.

Penn State football generates $70 million in revenue, $50 million in profit. Success in football has put the school on the map. Donations from JoePa built the school library. Home games are played in one of the most massive stadiums in the country. Alumni love a winner and alumni dollars roll in. Big-time football has created a reputation for the university that attracts students (122,000 freshman applications this year) and faculty nationwide.

The core of that reputation or brand, as articulated for more than 40 years by Paterno, is to be successful athletically, economically prosperous, and as ethically clean as a Disneyworld street.

So who is going take down this Magic Kingdom in the middle of Pennsylvania that has been 50 years in the making? A county district attorney declined to pursue one of the abuse allegations several years ago, mysteriously disappeared in 2005, and was declared legally dead in July of this year. A temporary janitor observed one shower room incident, told other janitors, but never made a report to police. Penn State’s athletic director was told of an incident and did not file a police report. The school’s president has been fired for, in effect, trying to hide the ticking time bomb to protect the brand. Several other officials have been put on leave. State College, home to Penn State, is a small, rural town. It’s been said a powerful football coach knows everything that happens in town. So does his staff. Even the janitors knew something was very wrong.

I don’t see any kind of willful blindness. No one was blind to the money machine that is Penn State football. They knew the value of Penn State’s clean image. Officials knew of the allegations surrounding Sandusky going back to 1998 at least and the risk posed by keeping Sandusky around “with privileges.”

Complacent? Yes. Greedy? Yes. Reckless? Yes. Blind, willfully blind? No. Penn State officials knew what they were trying to protect. They knew they were delaying, hemming and hawing, not alerting authorities, not filing reports, downplaying allegations when they did surface. They willfully decided to take a huge risk in not getting caught. Just like in so many workplace disasters. There was no ignorance. People thought they could get away with a risk and it blew up in their face.

Sorry, Mitt, corporations are not people

2011-12-15T06:53:00.000-08:00

Last August while trolling for votes at the Iowa State Farm, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney created a media stir when, egged on by an irate protestor, said, “Corporations are people, my friend.” After someone yelled, “No they’re not,” Romney went on: “Of course they are. Everything corporations ultimately earn goes to people. Where do you think it goes?”

Let’s put aside the issue of which “people” benefit most from corporate earnings, and the Grand Canyon-size gap between what executives are paid versus the average worker.

It’s been said forever that safety is all about people. Many if not most safety and health pros are drawn to their positions because of their feelings for people; their innate desire not see people hurt or killed on the job.

This often makes the safety and health pro something of a misfit in corporations. Because most employees in the corporation, most senior leaders, don’t share this level of caring and concern. Especially when it involves sizeable investments. So often the safety and health person becomes “the conscience of the corporation.”

If a corporation was a person, it would have its own conscience. It would have, either in its DNA or through parenting and schooling, some sense of right and wrong. But corporations are not biological, obviously. Some CEOs do have a conscience for safety, for sustainability, for a sense of corporate responsibility. But CEOs are agents for the corporation. Agents with agendas, emotions, perspectives, values, ambitions. These very human characteristics steer the corporation.

As such, sustainability and social responsibility often become “directional” tactics, not values. Marketing and communications departments get involved to make the corporation more appealing, more reputable and responsible to customers, stock analysts, investors, regulators, their own employees.

There is nothing wrong with tactics of self-interest if they benefit the safety and health of the employees, the environment, and the communities in which corporations operate. Let’s have more of it.

But don’t mistake that self-interest as coming from a living, breathing corporation. As the late economist Milton Friedman said, “The social responsibility of business is to increase its profits. In a 1970 article in “The New York Times Magazine,” Friedman said, “Only people can have responsibilities. A corporation is an artificial person and in this sense may have artificial responsibilities, but ‘business’ as a whole cannot be said to have responsibilities…”

No calls, no texting behind the wheel? I’ll go out of business!

2011-12-15T06:47:00.000-08:00

Wait a minute.

You’re telling me, no calls, no texting, no email behind the wheel! No hands-free headset even? Then what was the point of those things?

I’m going to go out of business. Who is dictating my demise?

The National Transportation Safety Board? On December 13?

There goes Washington. Again. Issuing regs that shut down businesses. Damn.

What that’s? This is only a recommendation? The NTSB wants all 50 states to ban the use of any type of personal electronic device while driving, a nationwide ban, is that right?

Those DC bureaucrats are chained to their cubicles, you know, so they can’t wander around in the real world. I swear. They are so cut off from reality. They don’t get it. In the 21st century your car is your office, or one of your offices.

Listen, I’m on the road selling every week. I’m in the car every day, for hours and hours. Now if NTSB gets its way I won’t be able to call or text or email my office, my customers, my boss all those hours I’m in a car. Talk about lost productivity, there goes my productivity, out the damn car window.

Hell, no call, no text, no email… I will not know what’s going on in the world, or at least in my business world. No emails? I’m lost. Doomed. You cannot live without email.

What’s that? More than 3,000 people lost their lives in distraction-related accidents last year, eh? In one case a pickup driver who caused two school buses to crash had sent and received 11 text messages in the 11 minutes before the crash, is that so?

Well, still, this is classic, world-class regulatory overkill. Those bureaucrats in DC, what do they know? They all commute to work on the Metro. Let’s see them hump the interstates like I do all week selling for a living and do without any calling or texting or emailing. How do I confirm appointments? Schedule calls? Check my messages? Change flights? Talk to my team? Say goodnight to my kids? I am supposed to drive 4-5-6 hours a day and just stare out the window, talking to myself. I’ll go nuts. Driving for hours thinking about the business I’m losing. Dammit, this is even interfering with my parenting. I always call my kids before they go to bed.

There goes Washington, sticking its nose in places it shouldn’t be sniffing.

What’s that you say? Research shows about half of American drivers between 21 and 24 say they have thumbed messages or emailed from the driver's seat. Yeah, that’s easy to believe. Texting is mostly a kid thing, teenagers. Mostly a social thing. Washington doesn’t get it.

What’s that? At any given moment last year nearly one in every 100 drivers was texting, emailing, surfing the Web or otherwise using a hand-held electronic device, and that number is up by 50 percent from the year before? Listen, I’ll be honest with you, I squirm a little when I’m a passenger in a car and the driver is texting or on the phone. I do feel unsafe.

In fact, I can’t stand being in the car with one of my kids driving and texting, so I won’t allow it. Yeah, I ban it. But that’s family. I’ve got to do what I’ve got to do to make a living. Which means call, text and email from the road.

See, I trust my own driving abilities. I’m not worried at all about myself behind the wheel. Hell, I just about live behind the wheel.

This calls for drastic resistance. I’m going to organize a protest. What the hell, everyone is protesting about something these days. A bunch of my sales buddies will drive to Washington. Remember when truckers did this years ago to make their point? We’ll have hundreds, maybe thousands of sales reps in car rentals, all silver, cruising up and down and around the Mall. Can you picture it?

Then, this is the kicker. We’ll show the regulators distracted driving. Guys will be driving and eating Subway subs, with lettuce and mayo falling all over ‘em. Guys will be driving and reading maps. “Damn those tiny highway numbers, says the Baby Boomer with bad eyes. Guys will be leaning in, squinting at a GPS, reading the sports page, turned around to the back seat trying to find a CD. They be driving and blasting CDs, Ozzy Osbourne, yeah, Metallica, heavy metal, distracting as hell. We’ll put two reps in the same car and have them shout and scream at each other in a fight. Reps have been arguing in cars for 100 years.

One time I was making calls with another rep on election day. We got into a huge fight about who should be president. The rep driving got so caught up, so upset in not being able to “sell me” his candidate, at one piont he stopped the car with a jerk and said, “You’ve got me so steamed I’m completely lost. Do you know where we are?”

Nothing electronic about that at all.

So what are the feds going to do? Ban eating in cars? Ban CD playing? Limit the number of passengers? No infants, they’re damn distracting, that wouldn’t be a bad rule. No political or religious debates. I can live with that. No fiddling with the radio? Ban back-seat driving? That’s one good thing that could come out of this travesty.

Look, I understand the danger of distracted driving to kids. And this kind of electronic ban should apply to anyone under 21. Like drinking.

But working adults. You can’t throw us back to the 1950s. Just wait til you see thousands of silver rentals clogging up the Mall and scaring everyone with perfectly legal distracted driving. Then what will the feds say?

The persistent mental health stigma

2011-12-15T06:45:00.001-08:00

One by one they disappeared into the dark house. All curtains and blinds were drawn. The house looked like a bulky shadow in the night. They were careful to time their arrivals. No clustering or crowds that would attract attention. Every few minutes another figure would knock and enter silently. Many wore hoodies, scarves and hats so their faces were concealed. They seemed nervous, edgy, walking to the house, looking around as though someone might be following them.

Inside, down in the basement, a circle of folding chairs was set up around a small table with white candles lit on it. Kind of like a church meeting.

The candlelight revealed the visitors to be adults of all ages. All appeared to be on their way home from work. There were a few secretaries. A car mechanic. Couple of warehouse guys. Then there were men in suits, executive looking. And women in smart pants suits. There was even a cop and a fireman. A teacher. Maybe two. And a nurse and a physician.

“OK,” said the hostess, a pleasant looking woman in her 50s. She looked like she had just come from work. “Everyone feel safe? No one followed you, right? That’s why we change the meeting address every week. Hard to find a moving target, you know.”

Everyone took their seats, settling into their chairs. Some had water bottles. Others brought coffee.

“Did everyone have a chance this week to read the material?” asked the hostess. Turns out hosts and hostesses rotate with every new meeting place.

Heads nodded.

“So… let’s hear it. What do you think of this report, ‘Sick on the job? Myths and Realities about Mental Health at Work’?”

There is uncomfortable silence. No one seems to want to break the ice. Numerous faces stare at the tile floor.

“Well,” one man finally spoke up. “This Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, that wrote the report, is based in Paris. I don’t take comfort in that. The Europeans have always been far ahead of the U.S. when it comes to facing up to mental health issues. I don’t think this report, important as it is, will have any impact whatsoever on U.S. businesses.”

“There is a lot of truth in the report,” said a woman. “One in five workers suffer from a mental illness, such as depression or anxiety, and many are struggling to cope. We can all relate. It is a struggle.”

“And it’s definitely true,” said a young man, “most people with mental health disorders do work. It’s not like we’re trying to be lazy.”

“When I’m anxious or depressed, sure, my productivity goes down,” said the mechanic. “I try to hide it best I can.”

“Sometimes I can’t get out of bed in the morning,” said one of the men in suits and ties. “I hate it, but I call in sick. That report is right, workers with mental health disorders are of course more likely to have more absences.”

“It just so tough to file a disability claim for anxiety or depression or burn out,” said one of the secretaries. “I tried it once years ago and got rejected. Even with my physician’s notes on my medical history. Insurance claimed that since I was not 100% incapacitated by my illness, that I could get up and get around and still do my job, I was not truly disabled.”

“The best I could do was get a month’s unpaid leave from my boss,” said a woman. “When I came back, he said, ‘Now I just want you to promise me this will never happen again.’ What could I say? He had me. As you all know, one of the real frustrations with depression and anxiety is it is unpredictable. You don’t know how you’re going to feel next week, or tomorrow. Some days I have energy, some days I’m really struggling. But I told my boss, “Yeah, this won’t happen again.” And I’m thinking to myself: It won’t happen on this job again because if it does, I’m out of here. They won’t put up with me.”

“That’s why I do everything I can to cover up my depression,” said one of the warehouse guys. “Once they find you out, they never look at you the same way. You are on permanent probation. They don’t trust you, no matter how many excellent performance reviews you’ve had. The stigma, I think it’s worse than being an alcoholic, a gambler, an adulterer. Those things are more out in the open. Hell, look at ‘Mad Men.’ All of that was OK in the office. Boys will be boys.

“But have a panic attack and have to hide in a bathroom stall, well, big boys don’t cry, you know,” said another man. When that has happened to me I wish I was a woman with a make-up kit.”

The tight circle of work-weary men and women laughed or smiled.

“I’ve used my company’s EAP,” said a woman. “They put me in touch with some good people. It helped. But you know, I do wonder about privacy. There just doesn’t seem to be privacy anywhere anymore. IT from HQ 600 miles away can get crawl all around my computer and emails. So I wonder. If I do use the EAP 800 number, you mean no one but no one in my company knows anything about it? I’m not sure about that firewall.”

“Well, it’s good to talk like this,” said the host. “At least here we can be ourselves, be out in the open. See and hear how others deal with working with mental health issues.

“You mean our stealth tactics,” said a young man.

“Our evasion tactics,” said another.

“You got to protect your livelihood,” said the cop. That report from France says people with a mental disorder are two to three times as likely to be unemployed as people with no disorders. I believe it, and I can’t afford to lose my job, not in this economy. So I go underground.”

“Or stay in the closet,” grinned another man.

“That’s why the report says almost 50% of those with a severe mental disorder and over 70% of those with a moderate mental disorder do not receive any treatment for their illness. It’s too much of a risk. You never know how people will react. Badly, mostly.”

“Well, our situation will never get better unless it’s discussed out in the open much, much more than it is today,” said a woman. “Most common mental disorders can get better, we all know that, and employment chances can be improved with the right treatment. But health systems just focus on treating people with severe disorders, like schizophrenia, who make up only one-fourth of sufferers. Employers need to know there are all different levels and degrees of mental health disorders. We’re not all bound for the asylum.”

The group got a chuckle out of that.

Borderline madness or myth?

2011-03-24T08:59:00.000-07:00

An Arizona Trilogy

Foreword

Bill Moyers: Can you say, for example, that John Wayne has become a myth?
William Campbell: When a person becomes a model for other people’s lives, he has moved into the sphere of being mythologized.

The west, Arizona for certain, is one of the states richest in romantic mythology. There is the land: Arizona sunsets. Arizona highways. The iconic Grand Canyon and Monument Valley, which straddles Utah. High desert country. Sedona’s red rocks.

There are heroes and villains. Wyatt Earp. Doc Holiday, Kit Carson. Cochise, Geronimo, Pancho Villa. And the actors of Arizona westerns (we’ll put aside the palefaces who played Indians): The Duke, Burt Lancaster, Clint Eastwood, Paul Newman, Kirk Douglas, Anthony Quinn, Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine. The Old Tucson movie lot provided the films, the context for myth-making, from about 1939 with the film “Arizona” (appropriately enough) until about 1997. By then filmmakers had fanned out across western states in search of better tax breaks.

I came to Arizona in late February for a way-too-short guerilla road trip tacked on to a business meeting. I came with a baby boomer’s memories of TV series like Gunsmoke, Bonanza, Wagon Train, Tales of Wells Fargo, The Big Valley, The High Chaparral. And films: Gunfight at the OK Corral, 3:10 to Yuma, Last Train from Gun Hill. Part of the attraction for me was, and still is, the John Wayne/Shane character model: havingr room to roam, freedom, independence, a natural savvy, no need to explain yourself. I also find a clarity out west, like seeing things in high contrast, that is lost in the polluted east. Perceptions improve. And there is an energy in the West, maybe it comes from having that room to roam free, or the fierce sun, that seems to be manufactured by ambition, the rat race, in say, Manhattan or DC.

I came to Arizona for a quick look-see at what has happened out here since the TV westerns died out after the 1950s and 60s, after Wayne and larger than life western actors died off. After the vast open pit mines closed. And since the invasion of illegal “wets” (a myth itself since the desert is dry ten months out of the year) and the empires of Mexican mafia clans began making billions of dollars. I would put about 750 miles on the odometer to see where and how the Old West meets the New West. How the legends hold up, and if they still have meaning.

Borderline madness or myth?

Why walk or drive across the Mexican border these days? My 88-year-old mother warned me, “God, I’ll be glad when you get back.” My wife warned me, my daughter warned me, friends and coworkers. Jeez, be careful down there. I was curious to see — as much as is possible in a three-day blitzkrieg tour tacked on to a business trip — whether the reality is borderline madness or modern media myth-making.

In Arizona the talk is about rugged individualism. Saddle up. Wagons ho! The Old West. The Far West. The Wild West. Stage coaches and bat-wing saloon doors. Tumble weeds and Deadwood Dick. Wyatt Earp and Pancho Villa. Cochise and Geronimo. Tombstone and Boot Hill. Mining empires and ranching empires.

Old romance versus current reality: More than 35,000 people have been killed since Mexican President Felipe Calderon launched his crackdown against drug syndicates — the Gulf Cartel, Los Zetas, La Familia, et al — in December, 2006. About 17,500 Border Patrol agents scour the nearly 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexican border. In the few days I was on the border local newspapers carried stories about a seizure of 8,700 rounds of ammunition; Arizona investigators seized $420,000 and confiscated about 100 pounds of marijuana and six pounds of methamphetamine. Minor losses for the bosses that make everyday news.

Border Patrol white and green SUVs and pickups are everywhere, like taxis in Manhattan. They’re kept busy. One afternoon the BP was called to a ranch after skeletal remains were found. A few miles east of Tombstone a body clothed in a hoodie and jeans was found off Middlemarch Road. Up in Tucson a Mexican drug trafficker was found beheaded in an apartment building. West of Douglas, Arizona a border helicopter’s searchlights spot 128 illegals lost in the desert one night. A Cochise County rancher was found last year murdered by a suspected illegal immigrant.

Is the border a no-man’s land, or a no-go-for-tourists’ land of kidnappings, beheadings and public shootouts? I did my Google research before flying west. Yes, it is easy to find various State Department warnings. The central thesis from all I could gather is to blend in as much as possible. So I went out and bought an “original Senor Lopez” black and green-striped hoodie. (“We call those ‘drug rugs,’ dad,” said my son. Perfect.)

Internet instructions included: “Avoid overt displays of wealth.” Don’t flash jewelry. Carry only the cash you need. Watch yourself at ATMs. Stay with the crowds on streets. Watch your back everywhere, day or night. “Visitors should be aware of their surroundings at all times.” “Always keep car doors locked and windows up while driving.” Avoid driving or walking alone at night.

“After reading all of this you may not want to go across the border,” states one blog post. Well, hello.

But I had a plan. From my base in the border town of Douglas, I’ll cross over into Mexico early, very early on a Sunday morning. Hopefully the drug lords and their minions will be sleeping off Saturday night. From Agua Prieta on the Mexican side I will hop on Sonora State Highway 2, which looks like a well-traveled route on the map and is hopefully empty on a Sunday morning. I’ll take it slow. Many highways in Mexico have steep shoulders to avoid flash floods and many more Americans die in highway rollovers than are caught by stray bullets. I’ll follow the advice from the movie Apocalypse Now. There is a scene where Chef and Captain Willard are jumped in the jungle by a tiger. Chef comes screaming back, “I’m never getting off the fucking boat. Never get off the fucking boat.” Rolling down Highway 2 for Cananea — “horse meat” in Apache — about 80 miles south and home to the largest open pit mine in Mexico, I’ll never get out of the car.

The car proves to be a problem, a mistake. My plan was to “blend in” by renting a humdrum compact and dusting it up a bit going off road before crossing the border. But Cliff, my friendly Budget Rent A Car clerk at Phoenix’s Sky Harbor Airport, announced I was his last customer of the day and gave me a free upgrade — a silver convertible Ford Mustang. I was too zoned out from the five-hour flight from Philadelphia to think straight. A convertible Mustang is not what you want to cruise Mexico in. I’d either be mistaken for a gangster or be car-jacked by a gang.

I cross the border around 7 a.m., past parallel 12-foot-high steel fences that run the length of Douglas and Aqua Prieta. Aqua Prieta is a “popular shopping area for southern Arizona residents,” according to one web site. “Where South of the Border Intrigue abounds,” states a brochure. The “intrigue” I get, the popular shopping is difficult to swallow. It’s hard to believe this is a city of 68,000. I see only wild dogs roam dirt streets. What I see of the city is dead, and looks reservation poor. Easier to believe is the Spanish name for Aqua Prieta: “Dark Water.”

Border Patrol agents look me over: “Where are you going? What will you do there? How long are you staying? What’s your occupation, sir? Will you be bringing anything back? Where are you staying? Is this your car?” I blame all the questions on the silver convertible. On the Mexican side I’m directed into a parking slot and asked a few questions in Spanish, which I do not speak. I nod “yes” and they wave me along.

The Sunday morning drive is in fog-shrouded, 30-degree weather called “equipatas,” a mix of hail, rain and snow. The road is cracked, worn, and as barren as the surrounding Sonora desert. All brown and gray. The vibe does not feel dangerous. At Cananea I’m abruptly stuck behind 20 or 30 semi tractor trailers, all stopped. I snake out of the line only to be quickly stopped by a Mexican police officer. I want to get to Imuris, I tell him, another 40 miles south. He grins. “No speak English.” The next half hour I spend driving up and down Cananea streets, looking for an alternate route. But I can’t get around a vast open pit copper mine, the largest in the country. I break my rule and get out of the car at a local supermarket. Another rule of the road for me is this: there are two ways to really check out any local populace — walk the aisles of a supermarket and take public transportation somewhere. Actually, in Cananea I’m hunting for Cuban cigars and the only store open is the supermarket. A long shot for cigars, and I find none.

Why drive further south to Imuris? A bit further on is Magdalena de Kino, where I want to photograph the Temple of Santa Maria Magdelena. It’s also where I plan to turn around and drive north on State Highway 15 for 50 miles to the border city of Nogales. I circle around Cananea to make a last attempt to pass the line of trucks and slip through a loose barricade of barrels and cones. I still don’t understand the delay. It is an embarrassing disadvantage to travel a country and have no idea of the native tongue. I’m shouted down by several officers as I try to squeeze through the barriers. Fuck it. Nothing is worse on the road than retreating back the way you came.

So I head back on Highway 2, now with the sun breaking through solid low cloud cover. I find a turn off, hang a left, and head to cross back into the states at the small, very small village of Naco. At Naco two Border Patrol officers direct me to park the car for what they call a “routine inspection.” A line of vehicles backs up behind me because I can’t figure out how to flip open the damn trunk. I fumble around like a clueless touristo. This is not blending in. Finally one of the officers figures it out. They open the trunk. Open the hood. Open the doors. “Sit over there, sir, this won’t take long.” They bang the tires. Roll adjustable mirrors on extension rods under the front and rear. Pound door panels. Meanwhile I watch a steady flow of cars with Arizona plates cruise through. I blame the “routine inspection” on the silver Mustang convertible. And possibly my Senor Lopez “drug rug.”

From Naco I have a choice: backtrack to Douglas, where there is nothing worth doing, or take a looping, long route to Nogales from the Arizona side. In Douglas, a town of about 15,000, I’m staying at the historic Gadsden Hotel, the largest building in the city. Built in 1907, it has five floors, one of the few remaining manually operated elevators in the country, a 1929 manual telephone switchboard behind the front desk, a lobby with a sweeping Italian marble staircase, a tiffany-stained glass mural, and four soaring Italian marble columns. Shadowy, headless ghosts supposedly wander in the basement, in hotel corridors, playing tricks with lights and furniture. The hotel burned down in 1929, with no loss of life, and was rebuilt. One night I was reading in bed when the bed lamp went out. I figured the ghosts were telling me it was time to turn in.

The rooms are Spartan, the radiator I couldn’t figure out how to crank up, and the room carpet is laid like loose sod. Did you ever see the Coen Brothers’ film Barton Fink? The Gadsden reminds me of the rundown Hollywood hotel Barton stays in, trying in vain to write a movie script. Steve Buscemi, bulging eyes and nervous ticks, plays the creepy desk clerk. Wallpaper keeps peeling off in Barton’s room. In the finale, narrow hotel corridors like the Gadsden’s become tunnels of flames in Barton’s hellish nightmare exit from Hollywood.

I don’t want to go back to Douglas. Saturday night in the Gadsden’s Saddle Spur Saloon was enough. Another legend has it Lee Marvin, in town to film a western and likely bored to death, almost got into a brawl in the tavern. I was compelled to leave — not by the three old timers talking real estate, or the young barkeep who told me Chivas Regal was one of the bourbons he had, or the old guy and his young thing getting lovey-dovey in a circular booth — no, it was the music. A lanky middle-aged rancher-dude with white cowboy hat and a beer swilling older babe kept returning to the jukebox to play dismal Top 40 hits from the 1980s, the worst decade for music in my life. Journey. Heart. Foreigner. Michael Bolton and Christopher Cross. My god what a dark, depressing scene. Also, I wanted to get upstairs before a DJ plugged in in the lobby to kick off sweet 16 party that the desk clerk had warned me about.

Instead of a drawn out aimless Sunday afternoon in Douglas, I decide on taking the long arc to the west to get to Nogales. Nogales on the Mexican side is one of the more notorious border towns. In Nogales, Arizona, the assistant police chief swears by low crime stats that indicate his city is one of the safest in the whole country, according to the Nogales International newspaper. But residents often hear gunfire, smell gun powder, and they don’t feel safe visiting their sister side on the other side of the line, according to the article.

Across the entire 2,000-mile stretch of the U.S-Mexican border, Nogales is one of the busiest crossings, rivaling Laredo, El Paso and Hildago Texas, and San Ysidro, California. The freezing late February rain and snow flurries don’t help, but I find zero romance in the sprawling city of 189,759 people. This time I walk across the border. It’s part of my plan: Sunday afternoon should be the safest time of the week to stroll on your lonesome in a border town. Mexican families are out and about shopping, despite the wet, dreary weather. Nogales is too poor for a car culture. Long lines wait for buses, white and blue rickety old school buses, and jitneys. I see no lovers holding hands. No smiles. No laughs. It’s grim. You get hustled immediately. “Taxi, taxi, you want taxi?” To go exactly where? My Internet research says never hop in a cab unless it’s called from a restaurant or hotel. Too much kidnapping. Vendors in booths, stalls, and cramped shops shout like carnie barkers: “What do you want? What do you want? Pills. You want pills? Come on, boss, see my stuff. Come in. See my store. What you want?”

A Cuban cigar is all I want. Cuban imports are banned in the U.S. But Mexico has little problem with Castro and I figure I should be able to score a legendary Cuban smoke. Soon enough, not five minutes into Nogales, I find a Cuban cigar cart. Again, Internet research says to always barter with Mexican vendors. Don’t wimp out; they expect it. One guide states you should pay only half of any stated price. I settle for two cigars, one light, one moderate. Very likely I overpay. And I wonder, are they truly Cuban? Are they five years old? I don’t believe anything I’m told by loudmouthed, in-your-face hawkers. A salesman is a salesman, in Nogales, Mexico, Las Vegas or the French Quarter. The harder they sell, the less I believe.

The best way to experience a border town like Nogales is to find an insider or a guide. They take you beyond the blending in scheme to go behind the scenes. They know of charming alleyways, the few that they are, the best, hidden restaurants, the authentic craft shops. Travel writers often use these guides, maybe from the local tourism bureau or chamber of commerce, and wind up writing appropriately glowing accounts. I read a few on the ‘Net about Nogales, and they were notable for what they didn’t say. The hard stares from old, leathery men. The small cluster of guys I wouldn’t walk near in the dark. Pathetic poverty. Nogales sits in a north-south valley with steep hills. Hills crammed with box shanties painted bright orange, blue, yellow, green, red, purple. I want to walk up worn steps along side streets to get a closer look at some of the pillboxes but, no, this is not my neighborhood. A gringo walking these hills is like a tourist staring at the Amish, or Indians on the rez. Except the natives are more restless here.

According to an unofficial tally by Radio XENY in Nogales, Sonora, a surge of violence in 2009 brought the number of homicides to 136, up by six from 2008. One Saturday, near midtown, neighbors looked on as a 28-year-old was assassinated inside his older-model Buick Century, according to a newspaper account. Witnesses said the car was sprayed with at least 30 bullets. A popular taco stand in mid-town was sprayed with machine-gun fire. Three were killed and five others injured. One Monday three bodies were discovered on the streets of Nogales, all victims of strangulation. Two men were found executed at a department store on the south side of the city. Two other men were killed and another injured the same day in the parking lot at a grocery story. The next day, a “convoy” of gunmen arrived at a drive-through store, doused the inside with gasoline and torched the building, according to news reports.
I pull my Senor Lopez hoodie over my head as far as I can so you can’t see my face easily, pull my hands inside the long sleeves, and put on a serious game face. I’m a 55-year-old suburban family man and my get-up would have my wife and my kids and my boss rolling their eyes. Suburbanites don’t blend well into the Philadelphia street scene, let alone a Mexican border town. I leave my camera in the car and walk with the straight-ahead stare, a hard-ass look I see worn by many of the men in town. It’s cold and wet. I keep walking. I watch out for cars that are not watching for me. Many are old models packed with passengers. I read where a 23-year old Mexican male was stopped in Mesa, Arizona. He tested twice the limit for alcohol — and had seven kids in his car, three in the trunk. My walk aims for a Coca Cola billboard sign, then further to a large Burger King sign. I pass a dead dog on a sidewalk.

The further from the line you go, the deeper into town, the vendor hassling drops off to almost nothing. Only narrow, twisted alleys littered with trash, tires and puddles. Bars, some blasting beats, clubs, movie houses, porn shops, diners, nail salons, hair salons, plenty of pharmacies, grocery stores, department stores, banks. It reminds me of walking in Times Square in the 1970s, long before the cleanup.

I’m also thinking of another movie. The famous three-minute uninterrupted crane tracking shot that opens Orson Welles’ noir classic Touch of Evil. A doomed couple in a flashy convertible cruise at night down four blocks of a border town amid flashing neon signs, blaring Tex-Mex music, shouts and crowds. The car stops at a border checkpoint, proceeds out of frame, and then blows up.

It is the atmosphere conveyed in that scene that I see around me in Nogales on a gray Sunday afternoon in February. Crumbling steps, potholed streets, side alleys, rusting cars. Nogales certainly cannot be captured in four blocks. It is the largest port of entry in Arizona. Four million people a year crossed the border on foot at Nogales in 2010. Millions more by car and truck. Most of the traffic seems to be Mexicans heading El Norte, certainly not Americans going south. I think of thin, middle-aged wives wearing designer scarves and jangling jewelry while their husbands fiddle with golf bags at the Phoenix Sky Harbor airport. No, they’d never go slumming down here, trying to hide their tans.

Walking into Mexico is a breeze, just flash your passport and driver’s ID to the U.S. guard. Coming back across is more time-consuming. I wait in long line of pedestrians, mostly Mexicans, for 20 minutes before pushing through the turnstiles and again waving passport and ID at the stone-faced U.S. guard. Coming back into Mexico are huge, boxed flat screen TVs from Wal-Mart pushed on dollies, and cases of bottled water in shopping carts from Safeway. Six or seven lanes of vehicles, mostly worn, faded sedans, SUVs, pick-ups and semis, stretch back a half-mile into Mexico. Like the Holland Tunnel at rush hour, but even more gridlocked.

There is obvious madness on the border. The beheadings, slaughter, blood feuds and people mad to escape into the states. There is media and political myth-making, too, much to the chagrin of southern Arizona tourist promoters, law enforcement officers, and elected officials. More than 80 percent of the 15,600 drug-related killings that took place in Mexico in 2010 occurred in only four of the country’s 32 states, and Sonora, home to Aqua Prieta, Cananea and Nogales, is not one of them. Highway crashes kill many more Americans than bombs or bullets. Tucson’s police chief said in a newspaper article his town is victimized by home invasions and kidnappings related to the drug trade, but “most of those committing the rip-offs are American citizens.”

The border is not a line in the dirt, a steel fence or cement wall. It is, as a Customs and Border Protection commissioner said, “a third country that joins Mexico and the United States.” The 2,000-mile corridor is poverty-stricken, desperate and full of fear on the Mexico side, and on the U.S. side it is heavily guarded, largely barren, with the faded glory of the Old Tucson movie set (which hasn’t seen any filming since 1997). Most American tourists will fly over this third country on their way to a South of the Border resort compound, if they go at all. That makes sense. The tranquil clarity I love about the west becomes something edgy and murky on the border.

Close encounters of the cacti kind

From the parking area of Gates Pass, a hilly area aptly named the Tucson Mountains just east of Tucson, Arizona, dotted with thousands of saguaro cacti, a hike up to a ridgeline about a half-mile away looks like a gradual slope, certainly doable. This so-called minor range has peaks from 2,000 to 4,600 feet. The climb I scope out gets steeper near the top, but that’s to be expected. Only later, after I spent an hour scrambling, often hand over hand to reach to top, and another half-hour sliding mostly on my butt coming down, did I read in Backpacker magazine that “overconfidence” is one of 52 common mistakes hikers make. About 42 percent of rescue calls in Utah national parks are due to fatigue, darkness, and insufficient equipment. The bottom line: foolhardy planning.

Guilty as charged. I came to the pass on the last day of February with no plan, no map, no route, no water bottle, no watch, no compass. It was just a brilliantly blue sky Monday morning, cool, cloudless, with the famous Arizona sun creating a picture postcard. It was early, around nine a.m, and mine was the only car in the lot. I had Gates Pass to myself.

And if I had a plan, it was simply to hike up a slope on the north side of the pass, snapping pictures of the saguaro forest all the way to the rocky top. There was no path, I’d choose my own zig-zagging angle of ascent, which had appeal. Little did I know I was ignorantly committing a “crime of fashion,” according to Backpacker. “Ever notice how many stories about rescued hikers include the line, ‘The missing man was wearing jeans and tennis shoes.’?” Uh, that would be me. The tennis shoes, or sneakers as we call them back east, would be my worst clothing faux pas.

Hiking up the reddish-brown sandstone slope took about an hour. Technically, this was an easy, pedestrian walk in the sun. But my sneakers offered no protection against the saguaro needles. Let me explain: The saguaro is the cacti most often used as an emblem of the southwest in commercials, movies, TV shows and tourist propaganda. These plants are light green columns, large and tree-like, with long vertical rows of needles an inch or more in length. Some saguaro grow arms generally bent upward. Some have as many as 25 arms; others have none. Saguaros can grow, very slowly over decades, to heights of 40-60 feet.

I had no trouble walking my way around these stunning plants, sometimes ducking beneath their arms. To see thousands of them on rolling desert hills on a clear, cloudless morning is to experience the power and glory of nature. But if you are out of fashion in your hiking gear, most importantly footwear, you have obstacles, enemies, that you most often don’t even see. Saguaro are very slow growing cactus. A ten-year-old plant might be only 1.5 inches tall. Time and again I’d feel a sharp pain, look down at my feet, and these damnable pincushions, like prickly green golf balls, would be stuck to my sneakers, with needles piercing through to my skin. “Where the hell did they come from?” I’d curse. They also proved adept at affixing themselves to my jeans and hoodie sweatshirt.

Prying them off was no easy deal. I couldn’t simply grab them and yank them off. I swear what seemed like hundreds of needles in each small, round ball of light green had little hooks on the end and extracting them was like pulling teeth. And I couldn’t grab the prickly devils with my bare hands. I needed a strong twig or a rock to scrap them off.

Still, the hike up was enjoyable — a good test of overall fitness, plus agility, flexibility, balance, strength, endurance, and best of all, the mental concentration. The concentration comes into play trying to figure out your best line, your clearest, most stable path, up through the saguaro, giant sage shrubs, ironwood trees, gullies and chunks of rock. Which rock to grab. Where the footing looks most secure. Is that branch strong enough to pull you up? You also look and listen for any signs of rattlesnakes in particular, under rocks, also maybe gila monsters, horned lizards, squirrels and rabbits. It’s like chess: do I make this move to the right, the left, or straight ahead? You are, as psychologists call it, in the “flow.” In the moment. A painful moment when stung by one of those youthful saguaro, those damnable burr balls..

I lounged at the top of the ridge for 20 minutes or so. To the west I could see the Old Tucson movie set. Down below snaked the Gates Pass road. To the east, ten miles away, was the min skyline of downtown Tucson. Homes dotted the hills to the north, with the Saguaro National Park further north, and to the south the Sonora desert stretched into the blue-gray of Mexico, some 110 miles off.

My descent was more treacherous and unfortunately involved a series of dork moves on my part. Again, there was no beaten path to follow. I quickly learned my sneakers provided no traction on the loose gravel and shale. I should have read the Backpacker article before my trip. Mistake number 41: Stepping carelessly. “About 77 percent of the 306 injuries recorded in Yellowstone in 2003-04 were leg sprains, strains, abrasions and lacerations,” said the article. “Watch you step. Wear high boots and use poles to prevent stumbling.”

I had no boots, no poles, and a sore butt from falling backward. About halfway down I realized the best tactic was to descend side-step fashion, one foot crossing over the other. Better traction, but still it didn’t prevent the biggest tumble, when I completely lost my footing and fell against a saguaro. Must have taken ten minutes to pry the pincushions off my sneaks, jeans, hoodie, fingers and scalp. Some of the most stubborn needles are still embedded in me, I believe, as I write this

Coming down I also committed mistake number 20 — getting disoriented. I had no compass and did not leave marks on my hike up that I could follow coming back down. I lost sight of the Gates Pass parking lot, and as I got lower, the Gates Pass road itself. Giant saguaros could serve as landmarks, but hiking through thousands of them is like a maze of mirrors. For the most part, they all look the same, that iconic symbol of the west.

Finally I found my way to the road, about a half-mile east of where I had started my hike from the parking lot. It was close to noon. Gates Pass was now being challenged by a steady stream of seriously committed cyclists. You know, the ones with zero body fat. The pass has been considered an extremely dangerous road due to a switchback slope that occurs midway through the route, with 58 wrecks reported between 1996 and 2001.

All in all, I considered myself beaten but lucky. I did the hike by my lonesome. The weather was gorgeous. I had no broken bones, twisted ankles, sprained knees or elbows. No snake bites. No bobcat or mountain lion encounters. No fateful blunder. But honestly, I was a foolhardy tenderfoot, a 55-year-old suburban baby boomer imposing another age-defying test on myself. Would I do it again? Not without a lot more foresight. Once pricked, twice shy.

Cochise gets the last laugh

It’s right there on the map of Arizona, in tiny red type that strains my 55-year-old eyes: Cochise’s Stronghold in the Dragoon Mountains, about 140 miles southeast of Tucson. It is the remoteness of the spot that draws me more than Indian lore. You see, I get excited by little dotted lines on a map. That indicates trails, not highways. The only way to Cochise’s Stronghold, either from the west or the east of the Dragoons, are primitive bounce-along trails.

There is a problem, though, I have the wrong vehicle to go off road. At Phoenix’s Sky Harbor Airport I was upgraded to a silver Mustang convertible, “a great deal,” I was informed. Has a kick-ass sound system, I’ll give it that. But it is so low-slung in design that it has but four inches of clearance beneath its underbelly and the road. Utterly wrong for the rutted, rock-strewn off-road desert rambles I planned.

I flew to Arizona from back east, Philadelphia, to see if I could find what hard facts might lie behind or beyond the myths of The Old West. Cochise County seemed as good place to look. It is the home of Tombstone, the “town too tough to die,” Boot Hill, the Gunfight at the OK Corral, Mexican border towns, and ghost towns like Gleeson and Pearce. Cochise’s Stronghold, just a tiny red square on the map, was ground zero for my exploring the Sonora desert country.

At the Tombstone Chamber of Commerce building I asked how to reach Cochise’s place. I pointed to a dirt trail, Middlemarch Road. “Will this get me there?” A rangy old-timer behind the counter looked at me strange, as in “Why in the hell do you want to do that?” “Well, yeah, I guess that’ll work,” he said. I was not reassured.

He’s the native here. But it was an optimistically bright late February Saturday afternoon. I lowered the convertible roof and took off down dusty Middlemarch Road. A yellow warning sign said: “PRIMITIVE ROAD. Caution. Use at your own risk. Surface is not regularly maintained.”

Just the welcome I was waiting for. The joke was the 35 M.P.H. sign beneath the lettering. Not in this Mustang. I crawled along at about 10 M.P.H., not wanting to owe Budget more than the price of my whole vacation. Every driver of a pick-up or SUV I passed heading the other direction would casually wave as we passed. Made me feel part of some dusted-up fraternity, a less of a jackass for being out here in a got-it-all-wrong Mustang convertible. I passed not a single sedan off-road. A Border Patrol pick-up, white with a large green slash running down both front doors, crept up behind me and followed for some time. Probably thinking I was either drunk or lost.

The Mustang bounced east along Middlemarch Road for ten miles, which took almost an hour to drive. The Mustang’s low clearance made the ten miles seem like one long cattle crossing rumble strip. Then Middlemarch Road came to a fork. I could continue on straight, or turn left onto a narrower trail with a sign indicating mountain views. There wasn’t a house, animal or human in sight. Just low trees, desert scrub, winter grass and the Dragoon range ahead. I was getting closer. The sun was still high. I figure on taking the mountain view. I had no GPS, but out here I don’t know if a satellite would find me.

It took some time for it to dawn on me that I had made the wrong turn. Sure, this trail was much more rocky than Middlemarch Road, which seemed like an interstate in comparison. And it wasn’t much wider than my Mustang. The few jeeps or SUVs coming the other way forced me up on the road’s shoulder.

But I was having fun figuring what imaginary lines to follow to miss chunks of junk rock, skirt gullies, ride the edge of old ruts; in other words how to avoid getting stuck. Up, down and around dry gulch beds the Mustang banged and clanged. I wasn’t driving, I was creeping under 5 M.P.H. Up a jagged incline and down a twisted hill. I was in the middle of the Sonora Desert and often couldn’t see 20 feet in front of me, what with the trail carved low, the bramble brush, boulders and tall grass. Got out and took a photo of the Mustang; all you could see was the windshield in what looked like a trough. Cochise’s Stronghold… I didn’t have a clue.

Cochise is a truly legendary figure, if you go by the formal definition of “legend”: someone forever talked about but never once photographed; someone actually seen by few people. A Chiricahua Apache, a solid warrior standing about six feet tall and 175 pounds with long black hair, his name “Cheis” meant “having the quality or strength of oak.” That would come in handy out here. His father was murdered by Mexican forces, and his brother and nephew were killed in battles. Cochise seemed to me a guerilla fighter or a frontier terrorist, a freedom fighter, supposedly unequaled with a lance. Something of a Native American Renaissance Man, a naturalist, spiritualist, philosopher and warrior.

“When I was young I walked all over this country, east and west, and saw no other people than the Apaches,” he once said. “After many summers I walked again and found another race of people had come to take it. How is it? Why is it Apaches wait to die – that they carry their lives on their fingernails? I am alone in the world. I want to live in these mountains. I have drunk the waters of the Dragoon Mountains and they have cooled me: I do not want to leave here. Why shut me up on a reservation? Let us go around free as Americans do. Let us go wherever we please.”

Sounds fair enough to me. Cochise lived to be about 70, and was secretly buried in the hostile, unforgiving terrain at north end of the Dragoon range, which I was attempting to navigate in a convertible sports car. I imagined Cochise up in the sky getting a good laugh out me. This little ant of a tourist from frilly Philadelphia inching his way between the broad boulders of the big man’s rock fortress.

I don’t know how they ever got Cochise out of there. The so-called stronghold is a jumble of 50- to 100-foot high slabs of dull red and gray granite, bunched together in slanted columns. In February the tall grass is yellow and the iron wood trees, well, leafless and looking like they’re made of iron.

Cochise used the stronghold as his cover and base from which he attacked white settlements in the 1860s and early 1870s. Arms, even artillery, could not dislodge him, but a treaty did, negotiated between a U.S. Army general and Cochise, then in his 60s. Maybe he had just run out of gas. Or room. He retired to where the present-day stronghold is and died in 1874 of natural causes.

I wasn’t close to running out of gas, but daylight was another matter. Clouds were rolling in and the light was beginning to dull. I was at the walls of the stronghold, but I’d have to hike to get in, and I didn’t have the time. Damn. I didn’t have a clue where this winding trail was leading. I kept imaging a nice two-lane asphalt state highway always around the next bend. Didn’t happen.

After bounding along for about an hour, I finally came upon humans. Young eco campers sitting around in the late afternoon, parked beneath a copse of trees. They turned and stared at the Mustang like it was a spaceship. “Excuse me fellows, but where the hell am I?” One camper in a wooly cap with flaps down over his ears said: “Go 500 yards and that’s the end of the trail, turn around there. Take this road back 12 miles and you’ll come to Middlemarch Road, much wider. Take Middlemarch to Route 80 and head south to Tombstone.”

Damn, a full retreat. And I never set foot in Cochise’s stronghold. A gloom set in. I was out of my depth. Had the wrong car. Misjudged the map. I’d be lucky to get out without rolling off a shoulder and being rescued by the Border Patrol. On my way back I passed a campsite of Boy Scouts settling in for supper. One of the men leading the pack slowly watched my drive by with a stare that said, “You tenderfoot fool. What the hell do you think you’re doing out here in a convertible?”

A few times the Mustang lurched down into a rut or flat ran over a rock chunk. There go the shocks, the suspension, the paint job. My only hope was to get the car so mud splattered and covered in grime any small dents and scratches would be camouflaged.

I made it back to State Highway 80 to see one of those famous Arizona sunsets. The hills turn to purple haze and the sky layered with streaks of burnt red, orange, yellow, then sky blue, deep blue and if you look straight above, stars are out with a clarity you will never back east.

I had about a 70-minute drive on 80 to the border town of Douglas, where I would stay the next two nights exploring the borderline. In the growing darkness I considered those Wild West myths and legends, how Cochise went from feared terrorist to having a county named after him, as well as a community college. He’d get a laugh out of that, too. First we killed his people, cornered them, defanged them, then turned them into what we call nowadays revenue streams. Wild Bill Cody showed off old warriors in Europe as part of his touring show. Back east in the late 1800s, publishers of so-called dime novels cashed in on pulp fiction heroes and villains of the Far West. Cochise, Geronimo, Red Cloud, Crazy Horse, they have been mythologized for more than a century now. Hollywood made millions off them. In the 50s and 60s TV couldn’t broadcast enough westerns. When Disneyland opened in 1955 one of the most popular attractions was an hourly Indian attack on a beleaguered but brave fort. This little fling of mine through southern Arizona provided just a glimpse of the barren, simple living behind the myths. Most tourists would sleep their way through this kind of hard country. Wake me up when we’re at Universal Studios.

Afterword

Arizona is the closest state in the U.S. projecting a third world vibe. You have the sprawling country club that is Phoenix. Gated communities like 500 Club at Adobe Damn, Antelope Hills, Apache Wells. Scottsdale’s walled in wealth — “plenty of late night partying and a buzzing hotel scene,” says The New York Times. Scottsdale is 90 percent white, with a median family income of $92,000. Stunning Sedona where retirees find the sunset is 92 percent white, with the median age of 50. Upscale resorts and fashion malls pepper Phoenix and Tucson: the Biltmore Fashion Center, Desert Sky Mall, Foothills Mall. Out in suburban Glendale sits a hulking silver aluminum space ship, an enclosed stadium with retractable roof and a grass field that can be rolled outside for cultivating. It is where the Arizona Cardinals NFL team plays. You have Arizona State and University of Arizona, hip campuses, “flipflops in February” is how they are marketed in the Midwest and East.

Then there is the legion of immigrants, legal and illegal. Douglas is 80 percent Hispanic. There is what is left of the Apaches, the Navajos, in isolated towns like Kenyatta up north and Nogales Arizona on the border. Residing in the middle class is Cliff the clerk at Budget Rent A Car, a 22-year veteran. “Recovery, yeah, sure, whatever,” he tells me. And Phyllis Little, who owns with her husband Rich the High Desert Antiques store on the small main drag in Benson, 40 miles south of Tucson on I-10. “You wouldn’t believe the rent here,” she says. She and her husband are hanging on. Not making money, not losing it. Tourism hasn’t come back, she says.

There is middle class life in new adobe subdivisions outside of Douglas. A Wal-Mart and Target and Safeway have done their damage, draining the life out of downtown Douglas and G Street. Phoenix is ringed by suburbs: Mesa, Carefree, Paradise Valley, Sunrise, Sun City, Goodyear, Chandler and Tempe. It’s all good.

But you’re never far from the edge between gated comfort and grinding poverty. A gap-toothed Mex with a loopy smile rings up a case of Bug Light at a Circle K convenience store. Asked his age, he says 35; he looks about 50. Two teens come in asking for firewood. Creepy. And I’m suburban Mesa.

The booze flows easy out here. Stacks of beer, hard liquor, jugs or minis, and racks of wine at any Circle K or Safeway supermarket. That’s a lethal combo, easy booze, guns and poverty. Put Tombstone on the map, and still is making news today.

On a cloudless Monday morning, I pull out of Douglas at 6:30 in the morning, frost on the car, 22 degrees outside. Driving west the sun begins to climb from the flat desert behind me, a blinding orange and yellow orb. The sky above turns rich blue. I want to grab a handful. The air is clean and clear and the road empty. The Chiricahua, Dragoon, Huachuca, Whetstone and Santa Rita mountain ranges rim the horizon. Who needs myths when you have mornings like this.

Soundtrack CDs for a southern Arizona road trip:
Outlaws musicians wealthy enough like Willie and Waylon to live outside the lines, and others who don’t make dough and don’t give up: Simon Stokes with his biker white beard. Ronnie Elliott playing lounges in Tampa. Brooding bluesman Charlie Musselwhite. The soundtrack from the film Get Low. South Memphis String Band. Jerry Garcia, live from Berkeley in 1975, an outlaw from the world of fluorescent office lights these guys will never and could never see. Sufjan Stevens. Richard Hawley’s “Truelove’s Gutter.” The Kills (for all you who think rock and roll guitar music is dead and gone), jazz pianist Fred Hersch, the soundtrack to the remake of “True Grit” (but of course).

Father and son racin’ around

2010-08-30T14:55:00.000-07:00

Much the time I go one-on-one with Steve, my 18-year-old son, is when we’re behind the windshield on the road. At home, he’ll watch ESPN or the NFL Network or Family Guy or Entourage in a recliner, channel surfing madly. I’ll walk in, sit down, he’ll flip around channels, I’ll get irritated and get up, come back later and the TV is off, with Steve in his bedroom room clicking away at NASCAR 09, Madden NFL 10, NCAA Football 10 on the XBOX 360, or maybe watching The Lost Episodes of the Dave Chappelle Show or some cable show DVD series.

This is nothing personal. I assume.

Sometimes Steve asks, “What time do you think you’ll be going to bed tonight? I’m thinking about having some of the fellows over.” In our small rancher this mean it’s time for me to clear out. Back to the bedroom

I am the old man to be avoided. I remember well when I was about 18, going over to John Pulliam’s house on summer nights, walking quickly through the thick-carpeted living room to the stairs leading to Pulliam’s bedroom. Always, you had to pass Otto, his hulking, bald physician of a father. Otto would be off in the family den, drinking beer, watching TV, in a zone. Acknowledge us? Never. Otto was one of the old men we avoided. He avoided us. A win-win. But Otto was a unique mystery. A physician who put beers away like an Irish dockworker, judging from the pile of cans in Pulliam’s trash.

Flagler Beach
Twice this summer Steve and I have left our comfort zones to hit the road. On the first day of July we flew to Jacksonville, rented a subcompact, cheapest things on the lot, and drove 50 miles south to Flagler Beach and the Si, Como No? motel, a true relic, a family-run throwback Florida classic with only eight units. Each one with a front patio, hammock, fridge, and TV and air conditioning, thank god. Our unit had a white picket fence since our room was on the corner, maybe a hundred paces across sand-swept highway A1A to the beach.

This was base camp for NASCAR’s Daytona Coke Zero 400 Powered by Coca-Cola, plus another race the night before, plus a mind-numbing tour of NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, (where veteran tour guides sounded pissed off about the shuttle program ending with no clear mission on the horizon. NASA without a mission is, well, call it Afghanistan.)

Steve and I also took a spin along the famous hard-as-bricks beaches of Daytona, where they used to race before Big Bill France, founding emperor of the NASCAR empire, built the massive 2.5-mile Daytona International Speedway in the late 1950s.

Steve did every bit of the driving down in Florida. He told me it was his father’s day present. Beautiful Steve, and pass me another Newcastle. Up and down I-95 every day, several times some days, we’d make runs through that green-sided tunnel from Flagler to Daytona. Interstate travel at its most banal — and that’s saying something since interstates are always so bland. Locals and travel authorities say the real Florida is inland. Steve and I thought about heading in, but it was so damn hot we drove all of three miles, to a marshy state park draped with Spanish Moss, crawling with armadillos, and home to the ruins of a sugar plantation.

Flagler Beach was old Florida enough. The parade passed Flagler by years, maybe decades ago. Now it’s pocked with vacant, boarded-up, rusting old homes with wild yards. An outdoor taco stand and narrow pizza joints along AIA. There are more liquor stores than churches. Pecker’s Pub and Hanky Panky’s Tavern. Drive around and you see some tidy homes in lime green, bright orange, aqua or pale red. There’s a totally old Florida garish orange and aquamarine motel. A maid or maybe it was the owner came over as I photographed this funky Florida color scheme. “What’d ya doing?” “Taking pictures. The colors are classic.” She shook her head and walked away.

Flagler looks like it’s been out in the sun too way too long. The same can be said for some of the natives. Leather-skinned wiry guys with more lines in their face than Waylon Jennings, ratty ponytails, crooked teeth, unsteady, slightly bulging eyes. Refugees from god knows where. One morning a group of them set their chairs and poles for a long day on Flagler’s fishing pier.

“I eat the right stuff, just too much,” an old hippie or alcoholic or both said to another. “Pizza has everything you need, you know. McDonald’s burgers, too.”

Flagler Beach defiantly embraces these refugees, hippies, bums, surfers, Harley riders, misfits who came up short making it to the Keys. The vibe is “whatever, who cares, take a load off.” A sign over the office of our motel reads, “Be nice 2 tourists… We’re ALL tourists!” Out by the tiki hut, where guests BYOB, light a bonfire and laugh and joke and bullshit beach nights away, there were more signs: “We’re all here ‘cause we’re not there.” “Breathe in life.”

Judging from all the “for sale” signs, though, many Flagler residents would rather be somewhere else. “Motivated seller.” “Lots for sale.” “Office space for lease.” “Sale by owner.” Marti and Karl, the middle-aged, born-again couple who own the Si, Como No? want to sell out, but Marti says the timing’s terrible, can’t get anything close to the price they want. “We may hold on.”

What happened?

Progress. High school and college kids on spring break now head to Mexico. Families flock to Disneyworld of course. Flagler got caught in what economists call “creative destruction.” The old gets chewed up and spit out by the new.

The Poconos
On the last day of July Steve and I started on another NASCAR-inspired trek, this one up to the Pennsylvania Poconos for three races: the Weis Markets 125, the Pocono Mountains 125 Camping World truck race, and the Sunoco Red Cross Pennsylvania 500, all at the vast Pocono Raceway, built 50 years ago by a dentist who is now a very wealthy man.

One of the things Steve and I converse about on the road is music. Me referencing my old school compact discs, Steve with his iTunes downloads.

We start the trip listening to Wilco, a so-called alt-country band, who quickly proves too laid back. We need driving music, groove music, on the PA turnpike, which rivals I-95 in its complete lack of scenery. We need to zone out. Kasabian, a Brit band, ups the tempo with its lively 2004 debut CD. Steve holds to the passing lane; we zip by cornfields, trailer parks, a dad lifts his squirming kid out of an SUV to take a piss, a middle-aged guy also is passed on the side of the road taking a piss. That’s as interesting as the turnpike gets.

Through a mountain tunnel Steve does some serious tailgating — again — and I put on Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse, which sounds vaguely Sgt. Pepperish. On road trips past Steve and I went gone over Sgt. Pepper’s influence, which you still hear in pop music production values 45 years later. We got rock and roll 101 — Elvis, the Stones, the Beatles, Zeppelin, Dylan, Marley, the Clash — out of the way on earlier trips. Now we cruise with what’s au current. Steve gets impatient behind the wheel — again — what with all these federal shovel stimulus highway projects shutting down lanes, squeezing traffic, plus family vans and SUVs chugging up and down Pocono hills loaded up with bikes, ice chests, folding chairs and trash bags of clothes for a week’s vacation lakeside.

We bound across grassy fields to park beyond the dentist’s grand raceway and my daughter Kate texts Steve: she thinks our dog is dying. I get on the cell: “What’s up?” “He’s just standing and shaking. He won’t eat. Looks like he’s gonna throw up. What should I do?” “When’s mom coming home?” I ask. In an emergency, it’s always “where’s mom?”

Every imaginable body shape and size roams around at a NASCAR race. Obese. Anorexic. Skeletal alcoholic. Fat bums. Wide bodies. Cholesterol-clogged time bombs. Inflated breasts. Runway models. Beauty queens. Bellies the size of boulders — carried with pride. Sumo-like puffy upper arms and massive thighs. Too many fans wear too little clothing, topless men, men and women in stretch shorts or tight jeans and too-small tees that show more than we’re interested in, thank you very much. There is all sorts of hair, or lack of it. Chrome domes, Marine crew cuts, Mohawks on seven-year olds, ponytails. ZZ Top beards, Civil War sideburns and mustaches. Goatees galore. Tattoos pay homage to eagles, flags, of course mothers, snakes, barbed wire inked on necks, breasts, chests, forearms, biceps, thighs, calves, across shoulders, on hands and feet.

There’s conspicuous 24/7 consumption of alcohol, mostly all beer and Jim Beam or Crown Royal, as any NASCAR lover or hater knows, but it’s all relatively tame stuff. The most consistent consumption can be found among the RV and camper villagers parked in the track’s infield for the weekend. Confederate flags, U.S. Marine Corps, USA flags, and flags numbered and colored honoring favorite drivers, all flap or droop from rooftop poles. But they’re not burning furniture or baiting cops out there on the infield. No sir. This is for the most part a law and order crowd. NASCAR races don’t scare away families who bring five-year-olds wearing green earplugs, bored 12-year-old girls, infants asleep on mom or dad’s shoulder, and plenty of grandparents, too.

NASCAR’s 36 weekend carnivals that wheel around the country from February to November present modern Americana in all its glory, if you’re part of the party, or all its excess, if you never want an invitation. These are roaring spectacles that mix military jet fighter flyovers, religious invocations — “Thank God, Jesus, thank you” — screams the winning driver over his crew radio in one of the races, an endless sea of corporate branding. At NASCAR races sporting competition meets rabid commercialism and feeds a consumerism unseen at other sporting events. From the ear-splitting jet flyover before they drop the green flag to the checkered flag, the noise level exceeds factories and turns racers deaf by the time they’re 50. The 43 cars on the track (that is how many start the race) whoosh by like a swarm of very pissed off mechanical hornets. They hit speeds upward of 200 MPH, often on banked curves steeper than sand dunes. Speed and noise, patriotism and religion, booze and babies, country music and 100,000 to 200,000 fans. Everyman becomes a hero: tire changers, mechanics, pit broom sweepers, spotters above the press box, announcers, retired racers doing commentary, also the drivers, crew chiefs, Iraq and Afghan grunts and generals introduced proudly before the race. Hell, even the sponsors with all their flashy logos and colorful icons get some love. Fans all over wear Ford or DuPont or U.S. Army or UPS tees and ball caps.

After going to races since Steve was in middle school, we take the show, for better and worse, for granted. Like a marriage. In good times and bad…

My son corrects me. He started watching NASCAR on TV in fifth grade after playing around with a NASCAR video game. I asked him what the attraction was. “It was all just big. Big stadiums. Big tracks. Big noise. Big field of cars. And always the speed.”

You need to sit trackside in the lower rows of the aluminum, steel and concrete stadiums to appreciate how you can’t talk to the person next to you until the pack of cars is on the other side of the track. If you’re at a half-mile track, forget it, you can’t talk for three hours. And you need to get low to appreciate how fast the pack gets around, how insanely bumper-to-bumper the cars are drafting together. If you go dirt track racing, bring googles with your earplugs. At our first dirt track race Steve and I got splattered by a wave of dirt every time the “world of outlaws” circled the track. At a quarter-mile dirt track, that’s about every 20 seconds .

“You can look at racing two ways,” Steve went on. “In one way, it’s simple. Cars going round and round making left turns for three or four hours. But it can get complex. Rent of buy a radio scanner with headsets and listen to the drivers talk fuel strategy, wedge adjustments, bitch about other drivers, curse their car for being being too “tight” or too “loose” in the turns. Listen to crew chiefs calm their racers down, or try to. Spotters up in the sky lead drivers past wrecks, through smoke and flames, and around slower cars. “The pit crews jumping the wall, changing four tires, filling the gas tank, making track bar adjustments, that’s a sport in itself,” says Steve.

Millions around the country, especially in the northeast corridor where we live, ask, “Why NASCAR? And the point is?” I got the NASCAR bug about Steve’s age watching ABC’s “Wide World of Sports” every Saturday afternoon at five. They showed races on tape delay, or highlights of races. This was before all the safety measures put in place after NASCAR icon Dale Earnhardt was killed on the last lap of the Daytona 500, before car designs became standardized, and to die-hards, bastardized. On Wide World of Sports I watched cars that looked much more like what you’d see on the street cart wheel across the infield, sail over walls and fences, disappear into smoke and flaming pyres, like plane crashes. Wrecks were often spectacular, drivers and fans could and did get injured and killed. What pulled me in, though, was NASCAR’s culture, coming across my small B&W TV. It’s the culture of small, rickety tracks in towns down south I never heard of. Rough blue collar fans who don’t turn up at any other sporting event except college football maybe. Racers with titles and nicknames: King Petty, Fireball Roberts, Tiny Lund, Junior Johnson. Growing up in the suburbs of Philadelphia, with a strong streak of romanticism in me, all this was the call of the wild.

Around fifth or sixth grade I started gluing together plastic model NASCAR cars in my bedroom at night, painting the color scheme, and carefully sticking on the numbers and sponsor logos. Steve started collecting replica miniature die-cast models of cars, a lot simpler than gluing a hundred small plastic parts. We both ended up with a lot of race cars in our bedrooms. Of which we would say not a word to friends. After all, in the sophisticated suburban culture we both came out of, stock car racing was for redneck hillbillies. Dumb asses. You want be a dumb ass, too? To this day the only person I talk NASCAR to is Steve; the same goes for him with me. It’s a blessing.

“You got to get into the rhythm of the race,” says Steve. “It’s like soccer or baseball. A lot people think those sports are boring, too. Nothing happens. You can watch in that simple way and drift in and out. Or you can use that radio scanner and listen to all the crew chatter and decisions and the race goes a lot faster.”

After the race the set list for the short drive to our lodge reads like this: Jack Johnson, a laidback Hawaii surfer dude, a soothing crooner to chill us out. Something called MGMT. Eddie Vedder singing songs he wrote for the movie “Into the Wild’” Hip hop’s latest street king Drake. Arena bands Dave Matthews and the Kings of Leon. A bouncy techno group from France, Phoenix. Steve’s all-time favorite band, the Brit bad boys from dirty old Manchester, Oasis, owing a heavy debt to The Beatles, which both the band and Steve readily concede. The Philly hip hop band The Roots. The late great rapper Biggie Smalls. Gorillaz, who’ve put out the best CD of the decade called “Plastic Beach,” a fantastic, grooving, seamless mash-up of hip hop, soul, R&B, electronica, dance, drum programs, rock guitars and driving rhythm section. And bringing the set to a close, a hip hop/reggae band, the Long Beach Dub All Stars.

Saturday night we bed down in the smartly appointed and overpriced Marriott TownePlace Suites Scranton Wilkes-Barre. It still smells new, having opened May 1. It’s the next step up from a Marriott Courtyard and ten steps above the Si Como No? in Flagler Beach. We’re talking “Towne” here, not “town.” The TownePlace is sold out with race fans. And two traveling salesmen.

Two for the road
“You don’t mind if we sit here?” asks one of the reps. I’m sitting alone smoking a cigar in the hotel’s front patio. Just me, two empty lime-green patio chairs, and a round glass table. Steve is supposed to join me I don’t know where he is. Later I find out he stayed in the room watching another race, then hit the sack.

The two reps appear to be in their late ‘40s. One wears a blue stripped office shirt with no tie. The other wears a purple golf shirt. “Man, what a long, long day,” one sighs, slumping back. “Here, here’s my family,” his partner shows him, flashing open his laptop. “You’re wife, what a number,” says his partner. Soon two laptops are flipped open on the glass table and these territory nomads are in a zone of their own talking shop with surprising intensity. It is, after all, Saturday night in upstate Pennsylvania, and it makes far more sense to me that NASCAR fans are across the patio popping Budweisers, smoking stogies, joking and laughing and wondering about tomorrow’s weather.

The two reps go off on their jargon. “He’s gotta have a writing surface.” “He needs a sink.” “That’s kind of a strange arrangement.” “Does he want his laptop near him?” “This one is good, I’m telling ya, he’s got good hands. I’ve seen him work.” “What kind of margin do you want?” “I don’t know what he’s got up his sleeve.” “If he’s in the office I’ll tell you what, he’s not doing his job.” “He’s gotta think reality.” They sell office designs to dentists.

One guy gets buzzed on his cell, reads it, and yawns. “I’ve got a bride desperate to hear my voice. I’m fixing to turn in.” Unfortunately he doesn’t. These guys are ruining a contemplative smoke, and there are no other empty tables for me to move to. From what I gather, both fellows are from Tennessee, or thereabouts. What brings them bedraggled but blabbing up to Scranton-Wilkes Barre on a Saturday night in the summer is a question I don’t’ care to know the answer to.

I turn away from their machine gun rat-a-tat-tat code language shop talk and see through a large plate glass window three women, all 30ish and pudgy, all wearing bright yellow tees with “Tire Monkey” on the back, legs lazily draped over comfy chairs in the hotel lobby. They’re laughing and drinking wine (who says NASCAR has no wine sipping class?) while watching the same race on a flat screen above the lobby’s faux fireplace that Steve is watching upstairs. NASCAR has more women fans than any other sport I go to, even baseball. It’s Saturday night and they’re doing what NASCAR fans across the country are doing: drinking, smoking and watching another race. In a parallel universe, the dental office reps plan how to make more money.

Then one of the reps shifts the conversation to talk seriously about his daughter called “Buddha.” “Buddha,” it turns out, has a life-threatening auto-immune disease slowly eating away at her innards. This so depressed the rep he quit his job, went on a prescribed cocktail of meds, and was on suicide watch for eight months. His doctor called his wife every night. His wife has fallen apart several times, he says, and is angry with God. They’re both angry and incredibly frustrated because they can’t get their daughter into clinical trials because the docs say she’s not sick enough. But when she gets sicker in few years, it’ll be too late, her father says. She has stabilized for now, and is on Viagra to help her blood flow. Her father weaned off the meds, got the itch to get back to work, and so here he is, in Scranton-Wilkes Barre on a Saturday night.

I get all this just sitting at the table, smoking my cigar. After a while I broke out a reporter’s notepad and began writing down bits and pieces of what I has hearing, partly to see if the guys could or would break out of their mindmeld long enough to notice I was spying, listening in. Never happened.

We don’t talk to neighbors anymore, friendships fray over time, families move away, but we air our grievances, disappointments and banalities in front of complete strangers. So what, we’ll never see ‘em again. Bug off, as the Brits say. It’s only an embarrassment if you blab next to a journalist taking notes.

This rep raps on like I’m invisible, about vacations to Cancun and the Bahamas, buying a Lincoln Navigator for one son, a Camaro for the other, his little girl Beanie who’s more a badass than her brothers.

This “social transparency” has spread like a cultural virus thanks to wireless technology, mobile phones, transient living, increased travel, confessions on Reality TV, Court TV, Dr. Phil, Oprah, Twitter, Facebook. NASCAR fans aren’t so confessional, which is another reason I like their company..

First thing I hear Sunday morning when I go to get coffee in the lobby is a woman who proclaims: “They’re not gonna get the race in today. Look it. It’s going to rain all day.”

A different NASCAR
“Buddha” is on my mind until we take our seats at the track down low along the ¾-mile home straightaway. Directly in front of us is an aluminum walkway wide enough for disabled fans to park their wheelchairs and watch the race. Some of the young kids are severely disabled, with muscles too weak to hold up their heads or handle food; they’re seated in padded, motorized wheelchairs. Fathers, about the furthest thing from the stereotyped NASCAR “Bud head” dads, feed their boys through straws, lean over to whisper in their ears and wipe away their sweat. This is not your suburban sophisticate’s NASCAR.

One dad wears a tee shirt: “Autism affects us all.” Raceway workers with “Disabled Patrons” golf shirts hand out free box lunches. A whale of a man tending to a friend in a wheel chair chugs back can after can of National beer, tossing them into a trash barrel like he’s chain smoking. A few rows in front of him, a dude wears a cardboard Coors 24-pack carry-out case on his head like it’s Halloween. Three Coors cans are glued to the top and one on each side to make for beer can ears. A smiley face is painted on the back of the box, smoking a cigarette or a joint. In front, an oval has been cut open so Coors King can gab and drink. He reminds me of face-painted football fanatics, but with a difference. The NASCAR faithful have been drinking and smoking and barbecuing for 48 hours since they showed up Friday night, still, I don’t see the fistfights or shoving matches like in the upper deck at Eagles football games. I don’t see guys tripping and puking and falling down the stairs like at Eagles games, or splashing beer on you as they squeeze by to their seats. Even Phillies baseball games get rough. At a game last year a drunk got annoyed after being forced to vacate a seat belonging to another ticket holder; later outside the stadium after the game his gang punched around friends of the ticketholder, killing one of them. If someone is sitting in your seat at a NASCAR race, no problem, they generally smile, pack up and move on.

NASCAR Nation lets tee shirts do the talking. “You don’t know quack.” “I’m all about trucks and bucks.” “I can only please one person a day; today isn’t your day and tomorrow isn’t looking too good.” “Every day is race day.” “Old guys rule.” “Future fire fighter.” “The Power of Freedom.” Then there are the thousands of walking boards for brand America: tee shirts stamped with logos and brand colors: Loew’s, Hooters, Home Depot, M&Ms, Jim Beam, Jack Daniels, Crown Royal, Red Bull, Target, Office Depot, Aflac, the Air Force, U.S. Army, National Guard, DuPont, 3M, Kleenex, Clorox, Long John Silver’s, Mountain Dew, Bud, Coors,

A NASCAR event is part German beer garden, Jimmy Buffet’s Margaritaville, Mardi Gras, Armed Forces Day parade (a soldier who wears one of those demolition suits from “The Hurt Locker” movie tells me inside his display booth the suits weigh 80 pounds and he can only last 45 minutes in one) Kentucky Derby, Bonnaroo rock festival, Willie Nelson concern, Harley Davidson rally, state fair, Sunday picnic, frat party, RV and Airstream camp-out. It’s orderly and controlled for the most part due to the Zen of NASCAR. It’s a philosophy that allows for the calm consumption of massive quantities of beer (not nearly as much hard liquor or pot). A practitioner assumes a yoga-like position in the bleachers, his or her radio headset is firmly in place, along with ear plugs, shades, maybe a pack of smokes and a six-pack of beer, and for three or four hours will sit almost motionless, except of course for taking a piss, following the pack around and aorund the track. The essence of NASCAR Zen was relayed to me at the Daytona race by an old boy wearing a plastic orange Home Depot hard hat. The race was in the middle of one of several rain delays that would turn it into a six-hour marathon. “It’s all good,” Home Depot boy said. “It’s all good, you know. I’m here ‘til Thursday so it can rain all it wants. Here, want a beer?”

Leaving the Pocono race Steve and I pass groups of Amish teenage boys walking and jogging on the side of Pocono country road Route 115, with their jacked-up suspenders and straw boater hats. What do they think of the miles-long crawling parade of car-crazed, gas-guzzling, alcohol-fueled race fans in monster pickup trucks, motor homes, jeeps, convertibles, minivans and SUVs? Thank God I’m a country boy.

Steve and I reverse roles on these road trips, especially with him licensed to drive. He does all the driving, never has a beer. I down shots of Maker’s Mark at dinner and don’t worry about anything. Steve’s more maturely cost-conscious than me, too. “$50 for a pit pass, no way dad. It’s not worth it.” When he was younger he’d buy the die-cast metal replica cars for $50-$60 a pop inside tents set up outside the tracks. Now if he buys any souvenir maybe it’s a refrigerator magnet. He downloads iTunes for 99 cents each. I buy CDs for $18. I buy Sports Illustrated; he downloads free podcasts. He gets all the scores on his cell phone. I still buy newspapers. I buy movie DVDs; Steve rents them from the cable company. Nothing particularly cheap about the old school

Our music set list for the two-hour drive home: The Beastie Boys, white rappers, in an all-instrumental CD, The Black Keys’ lowdown bluesy rock and roll that threatens to blow out the speakers with thumping bass lines, The Smiths, an artsy ‘80s smart-ass Brit band, REM’s early music from one of the great college towns, Athens, Georgia, circa ’82 to ’85, and finally The Strokes, a rocking New York band that was supposed to be the great group of the decade but couldn’t find inspiration or collaboration past their second album. Steve and I talk about how they are back in the studio recording after trying solo ventures.

We also talk about Steve’s transition to college living, just three weeks away, his mystery roommate, does he need a flat screen, where a degree in telecommunications might get him, his sister’s new job, friends of his buying motorcycles, one friend having it planned out to become an FBI agent after going through ROTC, Ranger School and majoring in a language, a girl on the track team who’s going in the Marines, a couple girls going to Arizona State, what it will take to make NASCAR as popular as it was before the recession, what kind of car Steve can buy for $6,000, the overnight success of the new pizza shop he delivers for, how Steve could make it as a sports TV producer. He has this way of seeing the whole field, the big picture, all the angles. He did it on the field when he was playing. He does in the stands or watching TV.

“So what kind of job do you get being able to see the big picture?” he asks.

“I don’t know, it’s like you’re a sociologist or a historian. Maybe you make documentaries. Or you’re the guy behind the camera, in the trailer, who sees all the camera shots at a game or race and makes the calls.”

“I could see doing that for awhile.”

“So, when did you get smarter than me?” I tease him.

Steve looks surprised. Reminds me of the time I walked into the office of one of the editors on my magazine staff, a woman from India, and squatted on the floor to talk about something. She looked startled and perturbed. “Dave, you can’t do that.” “Do what?” “Sit on the floor like that.” “What? Why?” “Because, you are my boss.” Cultural confusion.

“What’d you mean? You’re way smarter than me,” said Steve. “You have a huge vocabulary.”

A curious compliment from an 18-year-old. Not my wisdom or knowledge or experience. My vocab. But what compliments ever come out of 18-year-olds? They’re not built that way. So Steve listens to me after all, at least some times. But he knows I edit a magazine for a living. I better know a verb or an adjective or two.

“Well Steve, you know all the trades and drafts, the standings, who’s playing on what team, who’s coming out with new CDs, who’s touring, the good cable shows, the new racetracks. I can’t keep up.”

Steve pulls into our driveway right as dusk descends.

“Thanks for driving.”

“Glad to do it.”

Why do I feel like I’m getting off a stagecoach?

We haul our gym bags out of the backseat and head into the house. Steve goes to check his computer. I go to bed.

Close encounter of the complacent kind

2010-08-30T13:24:00.001-07:00

I spent a lot of this summer, like many of you, reading BP stories. From all the reports, speculations, editorials, attacks and defenses, one word kept coming up — complacency. BP, its partners and contractors, possessed the knowledge, the equipment, the safety experts, the top engineers, the protocols, plans and management systems that should have prevented the catastrophe.

But as a past VP of safety for BP said in an email passed along to me, fatal decisions were made on the rig “because they had done so before” and gotten away with it. According to a federal investigation, a Transocean rig supervisor told a maintenance technician who protested that a crucial safety device had been bypassed, or disabled: “Damn thing been in bypass for five years. Matter of fact, the entire (Transocean) fleet runs them in bypass.”

Duly warned
Bad decisions. Missed warnings. Pushing the limits. I can relate. One Sunday this past July was another 90+ degree day in the Philadelphia region. We’d had at that point more than 30 days over 90 degrees in June and July. And it’s no dry heat in the Delaware Valley. There’s always a blanket of smothering humidity. “Horrid heat grips region” was a headline in the Philadelphia Inquirer that particular Sunday. The National Weather Service extended its excessive heat warning. Fourteen deaths in Philadelphia had been confirmed as heat-related, according to the paper.

So there it was: knowledge. I read expert advice on how best to yield to the heat. I had the requisite experience, too: it had been a record-breaking sweltering summer. So what did I do on this Sunday in July? Decided to take a run, a jog is more like it, through Valley Forge National Park, a short drive from home.

Again, let’s compare notes. More than 50,000 wells had been drilled on federal leases beneath the Gulf before disaster struck. I’ve run through Valley Forge hundreds of times. I had my plan, my protocols, just like the drillers. Run early, before eight a.m. Bring along a water bottle. Wear a flimsy tee short, light clothing. Run on the trail that affords the most shade. On the stinking hot days, lay off the hills.

“Pushing production”
So what did I do? Circumvented my best-laid plans. The night before I’d been out late and slept in. I got a late start; I knew it. It was past eleven when I started my jog. And early on I decided to “push production,” you might say. I’ve read that enough about drillers’ mindset. I parked by the Visitor Center and jogged along the North Outer Line Drive. This trail is more open and exposed to the sun beating down than my usual route. I can’t explain why, but I pushed up the distance to swing around the National Memorial Arch, head up and past Wayne’s Woods, a picnic area, hang a U-turn where the trail meets the South Outer Line Drive, and then back-track to my car. Roughly a four-mile jaunt.

There’s a theory by James Reason that catastrophes such as the BP debacle occur when a series of breakdowns, bad decisions, etc., line up in precisely the order of a long chain of falling dominos that proceed to a catastrophic conclusion. He calls it the Swiss Cheese model of disasters. All the holes of multiple slices line up so a disaster of errors runs through the system unchecked. I worked my own Swiss Cheese model that Sunday morning. A series of lousy decisions. I ran later than was prudent. Further than was necessary. On a trail more hilly and sunny than I’d usually take. But “because I had done so before” and never paid a price, nothing seemed out of order.

Nothing was out of the ordinary until about 100, 200 yards from my car on the trail back to the Visitor’s Center. I was gulping for air. Slowed to a half-walk, half-jog, and said, “This is it. I gotta stop.” Damn, I wasn’t going to make my goal. I stopped on the asphalt trail and started to wobble. Heat exhaustion. Me?

The Good Samaritan
Valley Forge attracts more than 1.2 million visitors a year. On a day like this when the high reached 96 degrees, with the heat index above 100, the parking lots are empty. Reenactment soldiers in their blue wool uniforms go home. Very fortunately for me a fellow I’ll call John spotted me in my distress and came over. I can’t exactly remember our conversation but it went something like: “Man, you don’t look too good. You OK? You sit down here, OK?” He called to his wife, “Go call the Park Ranger Service.” John poured a bottle of water on my head. Another fellow materialized next to me. “You’ve lost a lot of liquid. Did you pass out? Are you dizzy? Don’t move.”

I don’t think I blacked out, but I had trouble putting thoughts together and answering these guys. Someone handed me a cell phone but I couldn’t remember my wife’s number. I’m lousy with names and numbers. I should have called the house line; that number is embedded in my head, but I wasn’t thinking straight. I was on the ground and could not get up. John handed me a large plastic bottle of SmartWater® A green and white park ranger patrol car pulled up, dome light flashing. Great. I’m the center of a scene created out of my own stupidity. “I’ve got an ambulance coming,” said the ranger. I started to come around after inhaling the water bottle and getting my wind back. I stood up, a little shaky at first, but I was able to talk the ranger out of the ambulance. We decided he’d drive me back to my car, then tail me on the short ride home.

“Have you had many people fainting in this heat this summer?” I asked Gordon, the ranger, on the way back to my car. “Just last Wednesday we had man, 57, die of a heart attack bicycling through Wayne’s Woods. He just went down. There was nothing we could do.”

After we pulled into my driveway, I asked Gordon for the name and address of John. I mailed him a six-pack of water bottles.

And now I read those BP stories a little differently. Hubris, recklessness, complacency, denial, tell me about it.

Up on Angels Landing

2010-08-30T13:20:00.000-07:00

Rock climbers are a breed apart. There he is, baggy shorts, shaggy hair, no shirt, hanging by his fingertips to thin cracks on the underside of a sandstone ledge, defying gravity. Has the body fat of a marathon runner. The taut, cut muscles of a gymnast.

Or there she is, in full climbing personal protective equipment. Helmet especially designed with an inverted ”V” in the back to accommodate her ponytail. Sleek, high-tech anti-glare eye protection. Gloves, boots, fall protection. Scaling the sheer ice face of a canyon wall, ergo-designed ice axes in both hands.

Climbing culture beckons the non-conformist. Individualists only responsible and accountable to themselves, or a small team. They are driven wanderers, seeking outrageous climbs, sometimes at the expense of local prohibitions.

“Climbing, after all, is about freedom,” writes Andrew Bisharat, in the June, 2010 issue of “Rock and Ice” magazine.

So what happens in this culture that prizes individual expression when a climber sees someone doing something dumb? Do they speak up? Intervene?

Rarely, writes Bisharat.

Laissez-faire climbing
But that doesn’t preclude climbers from thinking about saying something. Some are introspective, aware and attuned philosophers of the terra firma.

In his column, Bishart questions why he has allowed crazy fools to continue down their path of self-destruction. “Doing what’s right doesn’t come easily,” he says. The last thing the hardened climber wants to do is play safety cop, “that guy who runs around imposing his ego on everyone by telling him or how to act.”

Escape from Vegas
This past April I made my getaway from a business meeting to Las Vegas to drive three hours east to Zion National Park in southern Utah. Zion is climbing holy ground, with its 5,000 to 7,800-foot red, orange and white canyon walls, arches and hoodoos holding a “lifetime of adventure,” according to an article about the park in the June issue of “Rock and Ice.”

Believe me, I had zero intention of attempting any kind of vertical assault. I am a hiker, not a climber. My challenge would be Angels Landing. The trail to Angel’s Landing is 2.5 miles to a rocky viewpoint 1,500 feet above Zion Canyon and the Virgin River.

Here’s how Wikipedia describes the journey: “After a series of steep switchbacks, the trail goes through a gradual ascent. Walter's Wiggles, a series of 21 steep switchbacks, are the last hurdle before Scout's Lookout. Scout's Lookout is generally the turnaround point for those who are unwilling to make the final summit push to the top of Angels Landing. The last half-mile of the trail is strenuous and littered with sharp drop offs and narrow paths. Chains to grip are provided for portions of the last half-mile to the top.”

Seven fatalities
Days after I made the trek a woman in her 60s, hiking alone, died after falling from Scout’s Lookout. Angels Landing is “particularly notable for fatalities,” according to an article in the Salt Lake City Tribune describing the incident. Last year, two women in their 50s died from about 1,000-foot falls on the Angels Landing trail. Since 2000, seven people have died on Angels Landing, including a 14-year-old Boy Scout, according to Tribune report.

Had I done this Internet research before my trip, would I have stuck to the canyon floor and the verdant banks of the Virgin River? Not likely. I’ve climbed Angels Landing twice before, once with my then 17-year-old daughter. I was confident and determined this time around, the only traits I might share with serious climbers.

Personal experience trumps raw statistics and incidents I did not witness.

Ascending Angels Landing, though the way is marked and chained for you at times, cranks up your adrenaline and narrows your concentration to the rocks and grips straight ahead. Depending on the time of day and year, you pass any number of people going up and down the trail. There is little conversation between strangers, none during the trickier parts of the climb. You are absorbed in your own climbing calculations — do I go this way or that way? — and most aware of your grip, footing, and stamina.

What if…
What if I saw another climber, complete stranger, straying from the chains to carve his initials on a ledge 1,000 feet up? Would I say something?

Probably not. But it depends. If the stray climber was a ten-year-old seemingly by himself, definitely I’d be compelled to do or say something. If the boy’s father was nearby, well, I might say something to the dad. Or I might figure father knows best and be on my way.

If the person initialing the ledge was a tanned and fit twentysomething wearing REI climbing gear, I’d figure he knows more than I do and leave him be. Now maybe he smoked crack before making his ascent, but I’d calculate the odds are slim and leave him alone. If he was with friends, I’d be even less likely to intervene.

If that stray climber was a soloing 60ish grandmother type timidly inching toward the edge, I’d probably shout out to her.

Mitigating factors
To speak up or ignore someone taking an obvious risk involves a startling number of potential factors. What’s your physical condition at the moment of truth: gassed, alert? What’s your perception of the risk-taker’s experience and understanding of what he’s doing? Is the risk-taker alone or with a group of peers?

Says Bisharat: “Speaking up… immediately and inescapably intertwines you with the consequences of what happens. It can feel easier to live and let die.”

If I pull back the ten-year-old or a rapdily fatiguing grandmother, do I sacrifice making the summit to escort them back down?

Sometimes getting involved is a no-brainer. If someone is about to fall, there’s no time to second-quess and as Bisharat writes, “the self is forgotten and the moral course of action just takes place…”

But seldom is the situation so black and white. “Finding that right degree, the right speech and the right listener all need to come together, and I’m still not sure I understand how to achive that balance,” writes Bisharat.

Me, too.

Summer of discontent

2010-07-21T14:39:00.000-07:00

President Obama’s approval rating as the summer got underway: 46 percent were in favor of how he was directing affairs, 45 percent were not, according to Gallup. We are conflicted about the man. But approval of his leadership is trending definitely down. At one point in the past year, 61 percent were positive about the President.

“Conflicted” is being diplomatic to describe how many Americans feel about leadership in general these days. It’s been a sour attitude a long time festering. In the past few years we’ve endured the worst recession in 80 years. Wall Street’s embarrassment of riches. The BP debacle, the country’s worst environmental disaster and a human tragedy. Afghanistan, now the nation’s longest-ever war.

Dr. Martin Seligman, the guru of positive psychology, is perhaps the only person smiling.

Gloomy Gallup reports
Gallup reported in early summer that “slightly more” Americans believe good, quality jobs are for the taking. That’s generous. Gallup's June finding: a whopping 85 percent of Americans believe it is a "bad time" to find a "quality job." Overall, reported Gallup, “the total lack of optimism about the prospects of finding a quality job in June 2010 is consistent across ages, incomes, genders, and regions of the country.”

A “total lack of optimism.” Then there are other recent Gallup surveys: “Worry, Sadness, Stress Increase With Length of Unemployment.” “Fewer Americans Feeling Better About Their Financial Situation.” “Many Americans Say Gulf Beaches, Wildlife Will Never Recover.”

Wicked collision
Under these dark clouds Democrats on Capitol Hill have launched the most concerted effort in 40 years to reform federal occupational safety and health laws. If enacted, OSHA and MSHA fines will increase. Criminal penalties will be stiffer, enticing more attorneys to prosecute members of management, including EHS professionals for willful negligence causing serious employee injuries or deaths.. Meanwhile, over at the Department of Labor, OSHA chief Dr. David Michaels and deputy Jordan Barab are leading: 1) the biggest surge in agency enforcement since the 1970s, with record-setting fines; 2) the most ambitious standards-setting agenda since the ‘70s; and 3) development of perhaps the most sweeping single regulation in agency history, the so-called I2P2, the injury and illness prevention standard.

The irresistible political force coming out of Washington is slamming into an immovable wall of discontent. It’s a wicked collision.

“We are determined to put sharper teeth in our workplace safety laws and to step up federal enforcement,” said Senator Tom Harkin, an Iowa Democrat and chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee.

“Sharper teeth in our workplace safety laws and stepped up federal enforcement as Harkin states, WILL NOT improve safety and health management. People will do everything they can to avoid being penalized,” writes longtime safety and health consultant Ted Ingalls in an email.
“Bad actors have put profits before people,” blogs the AFL-CIO.

“I am not willing to trust the OSHA political appointees with the power” that would be granted the agency with the I2P2 standard, says safety consultant Tom Lawrence.

Where’s the trust?
Speaking of trust, that essential leadership element, what black hole did it get sucked into? The Tea Party grassroots insurrection, or whatever the mainstream media is calling it, has been created and is flourishing in a void of trust.

Too many businesses can’t be trusted, according to those who want a stronger OSHA and MSHA. “We have seen too many accidents over the last few months in workplaces across the country,” said Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) in a statement supporting the need for OSHA and MSHA reforms.

OSHA’s Dr. Michaels doesn’t trust the accuracy of industry’s injury and illness recordkeeping across the board. “In too many cases in this country, workplace safety incentive programs are doing more harm than good by creating incentives to conceal worker injuries,” he told the American Society of Safety Engineers’ national meeting in June.

Of course the oil industry isn’t deemed trustworthy after the BP catastrophe and a series of plant explosions. Here is OSHA’s Barab addressing the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association’s National Safety Conference in May: “Bluntly speaking: Your workers are dying on the job and it has to stop.”

Anything but empathy
In the absence of trust, you get bluntness, blame, anger, anything but empathy. You get current national dialog. Glen Beck. Hilda Solis’s “new sheriff in town.” The “small people” along the Gulf. Broken Promises. A general and his aides blabbing to Rolling Stone.

You get deep division over OSHA actions: I2P2 as the best move OSHA ever made or a Trojan Horse for an ergo rule. OSHA is fighting for the working man and woman or it is a police state.
It was 15 years ago, in 1995, that Daniel Goleman’s book, “Emotional Intelligence,” was wildly popular. “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People,” Stephen R. Covey’s book that has sold 15 million copies in 38 languages, dates back to 1989. Remember interdependence? Wrote Covey: “People who do not have the maturity to think and act interdependently may be good individual producers, but they won't be good leaders or team players.”

What planet did those books come from? That idealism seems of a different century, which of course it was. Pre-9/11. Before the housing, auto industry, 401K meltdowns.

Pre-occupied with self-esteem
“Empathetic Communication in High-Stress Situations” is the title of Dr. Peter Sandman’s timely web post from earlier this summer (www.psandman.com/col/empathy2.htm). “I think it’s unusually hard for my clients to sit still for empathy training,” wrote Sandman, the internationally-known risk communications expert.

And the problem is? Leadership’s pre-occupation with self-esteem, writes Sandman. Think General McChrystal. Tony Hayward. LeBron James. Our cultural obsession with being liked, more than respected.

In an interview this summer with the London newspaper, The Guardian, Judith Hackitt, chair of the United Kingdom’s Health and Safety Executive (think of a publicly-funded, apolitical OSHA) comes across as the definition of an occupational safety and health professional. Self-esteem takes a backseat to personal convictions. “Certainly, the belief and strength of purpose that Hackitt brings to the job is evident,” writes The Guardian. “She also admits to having ‘difficulty’ with negativity. ‘I’m not terribly sympathetic to the all-too-difficult brigade,’ she says firmly.”

“There are no flies on Judith,” says one colleague in the article. That’s a British compliment. A sign of leadership.

The flies are out in force this summer. All over the likes of McChrystal, Hayward, “King” James. How many are on you?

The revolution will be digitized

2010-07-21T14:36:00.000-07:00

Rather it is being digitized here and now.

I have been slow to catch on. Six months ago I didn’t know a tweet from a twit. Then I learned a bit about Twitter and thought tweeters are twits. Now I tweet every day. To go from writing 1200-word editorials to 140-character tweets has been a paradigm change. That’s OK, we’re all in for a paradigm change.

For a long time I thought Facebook was a teenage wasteland. Now I send Facebook news updates every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. I believed LinkedIn was for self-promoters. Of course it is. So what? Now I’m caught up in the numbers game — how many contacts can I add to my network?

It’s a brave new world, these social “nets.” Especially if you’re over 45 years old. According to “Twitter Usage in America: 2010,” the Edison Research/Arbitron Internet and Multimedia Study, 35 percent of 45-54-year-olds currently have a personal profile page on Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn or any other social networking web site. That compares to 77 percent of 18-24-year-olds, 65 percent of those between 25-34 years old, and 51 percent of the 35-44 crowd.
For safety and health professionals, so many of them baby boomers in the 45+ demographic, to use social nets is to venture where few of their peers have gone before. Most safety and health pros, cautious and conservative by nature (hallmarks of being safety conscious, after all), have not exactly jumped at the chance to “join the conversation,” as social nets love to advertise.

Free to choose
On our website is an open invitation to “join the conversation” and provide feedback, comments, opinions to my blogging and the news of the day. Consider this response:

“Oh gawd Dave... you've imbibed the millennial Kool-Aid. I have been fighting the rope pulling me into Facebook and so far have maintained my freedom. Social networking can be a ‘cancer’ in that it spreads rapidly and there is no real cure other than amputating the PC/laptop from the clutches of the fingertips.

“Don't let the new age rule your life. As Chloe said in the final seconds of "24," ‘SHUT IT DOWN.’

“Smell the coffee, hug the kids and wife and go walk the dog and breathe the polluted Philly air. THAT is what really matters.”

Now that is excellent blog material. Too bad he’s “fighting the rope.”

I also received this response:

“I keep getting requests to join associates’ groups etc., have done that, but have found few who actually utilize the network to any extent. Most say something like, ‘everyone else is in so I got in!’ I too must get better acquainted with the tools available. Thanks for giving us all (or at least those who are uninitiated to date) a little push.”
Consider this column a nudge.

“Inherit the future”
At least keep an open mind. Philosopher and one-time longshoreman Eric Hoffer: "In times of great change, it is the learners who inherit the future."

And to quote another philosopher, Bob Dylan, “The times, they are a-changin’.” Newspapers across the nation are folding faster than beach umbrellas before a storm. Sports Illustrated, Newsweek, Rolling Stone are pathetically thin. Evening newscasts are hanging on to the AARP crowd. Every other commercial is for a prescription med.

Dylan again: “Something is happening here, but you don’t know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones?”
Mr. Jones, with “his pencil in his hand” is a reporter. How prophetic. Many so-called “Mainstream Media” journalists stubbornly scorn social nets. The Babel of bloggers and blowhards.

Yet… in 2009, social net usage spiked to 57.6 percent of the total U.S. Internet population to 127 million users, according to projections from eMarketer. By 2014, social nets will reel in 65.6 percent of all Internet users, 164 million people.

Something is happening when Deepwater Horizon Response has 28,323 fans on Facebook. The official site of the Deepwater Horizon Unified Command has embraced social nets like a teenager, not a bunch of bureaucrats: Breaking news is sent via Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Technorati, StumbleUpon, email and RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds.

“There’s something happening here…”
Something is happening when, just on LinkedIn alone:

● The American Industrial Hygiene Association networking group has 1,491 members;
● EHSQ Elite has 12,108 members;
● The American Society of Safety Engineers has 3,787 members;
● The Society of Corporate Compliance & Ethics has 2,640 members;
● The Environment Health & Safety Professionals group has 9,127 members;
● The Safety Training group has 1,016 members;
● The Green group has 84,090 members.

Something is happening when the Green group discussion on “Is global warming finally being exposed for what it is?” elicits 3,949 comments.

To be sure, the overwhelming majority of discussion group members consist of a vast tribe called the “lurkers.” Lurkers passively follow and read the updates of others without contributing updates or comments of their own. This is no different than the audience at any professional conference. In a room of say, 500 people, how many walk to a mic stand to ask a question or offer a comment during the Q&A? We are a silent majority of lurkers. The social nets merely reflect human nature.

Come out of your silo
Maybe you have nothing to contribute to the conversation. But don’t miss out on the conversations occuring on the social nets. It is here that you learn what’s on the minds of your peers. What the issues of the day are. You’ll relate to some of the gripes and complaints. You’ll find some comments self-aborbed, specious, ridiculous.

That’s no excuse for dismissing the revolution in communication. This isn’t a fad. There’s no turning back. According to the Arbitron study: Eighty-four percent of the U.S. population has Internet access. Six in seven homes with Internet access have broadband connections. Dial-up is so 20th century. More than six in ten homes with Internet access have a wireless (Wi-Fi) network set up. In 2008, 24 percent of the populations had a personal profile page on Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, et al. In 2010, 48 percent have some type of profile page.

There’s a novelty effect here, no doubt. But folks by the millions are not going to wake up one morning bored with social nets, re-up their newspaper and magazine subscriptions and throw a life preserver to Katie Couric. It’s about the day-to-day pace. The times they are a-movin’ fast. We want to know what’s going on, right now, on demand, not tomorrow morning or next week.
So as you check in with ISHN’s daily Twitter updates, Facebook and LinkedIn updates, and daily e-news posts and blog accounts on our website, look at it this way: We’re not trying to ‘rope you in;’ we’re reflecting the revolution. And overturning paradigms is not for lurkers. Engage. Write a comment. Far too many blog posts show goose eggs in the comment column. The story is not just the facts of who, what, where, when and why. It includes how people react to the news. How they form communities. Hello Tea Party. Combustible Dust Policy Institute Group. Travel Media Pros. Writing Mafia. Find your niche. Be part of the story.

Who wants to be Mr. Jones?

Rock of Ages

2010-05-04T12:34:00.001-07:00

The best way to make your getaway from the assorted vulgarities of Vegas is to head east on Interstate 15. The posted speed limit is 75 MPH, which means you draft behind SUVs barreling along at 90+ MPH. And you do it for about a hundred miles. The first stoplight is 133 miles away in Hurricane, Utah, if you’re heading to true escape in the glories of Zion Canyon. God has a vacation home in Zion, the saying goes. Who’s to question His infinite wisdom?

Following a few days of work meetings in Vegas, my family graciously extended to me a five-day yard pass, allowing me dangerous free rein to roam southern Utah. My base would be the Zion Mountain Ranch, a collection of log cabins on 3,000 acres three miles east of Zion. The ranch doubles as a buffalo reserve, home to a herd of about 40 free-grazing buffalo. There’s no cell phone reception on the ranch, no phones in the cabins, no wake up calls, no clocks in the cabins. My family was comfortable with me going off the grid. In 2004 we spent Christmas at the ranch with a scrawny runt of a Christmas tree, no ornaments. Back then my kids tired easily of my all too frequent stops to snap photographs of canyon walls and hoodoos. Today they have absolutely no interest in returning to the rocks. So go ahead dad, disappear for a couple of days.

This is my fourth trip to Zion. Every time its massive red, white and charcoal cliffs have put me in my place. First time was 20 years ago, with two friends from work. Second time was in ‘93 with the family. We stayed at the old Parry Lodge in Kanab, where movie stars drank the idle nights away during the heyday of westerns in the ‘30s, ‘40s, ‘50s and ‘60s. Third time was Christmas, 1994. The kids agreed with reluctance to return with the promise of a few nights in Vegas.

It was April when I rolled into the ranch this time. I came in with an ugly low-pressure front from California, bringing freezing temperatures and a mix of snow and rain showers. “My girlfriend in Bakersfield says it’s raining cats and dogs there, so we’re in for a couple of nasty days,” said the owner of a unique bookstore/outfitter gear /CD/souvenir shop in Kanab. Kanab calls itself “Little Hollywood” and “The Greatest Earth on Show.” It is the county seat of Kane County, with a population of 3,564. Motels outnumber attorneys 20 to 3. The owner of one of Kanab’s two supermarkets, Glazier’s Foodtown, is a well-known local photographer. The eatery Houston’s Trail End has been family-run for 35 years.

Kanab lives off nostalgia for a west that no longer exists. What happens when the baby boomers raised on Gunsmoke, Rawhide and F Troop can no longer make the trek out here? Above the front doors of the small rooms at the Parry Lodge are the names of the stars who once stayed there: Frank Sinatra, Telly Savalas, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Arlene Dahl, Joel McCrea, Fred McMuarry, Maureen O’Hara, Ty Power, and on and on. When we stayed here over the Fourth of July in 2003 these names meant nothing to my kids. My wife was spooked by the prospects of ghosts.

So there’s something to be said for soloing to savor the rock of ages. A dusting of snow covered my rental Mitsubishi Galant the morning I grabbed two large Styrofoam cups of java from the ranch’s grill and headed east to Monument Valley. Another pleasure going it alone: you play whatever damn music you want.

The Impalas are a now-defunct surf-rock band out of Memphis, recommended to me by a know-it-all clerk at Shangri-La Records, not far from Sun Studios in mid-town Memphis. Healthy morning guitar twang and reverb to get you going.

Between Kanab and Page, Arizona, 70 miles southeast on 89 South, lies nothing save for an abandoned movie set used for “The Outlaw Josie Wales,” starring and directed by Clint Eastwood in 1976. The Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument, 1.7 million acres of vermilion cliffs, sandstone sculptures, canyons, mesas and plateaus, runs along to your left. On your right, a vast expanse of flat tumbleweed desert. Utah Off Road Tours asserts it is here you can stop and “feel your place in the universe.” Also “meditate with lizards” — I thought they dart around too much to stop and chill — and “come to know yourself through knowing a landscape.”

Mystical PR. It will take longer than my five-day yard permits to gain fresh insights into the nature of the universe. I’m on a whirlwind tour, listening to loud music, blowing down empty 89 South at speeds my wife would waffle me for. I control the volume, the speedometer, and the choice of liquor. It’s a few shots of Old Grand Dad and some Zion Canyon Virgin Stout beer (“brewed with love and kindness between the walls of the great Zion Canyon”) in the evenings back at the cabin. No TV, newspapers, voice mails or emails. That Virgin Stout refers to the Virgin River that runs through the canyon, by the way. The buxom lass on the label is too politically incorrect for my wife and daughter. Another benefit of leaving the family at home.

89 East runs from Page to Kayenta, Arizona, another empty stretch of sandy, rocky nothing. You have a long and unpredictable wait if you run out of gas out here.

The Impalas’ CD runs through an impressive 30 songs. I continue the surf theme with a new CD by Surf Blood, less classic surf and more a melodic attack of pop guitars. Well-known lone travelers run through my mind as I think of nothing in particular: William Least Hurt Moon, Thoreau, Kerouac, Hunter Thompson, and Edward Abbey, the bearded bard of the West, described on his web site as a desert anarchist “mocking the mindless bureaucrats hell-bent on destroying it.

The wide-open, wild west (despite Abbey’s old school protests, desolation is a few miles down an “unimproved” gravel road) has the effect on stress the same as an Ansel Adams photograph. One night at the Zion Ranch grill I hear the chef tell a dining couple about all the touristos who drive out from Vegas for a “cleansing.”

The road and remoteness is also tonic for your inner outlaw. “Resist much, obey little” advised Walt Whitman. It’s a tradition in the U.S. created by revolutionaries, mythologized by Zane Gray and Hollywood. But as the west was been tamed — Eisenhower’s national interstate infrastructure, Indians shunted off to the rez in America’s version of apartheid, cars now banned from Zion National Park April through October— who really resists anymore? Especially in 2010 after being beaten down by the recession for a couple of years.

What fight is left is channeled through Willie Nelson. Or Ronny Elliott. He’s next up on my CD player. A hillbilly rock and roll guitar twanger-banger out of a Tampa garage originally. In fact played with bands called the “Outsiders” and the “Outlaws.” Now plays with a bunch of self-described misfits called “The Nationals.”

I enter the Navajo nation near Kayenta in northwest Arizona. How “mindless bureaucrats” corralled and forced the Navajo into an estranged nation of misfits (from mainstream America and with numerous exceptions to be sure) is simply a bullshit embarrassment.

Consider these facts: 165,673 Navajo live on the rez in northern Arizona and southern Utah; median age is 24. Sixty percent live without telephones. Median family income is $22,392. Forty percent of families live below the poverty level. About one-third of the housing is without complete plumbing.

Ronny Elliott’s reedy bluesy vocals, long gone and aching, with harp, mandolin and a stinging steel guitar, are appropriate for the rez.

About 30 miles from Kayenta on 163 North is Monument Valley. I arrive on a postcard-perfect afternoon to bounce along the 17-miles gravel loop through what the Navajo call the “Valley of the Rocks.” About 570 million years ago the valley formed the floor of the Gulf of Mexico. The waters subsided as the Pacific and North American plates shifted, and about 65 million years back the mud from the ocean floor became sandstone, giving rise to Monument Valley’s Elephant Butte, Three Sisters, The Hub, The Thumb, Mitchell Mesa, Thunderbird Mesa, Spearhead Mesa, Sentinel Mesa, Gray Whiskers and Camel Butte.

The valley is bathed in red from iron oxide; some canyons and buttes are a darker blue-gray from manganese oxide. The towering rock monuments are icons of American rugged individualism. Maybe that’s what attracts curious tourists from around the globe — the chance to get a sense of America’s still adolescent spirit. I hear as many foreign accents and languages at the Monument Valley visitor center as I do English speakers. Sure, it’s April and American family vacations are months away. But I get the weird sense Europeans and Asians are more interested in our history than we are. Same feeling came to me a few summers back walking the rolling hills of Custer’s Last Stand in eastern Montana, where foreign tourists seemed predominant.

During the evening drive back to the ranch from Monument Valley, damn if I don’t nearly run out of gas. Out of nowhere I see the needle resting on E. A road sign indicates 30 miles to Kanab. This will be close.

The CD plays some more outlaws: Simon Stokes, a biker Willie Nelson with a long white beard, ponytail, tattoos up and down both arms. On the CD cover he’s sitting at a bar with another biker, both dressed in black. What else?

Miles Davis, up next, was an outlaw to his soul. Didn’t give a flying fuck what anyone thought. Played what he wanted, fans, critics be damned. Growled at the audience in something of an old man’s raspy hiss on the concert CD I’m playing. Proved Duke Ellington right — made music beyond category. Miles’ late period space jazz is well-suited for empty desert travel. Music to contemplate your place in the universe? Don’t get that heavy on Miles.

Too bad towns like Tesgi and Kaibeto on the road to Kanab don’t have gas stations. I don’t even see the towns, just the signs.

Outside of Kanab I put $53 dollars of gas in the Galant at a Phillips 66 station. The red canyon cliffs surrounding Kanab are radiant red in the setting sun, and I follow one brilliant sliver of glowing red rock to a place called Tom’s Canyon. From 1880 to 2000 this was Tom Robinson and sons’ ranch, where they raised crops and graze cattle. The Hollywood people loved to film here because it’s so close to town and the Parry Lodge. But now the canyon is paved with curvy boulevards named Donner Circle, Rainmaker Road, Cutter Trail. Empty lots are tagged with markers: Lot # 115 and so on. You can purchase a Tuscan style abode with 2,135 square feet of living space, or The Knolls, done in the southwestern style with 2,563 square feet. “Live everyday where you love to vacation!” says the billboard on Mohawk Drive.

So we’re not at the ends of the earth. Heroic rock outcroppings become development backdrops.

I decide to traverse up to Capitol Reef National Park the next day to say I was there. This evolves into a nine-hour jaunt through bizarre weather (hail, snow, snow showers, windswept rain, sometimes drenching) and fantastic scenery (crystallized white woods of the Dixie Forest, low-lying snow clouds, expansive white and yellow canyons, tight S curves through Rocky Mountain-like high forests, and the white domes of the park that do indeed resemble capitol architecture). Capitol Reef is in what’s called south-central Utah. Coming from Kanab there is but one road in and out, via 89 North to 12 East to 24 East, past Boulder, Escalante, Torrey, Tropic, and appropriately, Box Death Hollow Wilderness.

Damn if a tricked-up black Jeep suddenly flashes dashboard lights in my rear view mirror. I’m ticketed $165 by Officer Dunton for speeding 52 MPH in a 30 MPH zone through the tiny burg of Escalante.

The road to Capitol Reef is not for the vertigo-challenged. S curves time and again scale up and down canyon walls. Past Boulder a summit marker reads 9,600 feet. Outside it feels like February. What travelers, hikers I see wear parkas and gloves. It’s about 40 degrees. Snow clouds render the land white or gray. There is no other color. A sign points to Hell’s Backbone. Indeed.

On my way back I calculate I’ve got to make it to Angels Landing in Zion today. Tomorrow I have a few hours in the morning, then the drive back to Vegas and a 2:40 pm flight home to Philadelphia.

Watermelon Slim is on the CD player. Name about says all you need to know. Then a dude dubbed “The Hillbilly Cat” from 1955. The clouds have cleared, the sun is out bright over Moss Cave, about three to five miles from Bryce Canyon, elevation 7,777 feet (positive encouragement to press on). I get out of the car (you cannot see the west from a damn automobile, said Edward Abbey) to hike across the Tang orange soft gravel hills and a nest of red rock hoodoos. No self-absorbed reflection. Better to follow Thoreau’s dictate: Why am I in the woods if my head is some where else?

By the time I reach Angels Landing it’s what filmmakers call “the magic hour.” That short window of time, less than 60 minutes in the evening, when the low sun produces a fantastic shadow and light show off the rock of ages. I’m running late so I say screw the car ban, ignore the flashing road sign “Red Permits Only Beyond This Point” and park in an empty lot near the Old Grotto. Will the eco-police tow my rental away? Give me a ticket? A warning? What will be my defense: The shuttle goes too slow?

For whatever benevolent reasons, the Galant sits where I left it when I return from Angels Landing, still the only car in the lot. Back home in Philadelphia, no doubt, that car would’ve been long gone and I’d have a long walk to the park police.

There is no obesity epidemic on Angels Landing. What hikers I see are wiry and fit. The trail is what the park service defines as a “strenuous.” A five-mile, supposedly five-hour hike. An incline gain of 1,488 feet to reach the flat, white rocky summit at 5,785 feet. Two middle-aged women in shorts share the summit with me; one breaks out a kite to fly. “Isn’t she crazy?” says her friend. “No. You sure have enough wind up here,” I say. “Well, that makes you both crazy.”

I don’t’ know about crazy. An aging adolescent, as Abbey called himself, yes, that I’ll concede. Call me a guerilla resistor. For three full days, not counting the transit days from Vegas and back, I don’t think about much and it feels good. Appropriately, 1970s British pub rockers Dr. Feelgood are the last band on the CD player, after Jack-O and the Tennessee Tearjerkers. Again, their name says enough

The canyon floor of Zion on the Saturday morning I leave for Vegas is a riot of vibrant green coming alive on aspens, cottonwoods, Ponderosa Pines, and oak trees along the Virgin River. The azure sky is cloudless. The sun is brilliant. My yard pass is set to expire. I exit, turning in whatever road warrior credentials I have, to blend back into the suburbs.

A record snowfall puts us in our place

2010-02-19T08:35:00.000-08:00

The all-time Philly snowfall record was busted Wednesday, February 10. We’re now just shy of six feet of snow for the winter — 70.5 inches and counting.

I spent the day writing blogs for my magazine with the blinds on all four of my home office windows raised so I could watch storm rage on…

My neighbor is shoveling his drive. He’s a somewhat vague, bundled and determined figure with the snow coming down thick and wind-whipped. Often when we get snow around here big flakes float lazily to the ground, like one of those small shake ‘em up snow globes. The air is usually wet and the accumulation civilized.

This is not one of those storms. The snowfall is dense and unrelenting. It began last night and will eventually end a little more than 24 hours later. There’s already about two feet of snow on the ground from a storm last weekend. I see that my neighbor is up on his roof, shoveling off snow. Back on the ground, he then shovels away what he dumped on his front stoop and sidewalk.

Early in the afternoon my kids and I venture out to see what, if anything, is moving — people, snowmobiles, snowplows. We hear strange, muffled explosions. It’s thunder and lightning above the dense cloud cover. Visibility is 100-200 yards. We walk into a driving wind with heads down, trudging as though defying gravity. “Now I know what it’s like to be a Muslim woman,” says my daughter. She’s covered with layers of sweatshirts and scarves, boots, gloves, a wrap-around hood and wool cap. Only her eyes are uncovered. She wishes she had ski goggles, preferably yellow-tinted. With the exception of the howling wind, which reaches 30 to 40 MPH, and the intermittent thunder, it’s quiet. And smells very fresh, clean. A supermarket is open, and a convenience store. The linoleum tiles in both are slick with melted snow and slush. Everybody in line at the convenience store seems to be a snowplow operator holding a large coffee.

As always in these emergency-like circumstances — sirens periodically go off in the distance — some unprepared fools in compact cars too small and light blunder off the road or billow exhaust spinning their wheels on a hill. “What the hell is anybody doing out in this?” demands my daughter. “Where do they think they’re going?”

It’s scary amazing. Here in the mid-Atlantic states, crowded with office towers and strip malls, concrete and asphalt, we rarely see Mother Nature when she really gets it going. Volcanic eruptions, tornados, avalanches, hurricanes, tsunamis, floods, monsoons, earthquakes — the power when she unloads is random, merciless and miraculous.

Back in my office I see my neighbor is shoveling his drive again. Taking a broom to his cars again. I watch him as through veils of white gauze. The snow falls almost horizontally. “Falling” is too benign a description. The snow is being driven into the ground. There’s nothing gentle about it. Thin, small trees crack apart under the snow’s weight. Large evergreens sag like the weight of the world is on their branches. I see my neighbor dusting off the bushes he trims so fastidiously every summer.

Around 4:30 in the afternoon the electricity quits on us. I’m thinking it could be out for days. We just don’t have storms like this; Philadelphia Electric Company, PECO, must be overwhelmed. The township snowplows can’t keep up as darkness sets in. My son and I walk our dog, a Husky who frolics in this stuff. Our neighborhood streets haven’t seen a plow in hours. Some of the drifts are shoulder high. Power lines sag so low you can touch them. Don’t do that, I warn my son. A few men are out manning snow blowers. When nature turns nasty like this, it makes us humans nicer. Strangers mumble “hello” to each other. Hold on, this guy fishtailing up the hill needs a push. A neighbor with a wood burning stove calls and invites us over if it gets too cold in our house. My neighbor across the street is digging out a space by the street for the recyclable bin that his wife is holding.

By eight or nine at night, in the blackness, my kids are bored out of their minds. I see my neighbor out shoveling his drive one last time. Even the laptop with wireless Internet connectivity has lost its Facebook allure after three or four hours. The kids blankly text friends on their cells. My daughter reads by flashlight. My son drags our two dogs in bed with him and calls it a day. My wife bunks down in my office, warmer than our freezer-like bedroom. I’m lying on the living room sofa, in a hoodie and long johns and thick thermal socks, a mummy with a large vanilla candle balanced on my stomach. I’m trying to read The New York Times. It’s hell turning the pages without the candle sliding off and starting a house fire. I look out our bay window and see daggers of icicles, up to two feet, hang from the gutter. I think I hear my neighbor across the street scraping ice from his sidewalk.

Around midnight I wake up to the lights and widescreen TV on, the stove clock beeping and the furnace whirring and chugging to life. Homes across the street show signs of life. It has stopped snowing. That shadowy figure is my neighbor salting his drive; he’s the first one out of the neighborhood every morning. The wind rattles branches high in the trees and roars around the corners of our house. Otherwise, the storm has exhausted itself. But is has definitely served notice, putting us in our place.

Dissing the gods

2010-01-12T09:39:00.000-08:00

We’re actually all in the house at the same time. Kate, back in the nest after graduating from Delaware, works ‘til seven every night at a KinderCare. Steve, restless high school senior, frequently slips out to the Y, Barnes & Noble, over to a friend’s.

This night, for a few minutes anyway, not only are we all home, but in the same general vicinity. Kate’s watching “E! News,” kicked back in the recliner, doing her nails, the two dogs curled on the couch.

“So,” I ask, “what’s your recommendation for Steve? What college do you think he should go to?”

“Well, I just learned Drexel is $51,000 a year.”

“Next.”

The conversation draws Steve into the living room.

“Wait!” yells Suze. “What time is it? Turn on channel 12.”

“What?”

“Just turn on channel 12. It’s eight o’clock.”

Steve, after years of diligent practice handling the remote like an extension of his arm, flicks to channel 12.

There on the flat screen are John, Paul, George and Ringo, in soft-focus black and white, flickering as though transmitted from a distant planet. They’ve got their matching mop-tops, dark suits with white shirts and thin dark ties. “She loves me, yeah, yeah, yeah,” they sing, with a smiling earnestness seeming to be aimed at earning Establishment Ed’s approval.

“It’s the Ed Sullivan show,” says Suze. “It’s the first time the Beatles were on the Ed Sullivan show. I remember it like it was yesterday.”

“Who’s Ed?” asks Steve.

Steve and Kate start giggling, then laughing. Their parents are taken aback, especially Suze, who one time actually saw the Beatles live in concert. “What’s so funny?”

“They look so corny,” says Kate. “Yeah,” seconds Steve. “Did they really wear their hair like that?” asks Kate.

The kids are disrespecting the gods. Funny thing is, both of them like Beatles’ music off of CDs. But visually you better be styling nowadays: Calvin Klein, Urban Outfitters, The Gap, Banana Republic, New York Connection, Abercrombie & Fitch, Hollister, American Apparel, American Eagle, the brands that Kate (“I am, therefore I shop”) can recite in her sleep. Steve was a late bloomer but is coming on strong — J. Crew, Ralph Lauren, Polo, Nike. Awkward Ed’s show of course never scored any style points. Steve and Kate might as well be watching the Marx Brothers as the Beatles. But the Marx Brothers would be equally baffling and prehistoric. “Who are the Marx Brothers? You mean Karl Marx? Were they a band?”

Anyway, Ed comes out, shakes hands with the Beatles, and the documentary moves to a clip of the Beatles’ archrivals, the Beach Boys, also singing on the Sullivan show. The five boys in the band, barely out of their teens, are scrubbed fresh and wear matching striped shirts and white pants. A couple of hot rods have been rolled on stage for props. They’re sing “I Get Around” by Ed’s rules, like the Beatles, standing in place, smiling and clean. Nothing to unnerve the adults.
“Oh… my… god!” sputters Kate. “They’re even cornier. They’re nerds.”

“What do you think, Steve? Steve?”

Black and white TV was never his world. He’s retreated to his bedroom and his X Box 360 and NCAA Football 2010, with animated players more realistic than 45-year-old clips of the Beatles.
Next up, from 1969, Tommy James and the Shondells singing “Crimson and Clover,” with the Sullivan show now in color, and the camera going psychedelic with tripped out mirror images and dizzying, flashing shots zooming in and out. Scenes from Woodstock follow and Kate groans.

“You gotta be on drugs, then this music would sound OK,” says Kate, staring in befuddlement. “You guys did a lot of drugs back then, right? I mean the hippies. If that’s what drugs make things looks like, I’d completely freak out.”

“Times change,” says Suze.

“I should say,” says Kate, inferring a total understatement. “Can I change the channel?”

Only in Ojai

2010-01-11T07:27:00.000-08:00

Very freakish, Philadelphia getting bombed with almost two feet of snow less than a week before Christmas. So the first order of business Sunday morning, before I could go anywhere, was grabbing a broom and sweeping snow off our three cars, defrosting the cars, and then shoveling out. Figuring to find mayhem at the airport, I left about four hours before my flight to LA.

Sure enough, flights were canceled all over the departures board. Stranded holiday travelers were sprawled out or slumped over, bleary-eyed zombies at most every gate. My flight got pushed back from 2 to 5 p.m. in a case of a missing pilot. Then his plane landed but could not reach a gate for all the snow plowed into small mountains. Next came the dreaded tarmac delay. We were on board, buckled in and going nowhere. The pilot, with a soothing British accent, explained only one runway was operating, alternating take-offs with landings. Finally we were airborne about 6 p.m. for the 6-hour flight cross country. The plane’s cabin of course was crammed to the max, not an empty seat. Across the entire nation a little dog yapped, yapped and yelped, trapped in a cage stowed in the overhead luggage rack.

The most disorienting and dangerous part of a trip I find is getting a start in an unfamiliar city after the dark, when you’re in a rental car you’ve never driven before, making seat adjustments, mirror adjustments, deciphering the dashboard, trying to follow typed directions handed over by an automaton behind the counter at Avis Rental. I’m leaving LAX, scanning for street and interstate signs, discovering the directions are flat-out ass backwards wrong, and dealing with a zooming flow of traffic to the right and left. I do believe the highest risk for some kind of rental car road collision is always within the first 10-15 minutes when you’re trying to figure out both the car and where the hell you’re heading.

That critical juncture for me came at Sunday night about 9:30 in LA. Of course the freeways are flooded with streams of red and white lights across 12 lanes like rush hour in most towns. I take I-405 to North 101 and try to center myself if you will listening to a CD of raw gut-bucket Clarksdale, Mississippi bottomland blues by Terry “Big T” Williams and Wesley “Junebug” Jefferson. This deep-down thumping blues, totally at odds with the fast LA tempo, is what I need.

An hour and half later around Ventura traffic has thinned way out and I make a right to head up Route 33, which narrows to a twisting two-lane mountain road. It’s nearing 2 a.m. east coast time and a world away from shoveling snow in the driveway this morning. The key to my hotel room is in an envelope taped to the office door at the Blue Iguana Inn. Described by a tourist magazine as “hip and stylish,” the inn is designed in a Mexican motif by a local architect and decorated by his wife, who owns the place. All that matters to me after a day shoveling snow, waiting out a 4-hour delay, then the 6-hour flight and that damn barking mutt, and the 2-hour drive up to Ojai is that a beautiful bed takes up almost my entire room, with giant fluffy pillows and a cushy, soft mattress to die for.

Come 7 in the morning the alarm is beep, beep, beeping away. I set it early to leave sufficient time to chug vast quantities of java, clear my head, and think about what it is that I want to see happen at my 9 a.m. meeting. Also need some extra time to find the meeting place.

It’s an overcast Monday morning driving along Ojai Avenue past a running/bike trail, the town’s Spanish-style arcade, a bell tower supposedly reminiscent of one in Havana, the pergola, which is a walkway beneath a series of connecting arches, a skateboard park, small parks and plazas, small art shops, craft stores, restaurants and bars. Everything in Ojai is on a small scale. The town, two hours north of LA, has only 8,000 residents, most living in tidy cottages and ranchers in leafy blocks off the main drag. There is a lengthy list of Hollywood celebs who’ve retreated here to slum in disguise and hide out — Tim Burton, Julie Christie, Johnny Depp, Jake Gyllenhaal, Anthony Hopkins, Diane Ladd, Malcolm McDowell, Bill Paxton, Ted Danson. Johnny Cash and his wife June Carter had a place up in the hills in nearby Casitas Springs, where every Christmas John would put speakers on his deck and blast the valley with Christmas tunes, until a neighbor finally got him to shut it down. That’s John, sentimental, romantic and a pain in the ass at the same time.

The CEO and the Board Chairman were chatting, waiting for me when I arrived pretty much on the button at 9. The ice was broken by my being completely over-dressed for the occasion; wearing jacket, tie and pullover sweater. The chairman was in sneaks, jeans and a corduroy shirt. The CEO, a Brit, wore business casual shirt and slacks. He had been in Oslo, Norway last Thursday, stopped over in London on Saturday, and was here in the plush and comfy chairman’s office Monday morning. The chairman, an older man, was yawning, complaining he still couldn’t shake off the jet lag after a three-week trip to Taiwan, Singapore, and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Management consultants like these two make their living on the road, flying off to clients, conferences, training seminars and speaking gigs around the globe.

Our meeting was scheduled for Christmas week for the simple fact it’s one of the few times during the year both of these globe-trotters can be found in the same room at the same time. They’ve scheduled me for two hours and we take it down to the last minute. The casual conversation and open-ended brain-storming is laid back. The one exception to this relaxed atmosphere is the statute of a large, threatening gargoyle that dominates the chairman’s broad, clean desk. “Where’d you get that?” “My wife gave it to me to ward off evil people.” “Does it work?” “Why yes, I believe it does.” Not interested in learning the details, I bring our talk back on track.

We decide on two projects I’ll go forward on, shake hands, and part ways with smiles all around and Merry Christmas send-offs. I lunch for two hours with the communications manager, who fills me in some more about the projects I’ll be working on and the culture of the organization.

By 2 pm I’m a free man, feeling good about making a decent impression after Sunday’s long day and night. I head to Ojai’s public library to use one of its free Internet-connected computers to check emails. My magazine, the editing of which is my occupation aside from independent contracting, is winding down production on the January 2010 issue and there are usually last minute glitches and changes and questions.

The temperature is in the high 50s, the sun finally breaks through, and I get an idea of how the valley, running east-west about ten miles long and three miles wide, traps light all day long, inspiring Ojai’s colony of artists. Nordhoff Ridge, towering over the north side of town at more than 5,000 feet, is now clearly visible and stunning.

Stuart Rupp runs a shop where he makes prints of his wife’s delicate Oriental brush art — depending on the strength and balance of line — coupled with calligraphy and Zen seals ‘Laugher,” “Unique,” “Cherish the Moment” and “No method.” He explains to me how Ojai’s mountains and looming trees humble locals, an odd diversity of Hollywood intelligentsia, redneck farm laborers, retired millionaire industrialists, and new-age spiritualists. The sun’s day-long radiance, the famous pink glowing sunset, the absence of shadows, the mountainous confines and stands of forests put residents in what Stuart describes as a state of “Quiet Excellence.”

My conversation with Stuart, a short, gregarious man with shaggy gray hair who’s got a rep in town as something of a maverick, runs past an hour. He recounts how his wife Nancy’s life was cut all too short at age 57 in 2001 when she was struck in the leg by a car on Ojai’s Main Street, not 50 yards away from the shop. She died when a blood clot broke free in her leg 11 days later. Stuart keeps her spirit alive in the small shop, crammed with prints of Nancy’s art: the Buddha’s 12 barnyard animals printed on cardboard packaging boxes, tee-shirts, sweat shirts, night shirts and “Sanity Bites” framed reprints of mixed Chinese calligraphy and brushpainting. Stuart, who retired as a physicist and oceanographer at 45 to let Nancy do her thing, and I carry on about transcendent physicist Richard Feynman, Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, Obama, the New England Patriots, “global weirding,” health care reform, the computer software and hardware industries, junior chamber of commerce carpetbaggers, the country’s energy oligarchy, the demise of conversation, Johns Hopkins lacrosse, the 57 churches Stuart counted on his paper route as a boy growing up in Ojai, his father the doc who made house calls until he was 80, the orange groves to the north that benefit from the full day of sunlight to deliver product a month after the rest of the state’s groves are harvested. “Embrace life,” Stuart smiles at one point. “It’s all we have. We’re all in this together, after all.” I forget what we were talking about.

I run into a peppy young blonde woman with rosy cheeks sitting behind the counter at the Trowbridge Gallery who says people call her Sunshine because she’s always had a bubbling, giggling energy. She’s from the far northeast of Philadelphia and we talk about places in South Jersey. She looks like a native but has been out here just less than a year. It was time to “gain her footing,” she explains, vague about where her traction will lead. “You’ve got to learn California,” Sunshine says. “It takes a while. You know, it’s the west out here. People think different. More open. In the east people think more in boxes.” As I walk out the door she greets two friends and I hear her talk about “the good energy” to be found in something or somewhere. She’s right: back east you hear little about embracing the good energy.

Another dose of positive energy came my way at dinner Monday night at Azu Mediterranean Restaurant and Bar on East Ojai Avenue. Eric the bartender had set me up with a couple of generous shots of Woodford Reserve bourbon and a draught of something called Wildfire beer. I had retreated from the bar to a couch to talk on the cell to Kate, my daughter who was spending the night at her boyfriend’s in Delaware. No one had picked up when I called home, and son Steve and Kate hadn’t picked up cell calls to them. After 30 years of travel I still get nervous when no one answers the call at home.

“Everything OK?” a fellow asks me when I sign off with Kate. “Sorry, I talked too loud.” “No, not a problem, glad to share a couch with you,” he smiles. Ron is his name. He introduces a cute young blonde woman, Desiree, his best friend, he says. Desiree reminds me of other SoCal girls or women, attractive, fit, and seemingly somewhat bored and weary of it all. Turns out Desiree is 32, doesn’t look it, was born in Ojai, hates LA, there’s no culture there, loves New York but couldn’t live there, might end up in South Carolina, likes the pace, like country music.

Ron says all the money in the world couldn’t buy a friend like Desiree. Ron’s blind in his right eye, going blind in the other one. He’s 62, doesn’t look it, is tanned with his hair parted down the middle and a diamond in his left ear. Ron smiles constantly. He asks Desiree are they OK with time, can he have another 5 minutes? He was born in Manhattan and runs 4 massages parlors in Ventura he bought after getting sick off looking in his mirror each morning hating his work as an account manager for high-end men’s fashion accessories, belt buckles he mentions in particular. It was his father’s business he got into after 7 years working for CBS behind the camera in production, where he tired of kissing ass to get anywhere. “I was making $300,000 a year, now I’m making $35,000. I had a lot of money, I spent a lot of money. My life’s complicated like you wouldn’t want to know. But I can get up in the morning and look myself in the mirror.” As he leaves he shouts across to Eric the bartender, “We’ll be back. This is Desiree. We love this place.”

I’m back at the Blue Iguana by around 10. Read newspapers in bed to decompress and then wake up around 4 a.m., earlier than I wanted and before the alarm goes off. Grab some heavy duty Costa Rican java at a shop, Full of Beans and Fuel, and it’s off to LAX at 6 in the morning darkness to beat the dreaded LA rush hour. To bypass some of it, I take the Pacific Coast Highway outside of Oxnard and watch the sun rise over the Santa Monica Mountains at about 7:15. Make a point to drive to Zuma Beach and wade into the Pacific. A couple of men in sweatshirts walk large dogs. It’s cold and wind, and the sea is churning and roiling.

The security line at LAX three days before Christmas is out the door at 8 a.m. But it moves along. My flight gets delayed an hour — a case of a missing aircraft. Then we’re stuck on the tarmac again when the pilot announces we’ve either got a fuel leak in one of the wings or it’s goo leftover from a de-icing. “Keep your fingers crossed,” he says. He advises passengers who will miss connections to stay on board and hope for the best because there’s not an empty seat on any flight out of LA until Friday.

Holiday time is amateur hour for infrequent flyers. They bombard gate agents with anxious, edgy questions: Is the plane here? The pilot here? I’m going to miss my connection. When will we board? How long is this flight? A cell phone chorus makes the rounds: “We’re delayed, delayed, delayed.” Finally, when we get into Philadelphia at about 8:40 p.m., two hours late, one of the attendants grabs the PA: “Any passengers to Tel Aviv or Madrid, you’ve got to run to your gate. Please make way. The rest of you poor bastards who missed your connections, see the agent at the podium.”

I’m not moving, stuck in the last row by the window, seat 33A. The woman next to me sounds exasperated: “Dad, dad, I just landed. Dad, didn’t you check online to find my terminal. C’mon dad, you can do it.” From another row: “Brendan, did you find what you needed? Is that our bag? Where’s our other bag?” From behind me: “Hi, mom, we’re on the ground. Just getting off the plane. Huh? Huh? Can’t hear you. See you soon.” A small girl wanders off dragging a pink blanket, holding a purple stuffed dragon.

Walking through Terminal B, I see small tight clusters of lost travelers surround besieged gate agents, hands out waiting for hotel vouchers for an unwanted stay-over at the Marriott. Flights to Boston, Tampa, Charlotte, State College, are taking off at 10 and 11 tonight, unusually late for Philadelphia. Passengers, tired and blue, will roll into beds not as comfy as the Blue Iguana’s at 2 or 3 a.m. Adding to the irritation, the muzak in Terminal B’s is playing possibly the most ridiculous holiday songs, “ding-dong, ding-dong, Christmas bells are ringing.” Stressed-out travelers have already been dinged and donged. How about, “God rest ye merry flyers, let no delay dismay, air traffic is our saviour, our only ticket home, just save us all from winter’s power, when plans have gone astray, O tidings of comfort and joy, that’s what we seek, may departure boards bring comfort and joy, on-time flights, may departure boards bring comfort and joy.”

Dusseldorf divas and Bonnie’s delta dudes

2010-01-11T07:23:00.000-08:00

I imagine rounding up the noontime patrons at Bonnie’s Café for a group photo on the front porch. It’d be a challenge to break up the half-dozen or so conversations buzzing inside Bonnie’s. To pull these boys, 12 to 15 I reckon, away from their heaping hot supper plates of chicken and gravy and dumplings. Fact is, I seriously doubt some of these boys are ready to take directions from a Yankee photographer. “Squeeze in on the left over there, just a little bit more, little more. Now everybody say, ‘gravy’.”

It’d be hard to fit all the fellows in one frame. Bonnie’s regulars are big boys. Broad shoulders. Large hands. Mostly heavyset dudes. They clomp into Bonnie’s looking like they’ve wrestled in mud trenches all morning. Before they grab a seat they head straight back to the kitchen to wash up over the sinks. It’s a gray raw November day out and the boys wear layers of clothing, plaid shirts, overalls, Carhartt outer jackets, work boots or knee high rubber boots. Every one of them wears some kind of ball cap, skull cap or wool knit cap. They pull up chairs that scrape across Bonnie’s plain wooden floor and huddle around square pedestal tables by two’s and four’s; a long table by the front window seats a half dozen. They’re all chowing down.

There is nothing fancy in the least about Bonnie’s Café. Function trumps form. Work crews don’t lounge about, they’re fed and out in 25 minutes. The cafe butts up against an abandoned general store with a sagging red rusted roof and has two plump and torn old sofas on its porch. Train tracks run in front of Bonnie’s, on the other side of a gravel-strewn street where the boys park hulking, mud-splattered Ford and Chevy, red and black, pickups. You won’t find a minivan, an SUV, or any foreign made car parked anywhere near Bonnie’s. Not down in these parts. A white water tower standing on three steel legs and rising above bare trees has “Watson” spelled out in black letters. Watson sits on Arkansas Route 1 about 8 miles west of the Mississippi River, a little more than 100 miles southwest of Memphis.

The town is but a speck on the map, taking up 0.2 square miles and home to 288 residents, according to the 2000 census. Bonnie’s is where the action is at lunch hour during the week. The waitresses work fast and talk like they know every customer, which they do. Everyone gets a large round jar, no handles, of iced tea. Some of the boys bullshit, joke and laugh, talk about the weather or the morning’s work, or equipment problems or what they’ll be doing this afternoon. Others sit and shovel down the chicken and dumplings. Three teenage Mexicans sit by themselves wearing hoodies. One fellow sits down, he’s lost every one of his fingers and his two thumbs jut out from club-like hands. A young boy hardly out of his teens if he is at all drags his limp right leg from table to table, shooting barbs, and taking some himself. A couple of large men wear big bushy beards, other have sideburns from another century. All have weathered, creased and lined dirty faces. Definitely lived in. “Those fried taters are good with catsup, let me tell you.” “What d’ya have coveralls on for, it ain’t winter yet?”

A couple of Bonnie’s boys yell goodbye to the women working the grills and the other fellows, and shove open the creaking screen door. A few minutes later they’re sitting in the cabs of huge green and yellow combines, metallic monsters as wide as the street that roar past Bonnie’s and slowly lumber up and over the train tracks.

Watson, Arkansas is 4,644 miles from Dusseldorf, Germany. After a day making sales calls in Memphis, I passed through Watson on Wednesday, November 18, 2009 out of Clarksdale, Mississippi, spiritual home of American blues music, by way of Marvell, Arkansas (population 1,395 and birthplace of Levon Helm, The Band’s drummer), heading down to Vicksburg, Mississippi across miles and miles of bottom land cotton fields. Exactly two weeks earlier, Wednesday, November 4, I was sitting in Frank Gehry’s restaurant and bar downing a couple of shots of Noah’s Mill bourbon in what’s called Dusseldorf’s Media Harbour, by the Rhine River.

Absolutely the one and only common thread connecting Dusseldorf with Watson, Arkansas half a world away is beer. In Dusseldorf it is Altbier, an “old beer” amber lager poured into tall thin glasses with three-inch foam heads. And the waiters keep pouring, refilling, until you say, “no mas.” Down in the delta the beer flows easy, too. Liquor stores, shacks or huts still stand in the smallest, poorest of towns. A Miller Lite “Welcome Hunters” orange banner hangs on fence next to the F&L Liquor Store outside Watson. At Monsour’s at the Biscuit Company in Vicksburg I downed dark bottles of Lazy Magnolia Southern Pecan and Lazy Magnolia Indian Summer Spiced Ale, brewed in Kiln, Mississippi. That happens to be where future NFL Hall of Famer Brett Favre played quarterback for his dad, Irvin, who coached Kiln’s Hancock High.

In all other ways of life, culture and values, Watson and Dusseldorf trace extremely different orbits. Watson is rusted-out, dirt farmer poor. Dusseldorf, as Ibrahim, my Senegalese cabbie pointed out driving me in from the airport, is the most expensive city in Germany, the country’s center for advertising and fashion. Ibrahim confided in me his vision. After somehow enduring 28 years in Dusseldorf, where people of color are invisible, Ibrahim was finally plotting his return to Senegal, to build a home from scratch and bake all day. “If you are black, you get nowhere in Dusseldorf. No jobs, no opportunities, nothing,” he said.

In the delta you get stories, lots of stories. Just ask a question or two. I spent two hours jawing with a businessman named John at the bar in Vicksburg after the sun went down. According to John, who’s the only man in the bar wearing a jacket and tie — “It’s been a long day; I’m kinda tired — three times he sat down with old Irvin Favre for beers. “He was tough on the outside but a softie, really.”

Neil the bartender served up shots of Old Charter and kept the chatter going about Southeast Conference football, predictions, opinions and his supposedly inside information. Mark in a tie-dyed tee shirt and flowing locks walked past offering chocolate pecans. “Pass ‘em around. They don’t get getter than this. You OK, bud? Keepin’ the chill out?”

These conversations with John, Neil and Mark ran longer and deeper, far longer and deeper, than any conversation I had in Dusseldorf in the four days I was there, save for a dinner with the trade fair sponsor who paid my way over to write up the show. And that was the kind of shallow business lite talk you could have in your sleep. Dusseldorf is all business, no small talk. Germans I’m convinced don’t do small talk. Especially with foreigners. Especially in Dusseldorf, ranked by the Mercer 2009 Quality of Living survey of cities as possessing the sixth highest quality of living in the world and first in Germany. In Dusseldorf it’s about making money and spending money. Office lights are on until 7 or 8 at night at banking institutions, publishing houses, telecommunications giants, insurers, ad agencies and internet companies.

As I sat at world renown architect Frank Gehry’s stylishly hip, amber-lit woodsy bar rest assured no one came up and asked if I was OK or passed around chocolate pecans. The after-work crowd started filtering in around 8 and all went straight to dinner tables. No raucous laughs and ribbing like you got with Bonnie’s boys; no barstool philosophizing like at the biscuit company in Vicksburg — “It’s laid back here. It’s beautiful on these bluffs overlooking the river. People here, like the owner over there, they put up with me; they’ve shoveled me out of here more than once, I can tell you,” said John.

Image is paramount, image is everywhere in an ad agency and media capital like Dusseldorf. Nature is buried beneath late 20th century architecture, save for several parks. History is difficult to find, too. The RAF firebombed the city repeatedly in 1942, destroying 80 percent of it. More than 700 British bombers would crowd the night skies over Dusseldorf, igniting hundreds of fires, killing thousands, and making 140,000 homeless. “A pity,” said a middle-aged well-to-do investor, shaking his head, as I walked through the faux old town cobblestone streets taking photos. One was of a bright, shining red metallic front door of an office the man had rehabbed and was now looking to lease. He had rushed out to greet me like I was a potential leaser, scouting locations with my camera. It’s all about business in Dusseldorf.

And it’s about the fruits of a workaholic life. Black and silver BMWs, Mercedes, Audis, and Opels are tightly parked on “Queen Street,” the KÖ shopping district. Not a single minivan, SUV or pickup will you find. No U.S. or Japanese cars. And strangely, there is little sign of family life. No college stickers on rear windows. No “Proud parent of an all-star honor student” bumper stickers. “All this, too expensive, very expensive, for you and me,” smiled Ibrahim on the way to my hotel in the cab. Women in tight black skirts, with black stockings or black stretch leggings, maneuver atop black leather boots with spiked heels, balancing shopping bags from Gucci, Chanel, Prada, Boss, Sacha, Espirit, Tiffany and Company, Goex, Feel Good, Elena, Franzen, Kult, Villa Happ, Bvlgari, Louis Vitton. Men wear black, black ties, black scarves, black overcoats, and particularly hip black-framed thick, rectangular glasses that make them look like professors or scientists.

“Dusseldorf denizens thumb their noses at the rest of Germany,” I recall Ibrahim warning me. “But the German character is strong. No dancing about. You get straight talk. Yes is yes and no is no. That’s OK. But Germans, they are not warm and open like the Dutch. The time is come. I must live my vision. Make my home in Senegal.”

Down in the delta, folks of course are too damn poor to thumb their noses at anyone. Red Roof Inns don’t have portraits of Audrey Hepburn and Jackie O, like were hanging in the lobby at my Dusseldorf Hotel Carat. Red Roof rooms are twice the size of my spartan Carat closet, too. It is the world of dirt farmers, combine drivers, ditch diggers, machinists, blue collars versus Dusseldorf’s world architects, psychiatrists, fashion designers, lawyers, accountants, consultants and gallery owners.

At Gehry’s on the Rhine no one asked if I was OK to get home. John at the bar in Vicksburg leaned over at one point and strongly suggested in friendly manner, “You don’t wanna drive back up to Clarksdale tonight. That’s three hours. You don’t wanna do that. Tell you what, you go down the street to Harrah’s and get yourself a room for $31. Then come back and stay with us for a few more pops. Then you can just walk back to your room.”

I walked along the Rhine back to my hotel from Gehry’s. It was chilly and spitting rain. Couples walked arm in arm in wool caps, scarves, driver’s gloves, berets, those studious rectangular glasses, carrying umbrellas. Some jogged in running suits. Cars suddenly pulled out of side alleys, crossed walkways, wheeled and circled like in a Bourne movie. Silent cyclists occasionally zoomed up on you out of the dark, without warning, no bells or horns or “hallo,” seemingly intent on seeing how close they could come to clipping you.

A few times in Dusseldorf I chanced upon old white-haired Germans, stout, stone-faced husbands and wives, standing shoulder to shoulder, bundled up, like squat statutes waiting for a bus or the tram. I wonder if a wailing Little Walter harmonica solo would make them flinch, or wince.

Bourbon, break-ins and flashing blue lights

2010-01-11T07:22:00.000-08:00

on the road to father and bonding

Otto stared down at the phone he had just hung up. He paused. “Well, that’s a revolting development.”

I had hired Otto, a portly attorney and friend of my wife’s father, to find me another attorney who would handle my case in Virginia — site of the “revolting development.” He found Ms. Stacy Slatterhouse, with an office across from the Halifax County Courthouse, and we had just debriefed her on the details of my case.

“I can’t promise anything,” said Ms. Slatterhouse.

Days before, Virginia state troopers snared me racing 94 MPH under clear skies and with little traffic on Route 58E along the Virginia-North Carolina border. I was in a 60 MPH zone. They swooped in and nailed me roughly halfway between Roanoke and Richmond, about 400 miles from home near Philadelphia.

94 MPH is double reckless driving, Ms. Slatterhouse informed us. The judge conceivably could reduce the charge to defective equipment. Then again, “94 is a high number, very aggressive driving,” said Ms. Slatterhouse. Ms. Slatterhouse also brought up the touchy business of my son, Steve, being with me when I sprung the trap. “The judge might take into account, how can I put it, some egregious parental role modeling,” said Ms. Slatterhouse. But Steve was sound asleep in the shotgun seat when the blue lights lined up behind us. “What? What’s going on?” he asked groggily, realizing we were boxed in by three brown and tan state patrol cars. His first question was the same one the trooper asked me as he leaned into front seat: “What on earth are you doing going this fast?”

“When you come down for your court date, and make no mistake, you must appear,” said Ms Slatterhouse, “bring along your toothbrush. Just a heads up. You just might spend some nights across the street from the court house in the county jail.”

“You know, I was up your way not long ago,” said one of the troopers after studying my driver’s license. I know. Everybody drives fast up there. It’s different down here. It’s a different world. Why don’t you let your son slide over and drive for a while? He’s driving age, isn’t he?”

Sure he is, we’re out here hunting for a college, after all. That’s what Steve and I had been doing for eight days. I told one of the troopers we were tired and just wanted to get home. A plea he has heard, oh, possibly thousands of times. My bad. I should have stuck with the “different world” rationale. Steve slid behind the wheel and locked in a steady 60 MPH. We said nothing. Hell, we were out of cell phone range and I couldn’t even phone home and freak out on my wife.

I wouldn’t say Steve and I committed to this trip with a high sense of purpose, like actually finding a school for Steve. No, we didn’t drill down too deep. My wife Suze suspected all along we had other plans, other goals for this summertime road trip. To be sure, we stayed away from anything organized, organized campus tours, orientations, interviews, print propaganda handouts. We breezed through campuses, sometimes not even getting out of the car, and went with first impressions and gut feelings:

Penn State — 41,700 students, almost all white. Sprawling vanilla campus without discernable personality. At least the massive football stadium is a walk away from the dorms. A steady rain while we were there left a bland impression.

Indiana University of Pennsylvania — Workable size, 14,310 students. IUP wasn’t on the initial itinerary, but like many decisions on this trip, we improvised on the move. Old projects-like dorms are being demolished for new two- and four-person suites with private baths. This is a trend all across campus America. Kids coddled at home want to bring as much comfort and privacy with them to college as they can. The campus lifestyle factor can be a significant determinant.

University of Pittsburgh — Probably too urban for Steve. Petersen Events Center, where the Pitt Panthers basketball team plays, is a NBA-worthy glass and steel palace. It also houses the student fitness center. Rec centers and student centers are other major “lifestyle” draws on college tours. A classroom is a classroom, a commodity when college shopping, but student centers with multiple flat screen monitors and food courts, and gyms with rock climbing walls, this is part and parcel of creating brand reputations and positioning schools competitively. After 18 years of training, our kids know what to look for when they shop.

University of West Virginia — Confusing campus layout. The school loses points as we lose patience trying to find the football stadium. We find it, it’s locked up, we climb over the gate and stroll the astroturf field. You’ve noted no doubt the emphasis we put on athletic facilities. Colleges pour millions into their athletic budgets every year; athletics is part of the lifestyle equation and brand building; so we feel obligated to check out their investments. Of course that’s horeshit. Steve and I are serious sports fans, have been all our lives, and we’ll take every opportunity (or risk) to walk the fields we see on TV. Beyond sportsdom, Morgantown has too much weedy, ramshackle off-campus housing winding up into the hills. I heard someone once say WVU is too “trailer park.” That’s a helluva image problem for the admissions people to deal with. They’ve got to free the state university from the baggage of the state.

The College of Wooster — Classy, leafy, brick-lined liberal arts campus. Immediately out of our price range. And as Steve asks, “What good does a liberal arts degree do for you?” “It’s your ticket to keep studying a few more years in a grad program,” I explain.

Ohio State University — OSU suffers from bad timing on this trip. Columbus is hot and crowded and we’re hot and tired. Still, we push on to locate the famed Horseshoe, Ohio Stadium, “one of the most recognizable landmarks in all of sports” according to the Buckeye web site. Colleges love to tout recognizable landmarks, and of course most of them are the towering football stadiums. After all, ESPN, CBS Sports, ABC Sports et al don’t come to campuses to photograph the library or the physics lab.

Ohio University — Steve would be a legacy kid here, with both his mom and I OU alumni. “It’s a party school isn’t it?” he asked. “Aren’t they all?” I answer. I think he’s looking to escape his legacy, and more important, that zoombifying eight-hour drive from Philadelphia. OU is in fact a perennial top five finisher in annaul national collegiate party power rankings. The admissions folks grit their teeth and prepare their spin every year the rankings come out. “Oh, that’s such an old story by now…”

Virginia Tech — Steve likes the slate stone architecture of the buildings circling the expansive grass drill field, the heart of the campus has a military feel like West Point. Va Tech is another school standing in the shadows of an enormous football stadium. As mentioned, Steve’s not one for long windshield time, and Va Tech, like OU, is a drive too far.

Actually Steve and I didn’t talk about specific colleges on this tour as much as we went back and forth on areas of study. Steve is taking a shotgun approach to what major to pursue, and I can’t keep up with the rounds of questions. “What do you do with a sports administration major? What if you combined it with journalism? Is journalism dead? What’s a sports information director do? ESPN did a show about them. Seems there is a lot of pressure to those jobs. How much do they get paid. What do you do with a general business degree? What’s business administration? What kind of job could I get in TV production? How do you a get a job with NFL Films or ESPN or The Speed Channel?”

“Wanna see Applachian Bible College?”

“What?”

“Just messin’ with you. You don’t have to figure out the entire arc of your career when you’re 17.”

“But if I don’t know what I want to do, maybe I shouldn’t go to college for a year. Maybe community college. It’s expensive. Give you and mom a break. I know we don’t have a lot of money now.”

As you can see, there are no secrets, financial or otherwise, in our small ranch house. But the boy is prone to thinking too much. Just like his mom, dad and sister. We all need to chill a little more. Of course the stakes of finding an affordable four-year college experience don’t lend themselves to chillin’.

Our road trip talk becomes much easier to handle when music is the topic, which happens at some point every day on this trip. In the back seat sits a cooler packed full of CDs. Steve’s a particular fan of what’s called “Brit Pop,” the wave of British rock and roll bands from the ‘90s. He started listening to The Clash and took it from there. Oasis. Blur. Pulp. Coldplay and Radiohead, the Libertines, Keane. Back to Led Zep, the Beatles, the Stones, the Who. Throw in a lot of Marley, a bit of Dylan and The Band. I don’t want to lay my musical prejudices on him. Pick out another CD, Steve. But what’s most annoying is the iPod generation’s itchy trigger finger that keeps pushing the damn forward button searching for another single track. They’re “single minded,” no different than the transitor radio craze in the ‘60s.

A more complicated topic that often comes up has to do with what I’d call “cultures,” for lack of anything more descriptive. Steve doesn’t use the word per se, but he’s something of an anthropologist. Now how do you make money out of that? For years he’s followed the NASCAR culture and the Formula One racing culture. College football cultures and traditions, especially the hardcore southern schools and midwest Big Ten schools in towns and states without professional teams. Texas and Ohio high school football cultures. Books like “Friday Night Lights,” and “It Never Rains in Tiger Stadium.”

Steve talks some on this trip about the rust belt culture we’ve been driving through.Pittsburgh. Cleveland. Akron. Canton. He finds something interesting in the decay and the people and the towns hanging on. He zeroes in on the tortured history of the Cleveland Browns. Something about the old school plain orange helmet he likes. And the Browns’ history of Hall of Famers, die-hard fans, the Dawg Pound, and never being in a Super Bowl.

Dipping into NASCAR culture was a main attraction of this road trip. We aimed to see the Bristol (Tennessee) and Martinsville (Virginia) tracks. The Martinsville track is the smallest NASCAR races on the circuit. Bristol, aka “Thunder Valley,” is a pilgrimmage shrine. If you took the grandstands at Daytona International Speedway, which stretch for miles, wrapped those stands around and around, coiled them tight as a drum, higher and higher around a half-mile oval, until you had a ten-story coliseum, that’s Bristol Motor Speeday. The “world’s fastest half-mile,” with 160,000 seats.

Twice a year NASCAR races at Bristol, on a spring Sunday and an August Saturday night. In mid-July, when we drove up to the track, it was after hours and the tours were done for the day. The museum was closed. We pretty much had the place to ourselves, with a few other straggler fans.

Damn if a gate to the track was open and some fans were wandering in. We walked down the rows of seat, slipped through an opening in the chain-link fence circling the tracks, and ran laughing up and down the steep raceway banks like concrete sand dunes. Suddenly a red pickup flies by us on the track. “Isn’t that the guys who were out here taking pictures?” asks Steve. Hmmm. Sure enough, track workers left open a drive-in gate down by turn one. Steve and I hurried back to our car.

“You drive,” I told Steve.

“Why?”

“You wanted to see Bristol. Well, nobody’s here and the track’s open. Take a few spins around.”

“Really?”

“Hell, yes. Who wouldn’t want to take their car out on Bristol and turn a couple laps. Damn straight.”

Steve guns our Mazda and its puny put-put engine around the high banks, once, twice, three, four times. That’s two miles. Then it’s my turn. Twice around for a mile. We laughed our asses off.

We weren’t laughing several days later when a patrolman caught us trespassing inside the Martinsville track. The thing is shaped like a paper clip, track walls are scarred and gouged by metal and rubber, with the stands sunk low in a valley, hard to see from the highway.

“Can’t you read? Read the signs?” an old, leathery guard asked me. “I could arrest you for being out here.” Of course two “No trespassing” signs hung on the fence right above where I had slid on my back to wriggle my way on to the track. “Come on, Steve,” I yelled. He was wandering the far end of the paper clip. “Sorry sir,” I said to the guard.

Before the old boy had more time to consider our fate, we were in the Mazda heading east on Highway 58. We were leaving behind the old south culture and heading toward home, to Philadelphia. “Racin’ the way it oughta be!” as the Bristol Motor Speedway motto says. Leaving behind strip malls and Hardees, Long John Silver, Arby’s, Subway, Wendy’s, Burger King, Sam’s Club, Daylight Doughnuts, Doggy Bakery, General Tire, Auto Zone, K Mart, CVS, Lowe’s, Kohl’s, Food City, Walgreens. Cash Now. Cash 1. Bristol Cash. Gun’s ‘n Pawn.

Bristol is the “Birthplace of Country Music,” where the Carter Family came out of Poor Valley to first record here in ’27. Where hell-bent Saturday nights turn into solemn Sunday mornings. “Speak something worth hearing or be silent” commands one church message board. It’s not a long walk from the State Line Bar & Grille, Logan’s Roadhouse, Borderline Billiards to that Sunday morning coming down feeling at the Sacred Cross Church, Volunteer Baptist Church, the Faith Community Fellowship.

Bristol, the Carter Family, old time music, old time racing, they all were part of my romantic reflection until we were about two hours down the road on 58E and the blue lights came out of hiding.

It was a damn good ride while it lasted. Steve and I hit many of our targets. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, a subterranean collection of musical misfits, outcasts and geniuses. The Pro Football Hall of Fame. A World War II sub. The Pittsburgh Vintage Car Grand Prix in rainy Schenley Park — MGs, Austin Healys, Jags, Rolls Royces, Lotuses. A 14-inning Pirates game after a torrential rain delay to see ace Giants pitcher Tim Lincecum, thin as a reed, hair like a surfer’s, last year’s Cy Young winner. An Indians game viewed from scorching left-field bleachers, with a clown in the top row pounding on a tom-tom drum that just made you sweat more.

We drove through mountains and hollows in West Virginia. Where the Ghent Fire Department features Mountain State wrestling. Where in White Sulphur Springs, Mud Bogs are organized on city property. Whoever can drive an ATV, 4x4 truck and/or SUVs the furthest distance in the mud pit in the shortest time wins.

One afternoon we drove 40 miles south on Ohio Route 3 from Wooster to Mount Vernon, a rich green stretch of farms, hay fields, pastures, soft hills and a hot haze out on the horizon. Classic Ohio Gothic. I counted 93 barns during that stretch of road. Small, large, aluminum, tin, wooden, brand new and rusted ruins.

We had buffet dinners at Iron Skillets and Golden Corrals. Load the plates high and come back for seconds and thirds. Our minor contribution in the nation’s obesity crisis.

There was that Blacksburg pub where a spunky waitress described what it was to be a Hokie, the Va Tech mascot. “Soon as you get here, the first day, you buy your Hokie tee shirt and from then on you’re a Hokie. It is a family. Especially after the killings.”

“Were you on campus?” I asked.

“Yes. You had to stay wherever you were. Sirens went off and the school sent everyone an email saying there had been a shooting and to stay where you are. We all spent the rest of the day texting and emailing our friends to make sure they were all right.”

“Did you know anyone who was shot?”

“Yeah, my friend Michael was killed, shot in the back.”

There was one night in Athens, Ohio, when Steve and I had dinner at The Oak Room, serenaded by one sorry out-of-tune townie singer-guitarist-harmonica player, trying to win the crowd with ‘70s chestnuts by the Eagles, James Taylor, Pure Prairie League, the Beach Boys. Reminded me how fortune we are that it isn’t the ‘70s anymore, and never will be again.

Another night in Athens I left Steve to ESPN’s Sportscenter in our room at the OU Inn and traipsed up a bluff overlooking the Hocking River and the OU campus. Up there sits what once was the Athens Lunatic Asylum, dark and menacing, with more than 1,800 patients at its peak in the ‘50s. Behind barred windows patients had a panoramic view of the Hocking Valley. Plenty of sunlight and fresh air was the prescription for improved health. Of course some bizarre behaviors and procedures went on behind the barred windows. The focal point of the sprawling complex, spread over hundreds of acres, is a four-story fortress-like intimidating institution. It still stands, a series of set-back wings extending from the main entrance for a total 853 foot length. More than 18 million bricks, all manufactured on the grounds, went into construction of the rock solid building, along with concrete and a tin roof.

What was I doing up there in my bare feet alone with the ghosts?

Three shots of bourbon and a beer at dinner helped lubricate my way. Steve and I had been on the road five days at this point and needed some separation time. I needed a break from the steady rotation of ESPN updates that Steve never tires of. And it’s not all that ghostly up on the old asylum grounds. The hospital had been extensively renovated by OU’s Board of Trustees in the mid-‘90s, renamed The Ridges, and at the cost of four-million dollars turned into an art museum. The refurbished, stately central administration building was named Lin Hall in honor of former Dean of Fine Arts Henry H. Lin, the father of Maya Lin, architect of the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, D.C. Now it’s one of those recognizable campus landmarks.

I spent the evening sitting up there on The Ridges working the right side of my brain. Call it a baby boomer’s fantasy guilt trip. Fantasizing about hardships we never had to face.

I thought back to our walk through the World War II submarine U.S.S. COD, docked next to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on the shores of Lake Erie. “Find them, Chase them, Sink them” was the COD’s motto, accompanied by a graphic of a topedo smashing through the skull of the enemy. So damn cramped and confined. A city 312 feet long. Mess hall/movie theatre. Sleeping berths stacked four high in spots. Mini toilets, showers, washrooms, a laundry, a galley, They stayed trapped idown there up to 74 days on patrol. Twenty-two percent of all U.S. Navy subsmariners were killed in action in World War II. Death, how’d they live with it?

And I imagined what went on behind the dark brick walls of the asylum. Another self-contained city, with a dairy, a farm, a water system. Numb days and nights. Frozen stares. Music and dance shows were put on by patients. Lobotomies peeled back facial skin to run a spike up through the brain, sometimes successful, sometimes not. Screams. Shouts. Howls. Sobs. Most patients remained until they died, and were buried out back if not claimed by families. Rumors of chains on walls. False. Rumors of ghosts, of course. A dark, dank medieval basement for the craziest. An attic full of tight passageways. Lost patients. In the ‘50s and ‘60s the medication revolution commenced and mass institutionalization was out. Soon patients were out on the streets.

Yeah, it had been a damn good trip. There was the afternoon Steve displayed admirable patience, typically not found in large reserves in 17-year-old boys. After getting lost time and again, I finally found the Carter Family Fold and A.P. Carter’s log cabin birthplace and the general store he owned next door. We were in far southwest Virginia in Poor Valley, up against the Clinch Mountain. Steve fiddled with his iPod in the car for a half hour or more while I roamed around shooting pictures. Then I struck up a conversation with a couple inside the Fold. The Carter Fold is a sort of micro-Opry, a barn with a wood-beamed ceiling, ceiling fans, 850 hard-back seats, and a stage with a wooden bench, room for a dozen musicians, and framed photos of the Carter kin and various guest musicians. Off to the left on a podium is an open Bible.

“Of the sisters, Anita had the best voice, that high soprano. June (Johnny Cash’s second wife) was the best entertainer and personality, but she wasn’t the best singer. And then there was Helen,” says Paul, a slight, retired U.S. Department of Agriculture attorney. Faith Collins, a volunteer at the Fold, has talked Hal into staying over another night so he can make the Saturday night show, this one featuring the old-time band Wayne Henderson & Friends. I don’t think I’d have that kind of luck convincing Steve. He’s not much for songs about lost loves, buried lovers, foggy mountain tops, wrecks on the highway.

“It’s in my genes to love music,” says Faith. “I was born dancin’. My dad sang gospel. Sang in quartets. People who don’t have no music in their cars, it’s like a morgue. I don’t understand. Soon as I get in a car I turn on the music. I always have music on in my house. You come here tomorrow night, you’ll be up dancin’. Two years up to 90 years old you’ll see them dancin’. The three of us come out of the kitchen dancin’.”

“I owe you big time,” I said to Steve when I had heard enough and finally returned to the car.

“No problem,” he said. “How’d you find this place?”

“You don’t unless you really want to.”

It’s like finding Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Montana’s home, which we did courtesy of the Dawg.

Dawg and I have known each other for at least 15 years, with him writing a number of short articles for my magazine. The Dawg played football at West Virginia University, and before that with Joe Montana for a season. Dawg was a skinny sophomore at Ringgold High School, about 30 miles south of Pittsburgh. Montana was the senior starting quarterback.

The Montana tour doubles as a tour of Pittsburgh’s destitute Mon Valley. Donora, the Dawg’s hometown, has lost about two-thirds of its population since the mills’ belched and boomed in the ‘20s, 30s and ‘40s. Monongahela, Montana’s hometown, also has dropped two-thirds of its population since the 1970s. Both towns stretch up hills rising from the Monongahela River; both are faded blue-collar capitals with largely empty downtowns and blank, boarded up storefronts. A male resident of Donora today brings home an average salary of about $33,000.

“There’s nothing to do here. No jobs,” says the Dawg. “Used to be a bar on every corner. Millworkers would work all day, stop at the bar after work for shots and beers, get home for dinner, go to bed, get up and do it again and again every day. My dad worked one of the mills for 30 years. Never got sick. Now you gotta get out of here when you’re young or drugs will get you,” says Dawg. “It’s bad.”

A few weeks after our trip came to its abrupt conclusion, I was getting my hair cut, preparing for the court date in Virginia. Rose, who has cut my hair ever since I got out of college, had some muse-like advice. “You know, I know your back story well enough to know this about you. And your son should know this too, if he doesn’t. You’re a romantic.”

“Guilty as charged.”

“An imaginative romantic.”

“Guilty.”

“A bourbon romantic.”

“Guilty.”

“A mandolin romantic.”

“Guilty.”

“You live in the moment”

“Guilty.”

“You’re about experiences.”

“Guilty.”

“And you were on a mission on this trip.”

Rose has more insights than my shrink, and is of course a helluva lot cheaper.

“Yeah? What was that?”

“You wanted to give your son the experience you never were able to have with your dad.”

“Yeah, maybe it was a major ‘make-good.’ Making up for what I didn’t get to do since my dad died when I was 12. But my dad wasn’t a bourban man at all, never drank in front of me, didn’t know anything about NASCAR, and never would have taken me on a trespassing after-hours spin around one of the country’s most famous race tracks.”

“How do you know what crimes your dad might have had in mind? He was an artist, a romantic, he would’ve taken chances somewhere.”

The judge seemed in good spirits the afternoon he was to hear my case in the Halifax County Courthouse. “Let’s get these cases moving,” he said. “There are a lot of people here who don’t want to see me, and I don’t want to see them.”

He had no time for me, that’s for certain. “First thing here I want to say is that the state of Virginia law requires jail time for any speed over 90 miles an hour. The man was going 95. My god, I can land my plane going slower than that,” said the judge.

“I’m not going to touch this case. The law stands as is.”

Ms. Slatterhouse was caught by surprise, then jumped in: “Your honor, the defendant has driven 400 miles to appear here. He has completed an eight-hour driving course, and an orientation session for Habitat for Humanity.”

“I don’t care. Unless you can get the commonwealth attorney to advise against sending this man to jail…”

“When? Now?”

“Yes.”

A few sweaty minutes later my attorney reappeared with the smiling commonwealth attorney.

“I was going out to lunch when I was grabbed to hear this case, your honor,” said the commonwealth attorney. “The trooper says the gentleman was very cooperative when arrested. Given his clean record, the commonwealth does not advise jail time.”

The judge took a breath and looked me over. Maybe he saw another carpetbagging Yankee in a nice jacket and tie, fresh hair cut, trying to squeeze his way out of a tight spot with courtesy and remorse. Hell, all the locals in the room wore flip-flops and shorts. I was over-dressed. The judge wasn’t having any of it.

“I will reserve my comments on what I think of driving 95 miles an hour and keep them to myself. Since no one else here seems interested in this case except me, and the commonwealth has advised against jail…pause…$1250 fine. That’s it. Guilty as charged. I’ve traded you money for jail time,” he said to me.

Ms. Slatterhouse immediately advised me to appeal. That would require another trek down here. No, I was out of my element. A local got caught speeding at 92 MPH and the same judge dismissed his case completely this morning. No jail time. No fine. No nothing. Dismissed. I’ll pay the damn fine in full and hope Steve finds a college that gives him aid money.

Knockin’ on Johnny Cash’s door

2009-11-25T11:48:00.000-08:00

I pulled up in front of Johnny Cash’s boyhood home and couldn’t tell if anyone was home or not. A rusted old car sat in the gravel driveway, but the beaten-down wood frame shack, white with red trim around the windows, with a sloped roof jutting out over a small front porch, appeared empty. Johnny lived here from age three, in 1935, until graduating from high school in 1950. This is where he picked cotton, learned to play guitar and write songs, lost his brother Jack in a saw mill accident, listened to gospel music on the radio, and sang on a local radio station in high school

You pass just one other home on Arkansas West County Road 924 before reaching the Cash place. West County Road 924 is nothing more than a narrow dirt lane with potholes and mud puddles that just about swallowed up my tiny Ford Focus rental. Lined by tilting, wind-whipped wooden telephone poles and sagging wires, it cuts through miles of flat rice and bean farmland outside of Dyess, Arkansas, population 515, about 38 miles northwest of Memphis. The 2006 Cash biopic, “Walk the Line,” has overhead crane shots of young Johnny walking alone on barren and desolate 924. When I stopped by wearing a tweed jacket and tie after making sales calls in Memphis, the late afternoon chill, spitting rain and low clouds of November cast the bottomland in black and gray. A perfect day for the man in black.

In Philadelphia, where I’m from, you don’t just walk up to a stranger’s house and knock to see if anyone’s home. My internet research said the Cash place was owned and occupied by a William Stegall. Supposedly, he allows photographs for a donation, and there is a donation box out front so you don’t have to bother him.

I didn’t see any box as I slowly drove past, snapping photos from my open window. I did see a large hand-scrawled “Welcome” sign, which was enough encouragement for me to stop, take a chance, and knock on the front door.

“Come on in,” I was surprised to hear. Again, where I come from you don’t let strangers in your house, sight unseen. Let alone in the rural hinterlands at the isolated iconic home of one of the 20th century’s most influential musicians. Anyone from anywhere could be at the door. I pushed the creaking door open and there sat Willie in a recliner, watching a game show on a small TV with rabbit ears sitting on a stand.

I introduced myself and thanked him for inviting me in. The last thing I expected. Willie, short, on the hefty side, wearing several layers of worn t-shirts and sweaters and a day’s stubble of whiskers, said he’ll be 75 years old on April 14, 2010. He bought the Cash home “34 years ago, 35 in 2010, for $4,500,” he said, “from an old boy from Tupelo who got in trouble drinking, lost his wife, so he sold it to me. It’s home. It’s peaceful here, I enjoy it, but I’m getting’ old.”

I sat down on one of two ripped sofas in the living room. Willie’s cat jumped from one to the other. A rusted wood stove sat in the room, unused. The walls were peeling white-painted wooden planks with the wallpaper stripped away. A single bare bulb screwed into the ceiling cast a hard light on the wooden parquet floor.

“I just got in,” Willie said, motioning to the two electric heaters warming up. This was a world away from the “Blingdom” promoting Elvis’s Graceland on Memphis billboards.

“It’s nice meetin’ people,” said Willie. “I can’t keep up with ‘em all.” He had a way of immediately putting you at ease. “It’s better to be a good person than a mean person,” he said at one point. “People come from all over, across the water (the Atlantic Ocean), they know more about Johnny Cash than I do. Tour buses run out here from Memphis and Little Rock. One time a fella was selling bags of dirt from the yard for a dollar. The producer of that movie, he came in one time with Cuban cigars, said he wanted to sit around and get a feel for the place. Wanted me to show him how to pick cotton. Here, let me show you around.”

The kitchen sink was piled and jammed with a couple of week’s worth of dirty plates, pots and pans. The dining room table was piled with papers. Seven Cash children lived in this five-room house. Willie, walking with his cane, took me out back through sliding glass doors to show me where he planned to fix up a shed and clear out a small junkyard. That’s if he stays around. “I’ll have it fixed up by April if I’m still here,” he said. On Friday Willie said he was meeting with a banker from Little Rock who wanted to buy the property. “The state wants to buy it too, and pave the road. My ex-wife wants me to sell it. I want the cash in hand. You can’t believe half of what you hear.” Willie lives by himself. One of his sons comes over regularly to help him out. He still works, operating Caterpillar backhoes and excavators.

“I gotta quit,” he said. “But you get used to working and it’s hard to sit down and quit. You know what I mean.” I took it he was referring to my jacket and tie. “If they buy it, I might move to Wilson (a town to the east on the Mississippi River). Nice folks there. I don’t want a place in town. Want to be out where I’m by myself.”

Willie walked me out to the front yard and saw my mud-splattered Ford Focus parked down the road. “What’d ya park way down there for? You come back anytime. And park in the driveway, not way out there.”

I bounced along West County Road 924, looking at the empty land where Willie said “a lot of people just moved off,” thinking if I ever came back the road would be paved, Willie’s driveway too. There would be no pots and pans in the sink. The Cash place would be as clean as Elvis’s pristine birthplace in Tupelo. Thy “Blingdom” come.

Update from Owl Road

2009-06-24T05:57:00.000-07:00

Previously on Owl Road, when I last wrote about it, back in 1986, we had freshly emigrated from center city Philadelphia, Fitler Square. I was nursing a sick lawn mower, we were weighing gutter guard options, sizing up storm doors, and propping up a sagging carport. Kids were a consideration, but not a reality. I was unaware of the BK/EC great divide: Before Kids and Ensuing Chaos.

A couple of nights ago, Monday night, about seven, I was heading out to take son Steve for a lesson in the lost art of driving stick shift. Something seriously more harrowing than teaching him to drive automatic a year or so ago. If Steve stops for any reason on a hill while driving stick, we’re roadkill.

I’m coming out of the house and down the street a mammoth white tractor-trailer is attempting to squeeze onto Owl Road. Must be 30-40 feet long, high enough to break tree limbs. Owl Road has no sidewalks and is probably 30 feet wide, enough for two cars to pass. This massive tractor-trailer is like some spaceship gliding through the neighborhood. Completely alien.

What the hell? Is someone moving? No. Furniture being delivered? There’s a round fellow in a white tee shirt going door to door. Maybe he can’t find the address. I motion him over. “I’ve got a permit,” he yells, waving a laminated piece of something or other. “From the township. So we can go trying to sell this furniture.” He points back at the truck. “We got stuck with this load. Came up from North Carolina and the place we were to drop it at is out of business.” He’s got thick southern drawl. The tired eyes of a long distance hauler. “We’re selling High Point, North Carolina furniture right off the truck. Go see for yourself. Side doors are open.”

This guy is lost in more ways than one. First, he fails to realize in our little neighborhood any stranger coming a knocking at your door will scare the shit out of folks. That southern accent just makes matters worse. You simply don’t come across southern accents on Owl Road. In fact, Owl Road is absent of accents. Neighbors are peering out their windows, drawing the blinds, locking doors. What kind of con is this?

One neighbor down the street is out in his driveway when one of the good old boys approaches him. “Got real good furniture here. Sofas. Take a look.” My neighbor, a Long Island transplant and inherently suspicious New Yorker, keeps his distance like the guy’s carrying the H1N1 virus. “No, no, no thanks, not for me,” he shakes his head. Is this stuff hot? Possibly, but doubtful. This is a pretty damn clumsy scam if that’s what it’s about

I hop up to take a look inside the trailer. Steve is back in the house. So is everyone else. Batten down the hatches. No one ventures out to see what’s up. Sure as hell isn’t the ice cream man. There is some fine High Point wood furniture packed tight inside the trailer. Large, over-stuffed sofas and leather chairs. A grandfather clock. Some elegant wood carving. “This stuff is nice but too damn big for my house,” I tell a guy who says he’s from Winston-Salem. “We got another truck,” he says. “Selling it wholesale. Spread the word.”

How this whale of a trailer ever got from the turnpike to little old Owl Road I’ll never tell you. But they picked the wrong neighborhood for peddling, that’s for certain. Owl Road homes are tidy stucco ranchers from the mid-‘50s. You’d never get their big-ticket furniture through a front door. They should be up in one of the new developments with all the sprawling decks and cathedral ceilings. First came the pharmaceutical companies out this way, then the old farming families around Valley Forge sold out to the developers. Next came scientists and engineers from around the world. Accents abound up in the developments.

In contrast, Old Road is a throwback neighborhood. It’s proven to be sturdy and resilient in the 23 years we’ve been here. The neighbors on either side of us moved in more than 50 years ago, original settlers when this old pig farm was bulldozed into Birdland. It’s Birdland because the short, curvy streets have names like Owl, Sparrow, Thrush, Cardinal, Lark, Pheasant. You see, the first American home of John James Audubon, built in 1763, sits only a mile down the road.

Ten homes sit along Owl Road, each on a half-acre lot. Developers today would put 20 or 30 up. Of course right now nothing is going up anywhere, except “For Sale” signs. Not on Owl Road, though. Like I said, folks here are resilient. It’s probably 17, 18 years since someone new moved to Owl Road. That’s not counting the very quiet, almost invisible black man, Ben, who rents at one end of the street. A Mexican family moved in around the corner a couple of years ago. A small shrine to the Virgin Mary, with a mound of stones, pinwheels and a concrete statue sits square in the middle of their front yard, lit at night by two small spotlights. Soon as they moved in with their flaming red pickup the guy to their left planted a “For Sale” sign in the middle of his front yard.

On Owl Road today live a couple of widows, couple of grandparents, a divorced fortysomething father, a husband and wife who own a barbershop in the mall, an office products sales manager, a programmer for a defense contractor. Then there’s me. I write and edit from my home office, that sagging carport long ago enclosed. Right off of the kitchen, the office has been operational since 2002.

Owl Road provides the solitude for sustained concentration. Neighbors keep to themselves. If a police car drives by it’s unusual. Houses are sealed tight, central air in the summer, so you hear nothing, really. Even the youngest kids are in middle school or high school now.

One topic that does draw the neighbors out some, at least the moms, has to do with the notion of how much damage has been inflicted on the kids by growing up in the dwarf houses of Owl Road. Any number of their friends in this sprawling school district of ours live up in the developments where the sidewalks have no end, and no purpose, really. In the far reaches of the district, there are brick castles that would not be out of place in Beverly Hills or Bel Air.

It can be tricky talking to eight-year-olds about materialism. They are already consumers, of course, they just don't know it. Only a few times over the years have I heard Kate and Steve complain about living in confined quarters. Mostly when they were denied a sleepover because “there’s just not enough room; we’re all on the same floor and the TV will be too loud.”

Somehow they’ve managed. How their parents did is another story.

Now after 23 years the kids are pretty much up and out. That storm door has been replaced once. Maybe. Gutter guards never have been replaced. Never worked in the first place. I planted a pine sapling out back that Osborne gave me; the thing is now a good 30 feet high. Got two dogs, a five-pound thing with one eye, and a 50-pound cross between a polar bear with white fur and black, blank eyes, and a wolf. Don’t believe it’s a dog at all. We keep the grounds trim enough to avoid being shunned by the neighbors.

Solving the world's problems

2009-06-24T05:51:00.000-07:00

“Look at Randy over there putting clothes on the line. He’s been trained good. Hey, Randy, man, you are trained.”

From across the backyards: “Heh, heh.” Randy’s loud even chuckling to himself. He’s wearing shorts, a yellow tank top and leather high-top work boots. He’s a builder. Don’t know how much building he’s doing these days. Which might explain why he’s hanging wash.

It’s Suze’s birthday. It’s also 70 degrees in the sun this afternoon. Such is March. I had to get outside, so I went to bust up twigs and shove them into Home Depot bags. The branches, accumulated winter debris, are nested in and piled up above our cinder block fireplace, what remains of it, which sits alone in our half-acre backyard. We live atop what once was a pig farm and has been known for decades as “Birdland” (Owl Road, Lark Lane, Pheasant, Thrush, Sparrow… it is part of Audubon, Pennsylvania, after all, with John James’s first home in America, 1762, a mile down Pawlings Road). In 1955, a developer built 1,000-square foot stucco Cape Cod and ranch houses with carports and large living room picture windows on half-acre lots; each had a fireplace on a cement pad in the back. Ours is the only one left. We were also the last to enclose the carport. Now a developer would put 2,400-square-foot boxy moving cartons, no windows on the sides, on lots half our size. Actually, with no buyers, no lending and no construction these days, the pigs would still rule.

“Hey Dominic.”

“Hi Dave.”

Dom ambles over from his driveway. (Two things I’ve always liked about Birdland: few fences and no sidewalks.) Appears he neeed to get out of the house as much as I did. We’ve been neighbors for a quarter century, 26 years this Labor Day. Dom and Loretta, his wife, are one of a handful of neighbors who have lived in Birdland since the beginning. Tina and Allen across the street. Helen next door on the other side from Dom. He’s been retired as long as I’ve known him, permanent disability after a heart attack almost finished him in his early 50s.

“How was Kentucky?”

“You know what, it’s boring down there.”

I haven’t talked with Dom up close all winter. Haven’t talked with him at any length in several years. He’s older, frailer, voice huskier, skin whiter, slower walk, a kind of hunched shuffle. He’s been put through it. Close calls with his ticker, clogged arteries, emergency trips to hospitals. Rode a helivac to a downtown hospital once. Lost his first wife to cancer, and his first son Donald only a day old. His sweet daughter Lori lives not far in a home for the mentally disabled. Dom must be pushing 80 now. He’s the dapper little Italian today, with black slacks, black and gray shirt, and black sports coat. A slight man with thinning hair, large ears, and a large, crooked nose. Big heart, glint in the eye, wide grin. Tough. Carries old-time Norristown prejudices he voices without giving them a thought. Excellent cook. Hard worker around the house. Always pushing it, worrying Loretta. He’s not pushing it like he used to, nowadays.

“What’da people do down there, anyway?”

“You know old ma and pa on the front porch? Just sittin’. That’s about what they do. My sister-in-law hates it down there. Her husband wanted to move out of Orlando because, you know, it was getting too crowded. So they moved to the wilds. They like it. Or he likes it.”

“Can’t imagine a lot of jobs there.”

“No. There’s a Corvette plant near. But not much. It’s mostly farming.”

He says “Corvette plant,” something hard for me to picture. They still roll out ‘vettes in the states? I think of Dodge Chargers, Gran Torinos, Mustangs, eight-cylinder, 351-cubic-inch engines, muscle cars to go with a pumped-up mid-century America, Ali in his prime, Gunsmoke, Mercury and Apollo programs, steel mills, the Big Three networks, the Big Three car companies, union rule, cheap gas. My kids call it the black and white days, before color came to TV.

“So, what’da think, Dom, we gonna come out of this recession?”

Dom frowns, shifts his feet, looks down at the grass clumps starting to sprout, and shakes his head.

“I don’t think so. This guy (Barack Obama) is just throwing our money away. It’s bad. And our kids, like your Kate or my grandkids, what are they going to do?”

“Dante (his son) has three boys, right?”

“That’s right. Dominic is getting out this year. Wants to teach fourth grade. But he fooled around beginning of this year and has to go to summer school to get credentialed. Benny is two years behind him at Del Valley up in Doylestown, taking turf building.” Dom pauses. Smiles. “Then there’s Chris. He’s 12. He wants to go to Yale,” Dom says with emphasis.

“A brain, huh?”

“Oh yeah, he’s smart. But his dad’s going to pay for Yale?” Dom shakes his head, looks up at the rich blue sky and cloud puffs, and laughs.

“I don’t see things getting back to where they were,” I say. “I’m as bad as anybody, just spent and spent, never thought about it. Took a lot great vacations. Now… it’s something how fast you can turnaround and look at thing so differently.”

“I think it’s going to get worse,” says Dom. “People aren’t going to be able to get jobs. Some may be able to buy a house, but are you going to be able to meet the monthly mortgage? There are going to be people out on the street.”

“Watch out. Then you hear people talking about riots and marches.”

“I remember coming out of the depression, in ’36 and ’37. It was bad. People trying to sell you all kinds of stuff. Everything. Just to make a little. Come dinner time people’d come over and try to get something to eat. I mean, a lot people were barely making it.”

“In Norristown?”

“Yeah.”

Norristown is a half-empty, dangerously poor shell of its former self, a lively county seat in the first half of the 1900s. A mural on a brick wall in town says, “History reborn,” but it’s faded and peeling.

“How’d your family make out?”

“My dad, he managed to keep food on the table for us. We did alright.”

“He’d have to hustle? Different jobs?”

“He worked for Lee Mills. He was a machine operator. He did alright. Then, you know, they moved. To North Carolina. He lost his pension.”

“How’s that?”

“They said they were moving and he had to move or lose his pension. He was 61. You know Helen moved down there until she retired.”

Helen’s husband Louie, who was disable by a stroke before we moved in, spent those days in Carolina watching Braves’ games and walking the dog. A real gentle man, Louis was.

“Suze heard somebody on the radio yesterday say fairness has been thrown out the window.”

“Was a long time ago. Happened to my dad 50, 60 years ago. Happened to me, too. I was working in a sweater mill in Lansdale. I was ready to leave. It was a good business, they were selling sweaters all over the country. Jewish family owned it. But I could see it ending. Then they said, ‘Oh, Dom, we’ve got plans for you. You can’t leave.’ So stupid me, I stayed. Then two months later my supervisor comes to me, ‘Dom, I got something to tell you.’ I said, ‘Don’t even tell me. You’re doing me a favor.’ He was crying, feeling bad he had to let me go. I wanted to leave. I wasn’t going anywhere there. Mill’s been gone a long time.”

“There aren’t even mills down south anymore.”

“No, they’re in Mexico.”

“A lot of people are getting screwed.”

“It’s not right for our kids. We’re leaving a mess.”

“Where’s Dante work?”

“He works for the sewer authority.”

“That sounds safe.”

“Yeah, he’s pretty good. It’s like at the courthouse. Once you’re in, you’re in. How’s your business?”

“Publishing, it’s like you at the mill. It’s not going anyplace. It’s going down. Advertising will never be like it used to. You know, it’s all going to the Internet. I was talking to an advertiser this morning. Sales manager asked me, ‘You talk to a lot of people. Do you see anybody who’s… doing normal?’ I said, ‘In a word, no.’ President of this company, they make gloves, says, ‘I know the recession will be over when we get back to sales levels what they were before the first two weeks of last October. That’s when we started to go off the cliff.’ We’re not gonna get back to those old times, I don’t think.”

“You gotta be worried,” Dom says, looking straight at me. “Newspapers are folding all the time. I used to get the Times-Herald four or five times a week. Now, I’m not going to pay seventy-five cents for something this thin.” He holds his thumb and forefinger together. “All I get it for is the obituaries.”

“Well I’m in too long to get out. I would if I was younger and didn’t have this.” I motion back to our rancher, with the enclosed carport that turned into my office and in addition in the back to give us more breathing room from the kids.

“Yeah, you got too much time…”

“It’s something how publishing’s changed. I did a job on a newsletter on the side not long ago. This company, down in Virginia Beach that’s doing the newsletter, they used to have their own designers. Well, they laid ‘em all off.”

“Sure, they didn’t want to spend the money.”

“So they shipped out the design to the Philippines. They sent me the first draft of the newsletter, I looked at it. It was all wrong. Like they did it backwards. I said, ‘This looks like it was done by someone who never saw a newsletter before.’ They said, ‘You’re probably right’.”

“Yeah, they don’t have proofreaders anymore. Don’t want to pay for them either,” says Dom. He’s evidently given more thought to publishing than I ever would have given him credit for.

“You’re right. I got the final newsletter emailed to me today. There was a typo right on the first page.”

“People won’t notice. They’ll go right by.”

“You’re right. It’s like everyone’s ADD or something. Nobody concentrates on anything. Driving around with cell phones stuck in their ear all day.”

Dom smiles. “Well, I guess I better be getting back.”

“Yeah, I gotta take these bags out front. See you, Dom.”

“See you.”

Welcome to New York bleepin' City

2009-05-01T05:22:00.000-07:00

Father and son spend six hours in the city of eight million stories

Hanging from the awning of a cramped clothes shop on St. Mark’s Place in Greenwich Village is this black tee shirt with white block lettering across the chest: “New York Fuckin’ City.” It caught my eye and the closer we (Steve, my 17-year-old son and I) got to it the more I wanted to buy it. It sums up the city in a word. You won’t find a “Los Fuckin’ Angeles” tee shirt or a “Fort Worth Fuckin’ Dallas” tee shirt or a “Phila-fuckin’-delphia” tee, a “Washington Fuckin’ DC” tee or even a “Las Fuckin’ Vegas” or “New Fuckin’ Orleans” tee. And those last two towns are harsh, sleezy and slimy. What “fuckin” means to me in the sense of a metropolitan area is this: New York is the most emphatic city in the country. No doubt. It comes down hard on you. The natives talk loud, talk fast, emphatically, assertively, declaratively. They don’t much care what you happen to think. In other words, they’re fuckin’ edgy, opinionated people.

Then I thought, no, I can’t buy this shirt. First, I couldn’t wear to the mall, to the Y or to Barnes & Noble, or to mow my lawn. And then, what message am I sending my kids? I don’t particularly like them dropping the f-bomb in the house. Finally, I’m 54 years old — today — and a rebellious adolescent is still down deep somewhere, but the neighbors don’t need to know. Of course they’d shun me out of the ‘hood when I walked the dogs ‘round the block with a “New York Fuckin’ City” tee shirt on.

So we walked past the tee. We were searching for a CD store in the Village. If there was a vintage CD shop to be found anywhere, it had to be in the Village. But we had no luck and were wandering around aimlessly. At the NYU bookstore I asked a coed wearing NYU purple behind the cash register if she knew a CD store nearby. After a prolonged silence it seemed evident I was some old archeologist to her on an expedition irrelevant to her world. She was at a loss what to say. Steve was getting impatient with this expedition, I could tell. On East Fourth Street I ducked into Rivington Guitars, “NYC’s Best Little Guitar Store,” figuring if anyone knew where a CD store could be found, it would be musicians. This fellow Howie by the door shakes his head. “They’re all gone. Used to be two across the street, they closed.” That’s what I was afraid of. I have a four- or five-year-old street guide that lists CD stores on St. Mark’s like Mondo Kim’s and St. Mark’s Sounds. Gone. Then he says: “Wait. There’s Rainbow CDs over on First Avenue by Eighth Street. Go down Fourth to First Avenue, turn left, go four blocks and it’s across the street. Tell ‘em I sent you. They’re good guys.”

Rainbow Music 2002 Ltd. must be where all CDs go to die. A tiny, narrow slip of a shop, you can’t open the front door fully without hitting the first floor-to-ceiling tottering stack of random CDs. Rainbow is only 15-20 feet wide. Perhaps, what, ten thousand CDs could be inside. It’s impossible to guess. Along the sidewalls, which extend to the back 40 or 50 feet, piles of CDs climb until the top ones are jammed right beneath the ceiling. Four or five people were in the store and we had to turn sideways to slip past each other, like walking through a submarine. I’m knocking CD jewel cases to the floor, and that’s even after I took off my backpack. Steve seems mortified. This CD junkyard or graveyard is as far from his orderly world of iTunes as could be.

Rainbow Music, mess that it is, would seem to be under the ownership of a three-year-old, or a couple of college dorm mates. But no, Mel, the wizen, stooped proprietor, greets every customer coming through the door the same way: “Hi. Whatcha interested in? I got country along the side here. Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash. Got blues in the back. You like blues? Jazz along that wall. You like jazz? Art Pepper? Got a lot of Art Pepper back there. You like African? Gotta lot rap, you probably don’t like rap,” he says to me. Actually, I like steel guitar players, I say. Got any? Mel looks at me blankly. Maybe in the back with the blues.

Mel cannot stop gabbing. Used to be 20 CD stores in the neighborhood, now it’s down to his and one other. He’s getting flooded with CDs coming in almost every day from Wall Street guys selling their CDs for a couple of bucks because they can’t afford their 5,000-square-foot homes. Mel played Wall Street since he was 12, 13, if I’m to believe him. Now stock prices are coming back to what they were when he started, Mel grins. But he’s doing all right, he says, has stock in food and pharmaceuticals. People still got to eat, got to take their meds in this recession. I ask him if he thinks the economy will ever be what it used to be. The economy will come back he says. But it will never be like it used to be. Of that he seems certain. “There are more than 80 stores closed around here,” he says. “Too many of ‘em were selling the same thing.”

“What do you do?” he asks me. “I’m a writer, a journalist,” I tell him while I’m down on my knees, craning my neck to read CDs on the floor. “Newspapers… Jesus,” Mel just about moans. “I remember when newspapers used to be cash cows. Can’t believe what’s happened to newspapers.”

Steve seems, no, it’s clear, he’s ready to bolt this cramped chaos of CDs where you could easily spend an afternoon trying to find titles, what with CDs upside down, sideward, on the floor, up to the ceiling, stacks blocking other stacks, stuff in boxes. The whole place seems a house of CD cards ready to collapse. As we check out, you hardly see Mel ringing up the sale. He’s hidden behind a wall of CDs on the counter. There’s but a small opening to see his head and hear his constant patter. Behind me a young man and woman speaking German try out CDs on an old boom box. I’m blocking the front door from people who want to come in. “That guy, he’s a good customer of mine. Comes all the time,” says Mel. But they open the door and see us jammed by the cash register, like elevator doors opening and finding no place to slide in. “Pretty soon it will start getting busy,” Mel says. Friday night. After the workweek guys like to go out drinking, and once suitably buzzed, they come into the Rainbow for impulse buys. “I’m open seven days a week, twelve to ten on Sunday and Tuesdays, twelve to eleven Wednesday and Thursday, twelve to nine on Monday” Mel tells me. “Friday and Saturday it’s twelve to twelve.”

OK, NYC is obviously so vast I have no idea where we are when we step outside Rainbow Music. The cabbies are your guides, unless you’re a city regular or can decipher the subway numbering and lettering system and navigate the maze of tunnels, stairs and turnstiles. We are somewhere down in the Village, in a neighborhood I haven’t been to before. But all one needs to get around the Big City is a destination. We hop in a cab, say, “Pennsylvania Station,” and we’re off, watching the small TV monitor with grainy newscasters and rolling headline text. With luck we’ll catch the 5:39 p.m. to Philadelphia. These screens are embedded in the back of the cab’s front seat. It’s been years since I took a cab in New York, and they weren’t wired like this. I rely on Steve to push the touch-screen buttons and read about Tiger Woods muddling through the second round of the Masters. Simultaneously, video shows a lost whale somehow turned around in the Hudson River and making its way back to the ocean.

Earlier in the day, after a tour of Madison Square Garden and a peek inside the Knicks and Rangers’ locker rooms and standing cramped in a super suite with other tourists, mostly foreigners, watching — the last thing I expected — the grand finale of the Ringling Brothers Good Friday matinee performance complete with the train of 16 elephants trundling out the tunnel along with the tumbling clowns and acrobats and trapeze artists, the elephants coming to a lumbering halt with each raising a front leg and placing it on the back of the elephant in front, after the loud crescendo of the live band and the ringmaster concluding, “Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you, thank you very much,” Steve and I got in cab to find a spot to eat lunch. “Steve,” I said, “there are few things weirder than seeing 16 elephants in a room, I don’t care how big the room is. Elephants aren’t meant to be indoors.” Sure enough, protesters outside the Garden hold posters claiming the circus kills baby elephants. “Wait a minute,” a mother tells her young daughter, “I want to ask a question,” she says, pointing to a protester.

A foreign cabbie, perhaps from Eastern Europe, looks at me blankly when I ask if he knows where The Mean Fiddler sports bar is on the Upper East Side. OK, how about Mickey Mantle’s sports bar? I might as well been chewing a huge wad of bubble gum my mouth. He can’t make sense of me. How can anyone drive a cab in New York and not know Mickey Mantle? OK, just drop us at 57th and Madison and we’ll wing it. I had written the address of The Mean Fiddler and Mantle’s and other spots to hit from Internet searches I had Googled this morning before we took the 10:37 a.m. Acela up from Philadelphia, but damn, the paper slipped out my back pocket somewhere.

We wandered 57th Street heading west not knowing what we were after, and came upon Shelley’s Tradizionale Ristorante di Pesce; it seemed as suitable as anything. Steve took a look around and asked, “Isn’t this a little fancy for us?” The maître d was dress in an impeccable suit and crisp tie, hair greased, the tables were draped with thick white linens, ten-foot mirrors lined the walls, chandeliers hung from the high ceiling, but what the hell, they had hamburgers on the menu. At the table to our right two overweight young women talked about Florida, Palm Beach, the former FedEx chairman who has a plane and a hanger on his property somewhere, just like John Travolta, one of the woman said. Yeah Steve, we are a bit out of our depth here. Two tables to our right slouched a thin, red-haired, middle-aged woman by herself, who kept eyeing her Blackberry for messages at least several times every minute.

We have better luck with a knowledgeable cabbie who drove us from uptown to NYU. Konte from Mali. Came to New York to live with an uncle after graduating from high school. He is two semesters away from getting his degree in finance and investment from Baruch College. He absolutely hates driving a cab, which he’s been doing for four months. “Too risky, too much risk,” he says. He starts in on his arch nemesis, the bus driver. “This I don’t understand. The buses, they go where they want. They block me. They go across lanes. A bus runs a red light, the police do nothing. I run a red light, I get a $350 ticket. I stay away from the buses. Too big. Once a bus smashed my window.”

Today Konte’s been driving since three in the morning. It’s now past three in the afternoon. Yesterday a passenger puked in his backseat. Couple of days ago he got tricked into pulling over to pick up a young girl in front of a restaurant at night. He stopped his cab, the girl disappeared, and four very, very large men squeezed in. “Any one of them could’ve eaten me. Eaten me,” Konte says. They want to go to Brooklyn. Konte says he is not moving, not taking them anywhere. “But you have to, it’s the law,” they say. “I will call the police,” says Konte. “See, over there, the police. Get out. Get out of my cab now.”

I knock on the Plexiglas panels that shield Konte from the rear and right side passenger seat. “Don’t these protect you?” He laughs. “These, these mean nothing to some of the bad people I pick up. Sometimes I drop them off in places I don’t even want to wait to get the fare. I just want to get out of there. Too much risk. This job, too risky.” Not long ago Konte picked up two young women, so gorgeous that if he met them on the street, he said he’d be too embarrassed to talk to them. The beautiful girls wanted to go to Brooklyn. “I don’t know Brooklyn well,” says Konte. “That’s all right, we’ll guide you,” say the girls. They get to where they want in Brooklyn, a $40 fare plus tolls. The girls open the doors and dash down the street. Konte wants to run after them, grab their purses and get his fare. But he remembers what his uncle told him. Do something like that and the girls will say you were trying to rob them. The media, the police, who do you think they will believe? Konte tells a story of a cabbie who took a man and four girls to the Staten Island Ferry. The girls skipped out, too, running away. The guy, who maybe picked the girls up in a bar, ran after them to get his fare money. The cabbie ran after the guy, thinking he was the one who should pay. They got into a fistfight. Two months later, the guy, the customer, is still in a coma. The cabbie, he lost his job.

“What about your good customers?” I ask Konte. “What are they like?” Ah, the rest of the story. “Ninety percent of my customers are good people,” says Konte. “They ask about my life, tell me about their life, they encourage me to keep studying. They talk. Only ten percent are bad people. This is a good country. People can be nice, very nice.”

Before Konte drops us off by Washington Square he mentions a shooting that happened a few blocks away a few weeks ago. “You know, everybody in this town has a story,” I say to Steve after we get out of Konte’s cab. “Yeah, even if you don’t want to hear it,” Steve says.

Steve and I make our way across Washington Square, buzzing with students and neighbors on this cloudy, mild early April day, a day to be outside. The cherry blossoms are a wild riot of white, along with the striking yellow Forsythia. Bare trees are just starting to show a tinge of light green. “I don’t think I’d want to go to a city school,” says Steve. “You can’t get away. It’s not relaxing.” No, you don’t come to New York to unwind. “I know one thing,” I say. “My idea of four years at a college is not sitting around talking about who got shot a couple of blocks away.” New York Fuckin’ City indeed.

No more papers

2009-02-24T10:16:00.001-08:00

It’s been two to three weeks now without a paper waiting in the driveway in the morning darkness. I can’t remember a time without the daily paper, the “Inky,” the Philadelphia Inquirer. Before home delivery out here in the ‘burbs, I used to pick up an Inky every day at 30th Street Station when we lived in the city. We’re talking a daily fix for a quarter century, at least.

But what with the recession and a substantial decrease in my salary, the family accountant, my wife Suze, red-lined the $136 twice-a-year payment for the Inky. I agreed without much thought. The Inky has been backsliding for years with less original and shallower reporting. Just yesterday it filed for bankruptcy. Also, the news is so relentlessly downbeat you need some distance from it. “The worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.” “Millions forced from their homes.” Consumer spending down. Food spending, housing prices, the Dow, corporate earnings, all down, down, down. “The U.S. Federal Reserve said this week that the recession could last five years.” “A healthcare crisis and the planet on the brink of incineration.” This recession is absolutely accelerating the great migration from print; it certainly forced the issue in our household. Gone, too, are magazine subscriptions, one by one as they expire. Lost to attrition in the last few years have been The New Yorker, American Cinematographer, The Oxford American, The Progressive, The Sun, Newsweek, ESPN, Adbusters, Entertainment Weekly, The Hollywood Reporter, and surely others I can’t recall.

Gone also are the days, just about every day, when I’d get a turkey or tuna sandwich at the Valley Forge Deli and with it two or three papers, usually The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and the Philadelphia Daily News (aka the Daily Nuisance). Last time Sean at the deli rang up The Wall Street Journal it was $2.25. Even he did an exaggerated double-take. “$2.25? Is that right? Is that what it’s up to now? You know, we only make two or three cents per paper. The papers aren’t a good business. They’re dying.”

Join the funeral procession, Sean. It’s a long line mourning the passing of papers, and to a lesser extent, at least so far, magazines. I didn’t imagine it coming to this, myself and thousands of other journalists. But I’m referring here to giving up my addiction to print. I’ve been a newspaper and magazine junkie my entire adult life. Newsstands, the old school wooden sheds and narrow stores crammed with cigars, water bottles, post cards, lottery ticket signs and the kind of quirky, in-depth variety of papers and magazines usually only found on big city street corners or in college campus towns, always have been one of my guilty pleasures. That’s where, if you’re fortunate, you’d find The Times of London, London’s Guardian and Observer, Daily Telegraph and Daily Mirror, the Financial Times, the weekly Variety, and expensive and often short-lived dazzling niche mags like Beach Culture (long gone) for surfers and Doubletake (long gone) for photography and essays and 4c — color, couture, curiosity, culture (which I’ve only come across in southern California). And maybe, if the racks are long and deep enough, there will be a section for small personal “zines” like Survivalism by an Iraqi vet, Four-Hundred Word, a square little digest of short non-fiction, Reality Ranch, “a forum for humor writing,” and Sufism, the issue I bought containing a letter from the editor titled, “Intention and Expectation in Pursuing a Mystical Path.”

I bought all those zines at Powell’s bookstore in Portland, Oregon, which takes up an entire city block and bills itself as the world’s largest independent bookstore. I can’t tell you most hotels I stayed at or the restaurants I ate at when on the road for business or vacations, but I clearly can picture favorite newsstands in Santa Monica, Princeton, Boulder, Seattle, Chicago, Denver, Toronto, Manhattan, Newark, Delaware and Penn’s campus in Philadelphia. At any airport I’d search out the nearest newsstand before coffee or checking my flight. Always purchase the local paper. Far preferable to the free, homogenized, sanitized USA Today lying in the hotel hallway in the morning. Give me local color, local columnists, classic Herb Caen, god rest his soul, in the San Francisco Chronicle and Steve Lopez in the LA Times to name two, local heroes and villains, high school sports scores, the Chicago Trib and Sun-Time’s sports pages, the Dallas Morning-Herald’s sports, the Boston Globe’s sports, exotic LA Times coverage of Malibu brush fires and show biz, The Washington Post’s political reporting, even the crap, bland papers in Vegas, Orlando and Miami. Always good for passing time in trains, planes and nights propped up on pillows in hotel rooms.

Now magazines and newspapers fall under the miscellaneous category in our suddenly scrutinized family budget, a surely bloated monthly number ripe for spending cuts. And so it’s time for print withdrawal. Surrendering the print habit is somewhat disorienting at first (Sunday mornings with time on your hands is a test), but actually easier than I would’ve thought. Which has to be another nail in the coffin of “old media” publishing, because if a dedicated addict who mainlined black ink like me can give it up almost overnight, I can’t see who wouldn’t be able to.

It’s the alternate universe of the Internet that allows the transition from print to be as painless as I’ve found it. Of course there would be no transition from print if not for the Internet’s endless offerings. I’ve simply bookmarked many of the aforementioned newspapers and magazines and click on them for a quick look-see at the end my day in front of the computer. I know more about what’s going on in the Swat Valley in Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province than in my own backyard now. I’m too lazy, or my eyes are too strained by five o’clock, to look up the local papers’ web sites. And I’m not all that concerned about sewer expansion plans, another accident on Route 422, a bomb threat at a middle school or a small-time meth ring.

No doubt dropping the morning Inky has made me a less informed citizen. I have more knowledge of the fortunes of the British Premier League football team Everton than my son Steve’s Methacton High basketball conference standing. I know more about California’s budget crisis than Philadephia’s. I can delve into more detail describing to you why the Tennessee Vols’ new football coach is pissing off every Southeast Conference opponent in recruiting wars than what the Phillies manager is saying about spring training and the upcoming season. And I have no idea what times movies start at the mult-plex five minutes from my front door. Suze tells me the Oscars are on tonight. I had an inkling but that’s all. Suze listens to NPR all day and then gets 22 minutes of news read to her by Katie Couric at 6:30 in the evening. I can listen to music but not NPR speak while I work, and I can’t stomach all the drug ads that break up Katie’s teleprompter recitation.

I’ve retreated from print, but not paper. Due to the strain and uneasy ergonomics of reading more than a hundred words on the screen, I waste good timber and run through ink cartridges printing out articles to read later in the evening on a couch. The “Net enables me to come up with my own custom newspaper each day, lets me be the editor and select or censor stories. I read what I want to read. And I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not.

"Space Available"

2009-02-09T12:28:00.000-08:00

There’s a stretch of Trooper Road heading north, beginning beyond the stop light off 422, past the Harley dealer’s “No Money Down” sign and the gas station abandoned years ago, where on the left-hand side alone I counted five “Space Available” real estate signs in less than a mile.

Space isn’t all that’s available these days. Many homes are available, of course, with foreclosures and owners relocating for better jobs, maybe any job. “For Sale” signs are planted on front lawns wherever you go, more than few with “Reduced Price” attached.

Shuttered and decrepit Bud’s Tavern, about two hundred years old, plaster chunks continually falling off and orange barricade fencing encircling it, is available, and has been for probably more than a year. Whippoorwill Works, Mark and Xenia’s cramped little arts and crafts shop will be available shortly. The friendly counter-culture couple fought Target and K-Mart and Wal-Mart for decades, holding on, but now with Mark sick and their kids long raised, they’re moving their framing business back home. The glass-paneled corner store of the strip mall ten paces from Mark and Xenia’s is available once again. Years ago, when the strip mall still had old man Hillman’s Hardware store, Baskin & Robbin’s ice cream was sold out of that corner space. A plant and flower shop with a German Sheperd always loose inside made a run at it for a number of years before folding. Last up was a Beltone hearing aid center, which didn’t last long at all. The far end of the strip was long anchored by an under-sized supermarket, then Rite-Aid moved in. That space is available, too. Along with one or two other storefronts along the strip.

Five-hundred-and-ninety-eight thousand people laid off from their jobs in the month of January are available for work. Most of them, anyway. Some will retire if they can. Others will sulk and put their search. According to the government, about 3.6 million people have been put out of work since the recession started officially in December, 2007. There exists now a huge pool of nervous, struggling and available workers. My wife is available to start work immediately, full or part-time. Untold numbers of stay-at-home moms like her are diving into the pool.

Pass by any automobile dealership and you see row upon row of available vehicles, especially wide-assed chrome and metal pickup trucks and hulking sport utility vehicles too long for the garage door to shut. Farm land is available to build on. More parking slots are available at the mall. More seating is available at restaurants. More seats are available on Broadway, where shows are shutting down after both long and short runs. Empty seats beckon at basketball and ice hockey games and English and Italian soccer matches. You see it every night on cable. Physicians have more hours available for appointments. So do hair stylists. Hospitals have more beds available as people put off what they don’t have to do. Almost 100 million people in this country watched Super Bowl XLIII, a record-breaking number. Why? Because, well, it was cheaper to sit home and watch the game than go to the mall or a flower show or a boat show or to dinner or a bar. Commercial time for the Super Bowl in the end was not available, sold out, because, well, it was a one-time expense and there was this enormous captive audience.

Millions of Americans feel trapped, held hostage by an exhausted, bankrupt economy with the perverse strength to tie down millions. This experience is opposite of the promise implied by all things available. Something available is something to be had. Grab it, quick, before someone else does. Of course that’s not the way it works now. The drum beats daily sounding new layoffs and salary freezes, salary cuts and businesses disappearing, factories deserted, libraries and fire departments darkened, bus and subway lines running less often. The president talks of a possible catastrophe if we don’t get our house in order, and fast.

But there are tempting deals. Off 202 a black man bundled in layers against the cold has been standing for weeks holding one sign after another, “Going out of business,” first for Linen N Things. Then for Circuit City. The latest it is for Oskar Huber, the furniture store. It hasn’t been the same black guy for the past month, I’m sure. But wrapped against the weather, stamping his feet, shaking his hands, it looks like the same guy.

A strange contrast for sure, hunkering down when so much is there for the taking. We’re not used to it, of course. For years and decades leading up to 2007 or 2008, millions of us scooped up what was available without thinking twice. Anything seemed within reach. Maybe a house at the shore. Moving up to a larger home. Enclosing the carport, finishing off the basement. Adding a basketball court. A third car. A roomier car. A Harley. A floor-to-ceiling flat screen. Flat screens for the kitchen and the bedroom. Trips, repeated trips, to Vegas and Disneyworld. Biking in Baja. Vacations to Mexico or Portugal or Greece, who knows where. A night at the Ritz. During Christmas week a few years ago we spent surprise bonus money on a family night at the Ritz-Carlton downtown. Another Christmas we blasted the heat and tested the plumbing in two newly-constructed log cabins, one for the kids and one for mom and dad, outside of cold and empty Zion National Park. A few days later we were living large at the grand Bellagio in Vegas, ice skating on a temporary rink right on the Strip. A couple of good moonlighting gigs had come my way.

I come from the Ralph Kramden School of Money Management. “You see, Alice,” the rotund Ralph would bellow with gusto and satisfaction, in his bus driver’s uniform, holding court in the middle of his bare-bones ‘50s apartment in an episode of “The Honeymooners.” “You see, when I had it, Alice, when I had it, I spent it.” Business-minded people put a lasting value on money and so they work with it differently; they stretch it, manipulate it, multiply it. For me, it’s been a way to get to Zion or Crater Lake in the winter. Santa Monica in the summer. Or to The Blue Man Group show in New York or it is the means to build the CD library my kids can’t believe in the age of iPod. This philosophical difference helps explain why my bro is skiing in Vermont this week and I’m sweating renting three movies from Blockbuster.

Ah, if we had only known. If we had seen signs of this sudden, jarring crash in business and personal fortunes coming. No bonus. A sizeable salary cut three weeks into the new year. “I just kick myself,” said a coworker a few days ago. “Thinking about what I spent money on. Now I comb every expense and I go to bed at night thinking, ‘OK, what test don’t I know about that will come next?’” Her husband, who works independently painting blue skies and puffy clouds on the ceilings of children’s bedrooms in wealthy homes along with other unique custom paint jobs, says he is booked up for February but the phone’s not ringing and he’s concerned about March. A lot of contractors and consultants and salespeople are waiting by their phones. Or calling everyone they know.

“You’ll tell me if, you know, you find out, you know, that things might get worse,” asked my coworker, full of hesitation. When you are cornered and scared you think hard about who you can trust, what you can say, and who might cause you trouble. I assured her I would. “You would do that?” asked my wife. “If you were told in confidence?” This woman and I have worked together for more than ten years. She works extraordinarily hard when she must, which is often, and she’s very talented. “Yeah, I would, “ I said. “What could happen, really? They’d never find out probably.” “They” — the owners or managers who sign the paycheck to keep you going — have morphed into inscrutable and unpredictable figures. With one hand on the TNT plunger, it seems.

Many of us haven’t the slightest idea if and when HQ will rock us with the next blunt email announcement. Next week. Next month. Who knows? If sales keep falling across almost all markets in my industry, and right now our store is $80,000 off for March billings, will the owners be able to pay off the bank loan for last year’s acquisition negotiated just after the unofficial recession became official, only no one knew it yet?

It’s impossible to predict with any confidence how deep the recession will go, how long it will last. Any sense of confidence is but a whiff. People are dropping out of jobs like Mother Nature’s victims who fell from the sky in M. Night Shyamalan’s so-called eco-thriller “The Happening.” My wife’s sister emailed Saturday that her son got laid off from an investment house where he wasn’t happy anyway; said son and his fiancé lost their jobs in a bar that closed and they have moved in with her and her husband in Roanoke “to get their life straightened out.” A brother-in-law lost his job before the holidays. Her best friend’s husband got laid off this week from a auto dealership. Her daughter’s company got bought out and there is talk of lay-offs and relocating to Minnesota. “All in all we are thankful for what we have,” she concluded, rather abruptly. Still, amen to that.

She’s got the best perspective, but one hard to hold on to. Today I drove around thinking how office space, retail space, land, houses, autos, boats, motorcycles, tickets to this concert and seats that game are all abundantly available at the moment. But in a recession, to be “available” is too often a tease and a taunt. Six months ago, three months ago, heck, maybe three weeks ago I wouldn’t have thought this way at all.

Walking in L.A.

2009-01-20T06:50:00.001-08:00

I know, no one walks in Los Angeles, kingdom of the car, empire of the freeways. No one takes public transit, either, judging by the empty orange Metro buses and Rapid Rail commuter cars pulling out of the Mariposa/Nash Street station near my hotel. But I had a couple of hours to kill in the morning before my flight so I headed out for a walk.

After a 70-minute stroll I return, having passed all of seven people on the street. Now this is in a district of L.A. far from the movie dream factories, Hollywood Boulevard, the beaches, Rodeo Drive or Santa Monica pier. I’m a seven-minute shuttle ride from LAX in El Segundo — “the most business friendly city” — according to banners flapping from lampposts. In other words, another concrete commercial no-man’s land no different from what you’d find in Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Philadelphia, Buffalo or Boston.

In L.A., you could call it paradise interrupted. There’s nary a palm tree in sight.

Starting about 9:30 on a cool, overcast Tuesday morn, the last week in November, my jaunt takes me a few blocks north on Mariposa Avenue to Sepulveda Boulevard, where I turn left and head west. Sepulveda is an eight, sometimes ten-lane flat, straight-arrow highway that’d pass for an interstate with stop lights back home. Crossing it on foot is worth your life. I didn’t try.

The sidewalk along Sepulveda serves a purpose I know not. It’s a long, lonely stretch of cement block dotted with empty bus shelters and randomly-placed brown metal benches that make no sense whatever other than effecting El Segundo’s “friendly” vibe. I’m naked out here, there’s not a person in sight. And it’s beyond me that someone would or could relax on one of these benches, reading a paper, the traffic roaring by.

This is L.A.’s back, back, back lot. On the blocks of Sepulveda I cover I pass by the Powerlight Solar Electric Energy compound and 20- to 25-story glass-paneled office boxes housing the likes of IBM, NCR, Xerox, Raytheon, Mattel, Oracle, SAIC, Sun Microsystems, Continental Datagraphics, Malaysia Airlines, Air New Zealand, Thai Airlines and Boeing.

Across the boulevard sits the mysterious International Rectifiers office, a hidden think tank for Jimmy Carter and Henry Kissinger wannabes? The nearby International Garden Center has rows of fresh-cut Christmas trees and “snow flocking,” which seems absurd of course to a northerner. But this is L.A. after all, with its facades and facelifts and history of nifty film fakery.

Katmandu Bedding and Furniture is in the middle of a mattress sale. Next door the Just Massage studio works you over for $45 an hour. In the parking lot of Ralph’s, a supermarket chain, Rebek’s Juice in a small squat building sells Energy Berry with mega-antioxidants for anti-aging.

If you look, you’ll find clues that yes, this is L.A. and not Houston. Like the little “L.A. Yoga” magazine stand outside Rebek’s. Or the pink, orange and purple flower bushes that pop up along the sidewalk. Or all the black or silver Hummers and Beamers and Lexuses on Sepulveda. Come to think of it, all the cars seem either black or silver. Or the young dude behind the counter at Border’s with the two steel studs protruding from each side below his lower lip and the shoulder-length black hair and the shaggy beard and the black tee-shirt with “think” on the front, while Elvis sings Christmas tunes from the ceiling and a black guy just in from Atlanta who says he’s a stand-up comic hits up another long-hair employee, apparently a guitarist in a band, for tickets to his upcoming gig and the café in the back serving Seattle’s Best has five or six people with open laptops setting up shop and it’s ten in the morning.

But the idea as I see it is not to notice. Not on Sepulveda with the obligatory McDonald’s and Starbucks and Subway and FedEx Kinko’s and strip malls and the Chevron station and food mart and the Public Storage row of sheds and the 24-hour Walgreen’s that just had its grand opening and the five-minute Express Car Wash and the Grand Café Bar and Grille. In the hour-plus I’m out and about I don’t see a single home, an apartment, a condo, not one sign of people going through their everyday living except for The Lakes at El Segundo golf course with middle-aged guys and women toting their clubs and a series of steel towers planted across the course carrying 20-30 slightly sagging power lines.

The sheer boredom of this barrenness dulls the senses. Which is fine I think with the sales grunts and grinders staying at my Hilton Garden Inn or the Marriott Courtyard next-door or the Homewood Studio Suites down the street. The idea is to get on with your business; get in and out, hopefully on an earlier flight or an upgrade to first class.

I’m out here for two nights, having spent $946.80 on airfare, 11 hours in the air, 6,000 miles roundtrip, $183.76 a night lodging, for two meetings, one lasting 90 minutes, the other maybe a half hour. The first meeting boils down to Bernard, the small, thin pleasantly determined Brit, asking and getting the same rates for his ads next year, $80,000 or so. The second is a bullshit session with Craig, cranky partner of a small agency out in the farmlands by Oxnard 60 miles from our first appointment, who drives a pickup to his office, wears jeans, a tee shirt and a ball cap. It’s a bullshit session because the contract between our magazine and his client was a done deal last week and the wiry, mustached, southern drawling Craig, who loves to drop “Fuck this” and “Fuck that” and “I remember that fuckin’ rep,” and many references to “Fuckin’ Charlotte” his client likes RDG, the magazine’s publisher, and RDG always gets a kick out of Craig and wants to drop by to thank him for the business.

I’ve been out to L.A. ten or twelve times in the more than 25 years I’ve been on the magazine. RDG, who was 8 years old when I started editing the magazine, might do that in 18 months. Completely shaved of head with a goatee and an easy grin, overweight and given to wearing ill-fitting suits and no longer a tie, he’s on a plane every week selling two magazines and 300 or 400 accounts. Do this for ten or twenty or thirty years, depending on one’s endurance and income expectations, and why not persevere comfortably numb and rather blind to where the road’s taken you this time out?

With RDG in the over-sized silver Lincoln Towne car rental, “grandpa’s car” he calls it, driving up I-405 and then Highway 101 through the San Fernando Valley suburbs to Ventura County and Oxnard and Craig it’s all business. From 9:30 in the morning till 5:30 in the evening when on our day is done and then RDG always, always calls his 8- and 5-year-old girls at his ex-wife’s home in Detroit. Otherwise, there’s no radio, no music, no news, no idea that off to our left a Super Scooper is dive bombing into Malibu’s Corral Canyon, dropping thousands of gallons of water on the remnants of a fire that destroyed 53 homes over the weekend with 2,000 firefighters battling the blaze at its height. The rental Lincoln is a sealed-tight sales mobile bubble; no noise, no smells, no notion we’re passing through canyon country with its cactus and coyotes and bobcats. Not when RDG has a list of 20-30 customer phone numbers on his lap as he drives and he makes call after call on his wireless headset and scrolls through emails on his Blackberry. “Did you get my proposal? Do you want me to send another?” “Is Jeff in?” “Have you made any decisions?” “We’re closing January next Monday.” “How about I call you in another six weeks?”

He’s in a zone, 35 years old, at the top of his game, his only apparent distraction a live-in girlfriend with two kids who’s pushing for marriage. His resistance is bound to crumble, he knows it. But most of all, he loves the game, chasing and closing deals. “I’ll sell anything,” he says over dinner. “A $750 ad, classified, it doesn’t matter.” From what I’ve seen over the years with sales reps, he’s in a definite minority. First sales trip I ever did the rep took the afternoon off to tour old mansions on Rhode Island’s coast. RDG bitches about one of our reps who he can’t get on the road enough, about former reps who wouldn’t travel or answer his calls, about competitors who don’t travel. “Frank, fuck, he just drives everywhere and sends accounts two-line emails. Jackie, you think she gets on a plane at her age? She just chats with her girlfriends on the phone. I’d be bored out of my mind.”

So if you’re doing something like RDG’s routine week after week, a place like our Hilton eases you along with its clean, simple, tan and brown, tile and brick fake fireplace in the lobby, a free water bottle and cookies at the counter, a gracious Mexican waiter in the restaurant — “Sorry to interrupt your reading sir, but I have a delicious dish for you” — a flat screen TV that swivels any which way you want in your room, five pillows piled high on your king-sized bed, a Cardio-Theatre 12-inch TV monitor attached to the treadmills in the fitness center and of course a USA Today at your door every morning.

Being dulled out and disengaged helps some when the inevitable occurs: flight delays, mechanical failures, missing crews, ice storms or clients who blow you off, stand you up, or take their money to a competitor. Here’s a for instance: “Bravo!” yells a guard as I go through security at LAX heading back home. “Freeze. Back against the wall, sir,” another guard instructs me. All the commotion instantly stops. Silence. Everyone stands in place, bewildered. “All clear!” someone yells 67 seconds later. One of the guards kept count. As in a game, the start button is pushed and all the travel players are off and running again. “She wants to get back into consulting,” I hear a guy say in passing. “When I’m back in the office tomorrow…” says a woman on her cell. Moving through the first-class cabin to my seat a gentleman by a window has this to say on his cell: “My heart’s not really into telling you how you screwed the thing up but that’s my assignment so for future reference please say I was an asshole, OK? Thank you.”

Taking care of business, as Elvis used to say.

Landlubbers

2009-01-20T06:48:00.000-08:00

“So, Kate, how could we suck so bad at something so simple as rafting down a river?”

Kate, you see, was the only one among us with any nautical experience to speak of, having rowed varsity for Delaware’s crew team for a month or so last spring, before the 6 a.m. weight training sessions made it a job more than anything.

“Well, we had the crazy old man who thought he knew what he was jabbering about but didn’t know a thing, and he wouldn’t listen to me. His wife was basically dead weight. She didn’t touch an oar. So their side of the raft unbalanced us. Mom, ummm, she kind of got confused.

We were a tired, beat-up squad coming home from a bruising encounter. Heading south on the northeast extension of the PA turnpike, returning from “one of those awesome days we all dream about,” according to the Whitewater Challengers rafting brochure.

“I don’t think we ever once rowed in the same direction at the same time,” said mom. “Back stroke, forward stroke, back stroke, forward, I had trouble with that.”

“I think we were trying too hard,” said Kate. “And in rowing you have a coxswain telling you what to do. Dad, you didn’t even know port from starboard.”

What defense did I have? “I wasn’t going to tell Elva (the dead weight) to row if she didn’t feel like it, and she didn’t feel like it. And Josef, how can you push a little 67-year-old Hungarian refugee with that heavy accent?”

“He was a pisser,” laughed mom. “Telling every raft that we were racing for a case of beer. Calling that grim old guide with the bushy mustache wearing the silver metal helmet one of Hitler’s guards. Before he threw the buckets of water at the raft with the Japanese he told us, ‘Time to get ‘em back for Pearl Harbor’.”

“All I know is the picture they took of us from the trees or wherever they hid that camera, if you look nobody has their oar in the water except me. Did you notice?” I complained. “Not one oar in the water. Everyone’s holding on for life. I was doing all the work. Josef said, ‘Someone take out a life insurance policy on that man’. Steve, you look like a rangy young sophomore surfer dude with your shaggy blond hair and baggy trucks. I expected more out of you. Where’s your beaded necklace?”

“That picture was when we were going through the rapids,” said Steve. “You don’t need your oars in the water.”

“Dad, you looked like you’re falling out the back of the raft,” said Kate. “Mom, you looked like you’re trying to climb out.”

“I did fall out a couple of times,” I said. “Almost got slammed by the damn raft on the rocks ten minutes into the trip. See this knot on my shin?”

“I got run over too,” said Steve. “Couldn’t climb back in the boat.”

“The only time we went in a straight line was when I got out and pushed us,” I said.

“There were too many rafts out there,” said Steve. He was right. The only whitewater rafting in the entire Poconos seemed to be along a short stretch of the Lehigh River south of the town of Jim Thorpe. On this brilliant August Sunday when we were on the river, 400 rafts, red, blue, gray, green, from different adventure outfits, skittered about like absent-minded waterbugs. Every half mile or so we’d collide with another outfit’s party, gridlocked and blocking the river. The procession down the Lehigh was as disorderly and slow as a Mummer’s Parade; everyone dressed in blue life vests instead of feathers.

“I’ll never do it again,” declared Steve. “We’d start and stop. Start and stop. Then the guides made us wait. Who told us the whole thing would only take three or four hours?”

“It wasn’t exactly relaxing,” said Kate.

“The woman at Whitewater Challengers told us that,” said mom. “If she told the truth and said you’d leave at nine in the morning and get back at six at night, half the people wouldn’t go.”

“Yeah, not exactly what I wanted to do the day before soccer practice two-a-days begin,” frowned Steve.

“My ass was really starting to hurt, wasn’t yours?” asked mom. “I didn’t think we’d ever get out of those rafts.”

“Josef said he was going to hang Elva by her ankles from their hotel balcony for suggesting the trip,” I said. “And we were on the supposedly ‘Easier Whitewater Rafting’ trip. Imagine the ‘Exhilarating’ trip. They’d still be searching for us. We really screwed up those last rapids. Went around the rocks totally ass-backwards. The young guide just smirked as we bounced by. Suburban flatlanders.”

“We went through all the rapids backwards,” noted Steve.

“The only thing we perfected was that spin move, you know, where we’d hit a rock dead on, then bounce around it sliding backwards and do a 360 to get turned around. Didn’t see anyone on the river spin out like we did,” I said.

“They didn’t have to,” said Kate. “Even the little kids, you know, the ones from some camp with that lazy, fat counselor who never stopped yakking, unless she was napping, she was so annoying, but even they rowed straighter than we did.”

“I think we tried too hard,” said mom.

“You’ll never get me back there,” said Steve.

“Come on, Steve, it was family bonding,” said mom.

And who ever said family bonding comes easy? No pain, no gain.

Time Out for Bonding

2009-01-20T06:46:00.001-08:00

Spending a couple of nights in a Holiday Inn Express for a weekend of NASCAR races is not exactly the most popular form of teenage entertainment in the Northeast suburbs. But my son Steve is a 15-year-old hooked on NASCAR, so off we’ll go. But Steve has other plans as well, a movie with friends before we depart Friday eve.

His mother’s concern, it seems, is does dad have enough sleep in him to make the drive down to Chestertown, MD, our hotel locale, leaving about 9 or thereabouts. Mapquest says the drive should take 1 hour, 52 minutes. Total estimated distance: 90.85 miles. Shouldn’t be a problem. So what if I’m usually in bed reading some book or magazine by 9:30. So what it’s too damn bad Steve is three months short of being able to drive. My problem could well be reading the small print and numbers on the map, in the dark, with squinting eyes and no GPS. Where the hell’s Chesterton anyway?

It’s where the closest hotel exists that I could find for the Big Dover Monster Mile weekend. If the room didn’t cost $200 a night, I’d have cancelled Friday night and driven straight to the track Saturday for the afternoon Busch Series race. In fact, Steve asked if we could do just that a couple of nights ago. Alas, too late. Past the cancellation deadline.

So this compromise. Steve gets to go to the movies with who? Whom? A girlfriend? A gang? It’s a mystery, of course.

“Ready to go, Steve?” mom asks. To the movies, that is. “I’ll take him,” she says. “It’s a mom thing.”

I just wonder, has Steve done any packing whatsoever for the weekend? “No, I was going to do it while he was at the movies,” says his dutiful mom.

OK. I think I’ll just sit in the rocker here and have a couple bourbons. Don’t worry about a couple of shots of Kentucky’s finest. First, it’ll kill some time. Two, I’ll shower before we leave. And I’ll take a jumbo cup of java from Wawa before we try to find Chestertown.

“Choppa, choppa,” yells mom. “We gotta go. Movie’s almost starting?”

Just wait. Daughter Kate is showing me how download a ringtone for my new cellphone. Elvis’s “Suspicious Minds.” “C’mon, let’s go,” yells mom. The car’s running.

Just wondering. How’s Steve getting back from the movie?

“That’ll be figured out later,” says mom. Figured out later. It’s like a mantra.

One more act of practicality before hitting the Kentucky firewater. Call the reservation desk down in Chestertown. “Looks like we won’t be rolling in ‘til about 11:30 tonight. Just want to be sure we’ll have a room.” “Yessir. Your reservation’s guaranteed.” “Thanks.”

We pull out from the driveway about 9:30 pm. Steve climbs in the back seat to “chill” about 9:40. Around 10 three lanes on I-95 merge into one and it’s a crawl. On the tape deck Paul Simon sings about his nine-year-old traveling companion from his first marriage going to Graceland with him. Steve toured Graceland once. He might have seven or eight. Other than Elvis’s Jungle Room, all Steve wanted to know is “when’s this tour over?”

“Is this it?” he asks when we pull into the Holiday Inn Express about 11:30 pm. “How come you kept stalling out all the time?” Got a new clutch put in and yeah, it was touchy and I drove it like a teenager.

“All right if I take a whiz here?” Steve asks, hopping out of the car. What is it about young males pissing wherever they feel like it? I whizzed off the side of Jersey Turnpike one time in rush hour so who am I to tell him to hold it in?

“You do snore a lot, dad,” the boy says next morning upon rising. “Good thing you brought your earplugs.”

Steve does geometry homework, God bless him, and I drive and check out Chestertown, Maryland. It’s Eastern Shore rural upscale you could say. We’ll miss the diesel tractor pull this afternoon. Dollar discount stores in strip malls ring the downtown village green that’s circled by brick sidewalks. Then there the street, Philosopher’s Terrace, Idiot’s Books, an Intuitive Gardens service, “Unwind your mind” with a Swedish Deep Tissue therapist, and a farm house with pond going for $3 million from Select Realty.

Says a middle-aged woman in a wide-brim straw hat sipping coffee outside Play It Again, Sam: “In the evening we all sit around an parse over the news and have a glass of wine and fall asleep.”

OK, enough parsing, let’s go racing. Steve and I cruise past cornfields, yard sales and large rain puddles. I decide to ask him about last night’s movie. “What did you see?” “The Bourne movie.” “Not with girls, did you, that’s not a chick flick.” He smiles. “I don’t think you know who they are?” “They who, the girls?” He smiles.
This is delicate, dicey territory with a 15-year-old. “Can I get a name? Of the girl you went with.” “Mackenzie.” Ah, how far to venture? “She play sports, music? What’s she do out of school?” “She plays soccer.”

The inquisition shall end there. This is a road trip, not a torture trip. Thirteen yellow flags slow the RoadLoans.com 200 Busch Series race until almost the sun sets on Saturday afternoon. The Dover Raceway is maybe one-third full for this “B” series race. We catch dinner at a nearby TGIF Friday’s on Route 13 and get back to the hotel to watch three hours of college football on the Vizio flat screens. Good games. Kentucky 41, Arkansas 29. Georgia 26, Alabama 23, OT. Wisconsin 17, Iowa. 13.

Along the way, in the dark flatlands, Steve asks some hard questions: “(Since the race is in Delaware) What does DuPont make?” “How do you think we will get out of the Iraq war?” He answers that one himself: “There is no easy way to get out of a war, is there?”

Sunday the raceway is jammed with 120,000 fans. I wear an AC Milan Italian soccer league jersey to see if even one motor head in 120,000 know their soccer. Turns out two do: “AC Milan sucks!” yells one. The other, shirtless, eyes glazed, leaving after the racing, blurts, “Is that a soccer shirt? I always get lost at this point coming out of races.” He is, as kids would say, way lost.

Steve and I barely speak to each other during the race. For one thing, it’s so frickin’ loud. And we’re the equivalent of 15 stories up, a good 150 feet above the track. Plus the crowd around you at a NASCAR race is always entertaining. Steve calls it a traveling circus. I say it’s like a state fair fueled by beer, great quantities of beer. Two wide-assed guys sit in front of us. One’s tee shirt reads, “The Beer’s Prayer — Our lager, which art in barrel…” The other’s displays the Periodic Table of Fish Lures & Flies” in great detail. To the left of them sits a fellow with a black Mohawk, so black it’s got to be dyed.

We save our race analysis for the ride home. Steve does some English homework with one of the inside lights on. Mostly we play old hip hop cassette tapes of mine, but Steve, the iPod download boy, has trouble with retro tape player technology. He can’t figure how to insert a cassette, but he can set the correct time on my cell phone in maybe a minute. Would’ve taken me an hour.

Nearing home around 8:30 pm I need some loud tunes to fight the weekend fatigue factor setting in. Steve looks at my tape collection from the late ‘90s and hasn’t a clue what to play. “I got one for you.” It’s the Stones’ “Get yer Ya’s Ya’s Out,” recorded in Madison Square Garden November 27th and 28th, 19 frickin’ 69. My god, 38 years ago, 22 years before Steve was born. I talk about Keith Richards’ Swiss blood transfusions and the driving brilliance of Charlie Watts and the blues, how the Stones listened to the blues in their formative years. “I remember going to blues concerts with your mom. You know, blues fans are like NASCAR fans. Different. Strange looking longhairs and bikers. I’d say, ‘Where are these people during the week? You don’t see ‘em at the mall.’ Like NASCAR fans.”

Ah, there’s so much more to lecture on about the Stones, Delta Blues, Chicago Blues, Muddy Waters. Willie Dixon. “Where’s the House of Blues?” asks Steve. But I stop. When I was 15, I wasn’t musing over music made 22 years ago in 1933. Not Duke Ellington , not Louis Armstrong, not yet. “It’s a pretty good album,” says Steve of “Yer Ya’s Ya’s.” We’ll leave it at that. When bonding, like many things, it’s what you don’t say sometimes that helps cement the bond.

The Lost Art of Conversation

2009-01-20T06:31:00.000-08:00

Art forms rise and fall. Evolve, peak, and peter out. And so it goes.

At first man grunted. Eventually he conversed. And wrote and mailed and waited for letters. But all that might as well have taken place on another planet. This is what I discovered after a recent three-day spring break road trip with my 20-year-old daughter: After the ancient house phone died of neglect. After mobile phones and emails lost their lure. Beyond what now seems the old art of instant messaging, the world belongs to the nimble-fingered text messengers.

Kate and I were in the car traveling through Virginia for three days, the first three days of April, and though her purple cell phone (“I need a new one dad”) was always by her side, not once did she use it to actually call someone.

I take that back.

Once or twice she phoned her mother. And on the last day, about an hour from home on the PA Turnpike, she spoke with her roommate. “Only because she called me first,” according to Kate.

Otherwise, Kate was in more or less constant contact with friends up and down the East Coast by texting them. “I don’t like talking to people,” Kate confessed. “No unless I have to. Especially boys. They have nothing to say.”

Except Kevin, her old boyfriend. “He’s the only one I could actually talk to.” Once on vacation in the wilds of southern Utah, we had to drive 30 miles into the small town of Kanab each evening so she could get cell phone reception and whisper to Kevin from the back of our rented SUV.

But that seems long ago and far away. Now thousands of years of communication have been reduced to, or returned to, mysterious hieroglyphics:

ayt.
afaik. jk. pos.
np.
break sucks.
ruok?
rme. bored2death.
gal. hf.
em. pir. prw.
f2f p911? jw.
imo. kpc lotta work. iykwim.
weg. eod.
need gbh.
ilu.
gmta. ilu.
b4n.
ptb. aeap.
lu.
Lu2.

Translation:

Are you there?
Are far as I know. Just kidding. Parent over shoulder.
No problem.
Spring break sucks.
Are you OK?
Rolling my eyes. I’m bored to death.
Get a life. Have fun.
Excuse me? Parents in room. Parents are watching.
Face to face parent alert? Just wondering.
I my opinion, keeping parents clueless is a lot of work. If you know what I mean.
Wicked evil grin. End of discussion.
I need a great big hug.
I love you.
Great minds think alike. I love you.
Bye for now.
Please text back. As early as possible.
Love you.
Love you, too.

Every two or three minutes Kate would take her cell out of the glove compartment to check a new text. I’d never hear a beep, ring or buzz. Maybe she knew intuitively when a text was coming in. She’d quickly punch out a reply and put the cell back in the compartment.

On our brief road trip to Charlottesville and UVA, Monticello, Appomattox, Va Tech and my writing friend Professor Geller’s hilltop ranch lodge, I must admit Kate had no trouble hold a conversation. We discussed the former New York Governor Elliott Spitzer’s secret fondness for have prostitutes pee on him; the prospects of Obama actually winning the election; how the north, with its factories versus the south and its farms, was bound to win the Civil War; how we have no clue where brother/son Steve will wind up in college; the charm, and expense, of quilts; why Jefferson needed slave labor to operation his plantation; Tupac versus Biggie Smalls, who’s better; how lucky Jack Johnson is to live the surfer dude life in Hawaii and actually have a way of making in living with his music, and so on.

Still I wondered, if you’re not trapped behind the windshield with dad… “So Kate, what do you and your friends talk about when you’re actually face to face?”

“If it’s somebody I don’t know, it’s the usual questions. Where are you from? What’s your major? Where do you live? If we’re at a party, nobody talks anyway. It’s too loud.”

I was thinking while Kate talks. Let’s see: Automated teller machines handle our transactions. A computerized voice makes and confirms my flight or train reservations. The doc’s office has an automated prescription refill service. Pharmacy has automated prescription ordering. I always get automated receptionists. You can buy anything online. Buy or rent a house or a car online. Plan a vacation. Plan your retirement. Drive anywhere at the beck and call of the droning voice directions from the GPS.

“I don’ like talking to people if I can help it,” Kate says again.

“What if you get lost or can’t find what you need?”
“You ask them for me, OK? Will you?”

My faith in all things not texted or automated was restored less than an hour after we returned home. Kate retreated to her bedroom and I could hear her end of a cell conversation, must have been with that lasted a good hour-plus. Later that night a girlfriend from high school came over and they stayed up until three in the morning talking. “Yeah,” said Kate, “we talked like real human beings.”

The art of conversation may be at the tipping point, edging close to the abyss of automated voice programming and texting around the Thanksgiving dinner table, texting your wedding vows, texting your way through a job interview. “It’s just more efficient, dad. More to the point. And if you don’t have anything to say, you don’t say it.”

Just turn off your cell.

But we’re not there yet, thank god.

Appy Who?

2009-01-20T06:27:00.001-08:00

“Where is Appalachian State?”

“I dunno.”

“Boone, North Carolina.”

“Where’s Boone, North Carolina?”

“I dunno.”

“Do you pronounce it Appa-latch – ian or Appa-lay-ian State?”

“I think it’s Appa-latch-ian.”

This little tale should be about Delaware, or as an App State student had painted on her bare midriff, “Dela-where?” Apparently neither side was sure of the other. Our weekend road trip, with Kate, Steve and Kate’s look-alike roomie Alix, took us in mid-December to Chattanooga, Tennessee to see the Blue Hens battle the App State Mountaineers on a clear, 50-degree Friday night for the 2008 NCAA Division I Football Championship.

But for all intents and purposes, this was a home game for App State. Seventy percent of the 23,010 fans packing sold-out Finley Stadium were screaming Mountaineer Maniacs, according to a newspaper report the next day. Boone, it turns out, located in western North Carolina’s “High Country,” named after Daniel Boone and with a population of about 14,000, is but a four or five hour drive (269 miles) over the Blue Ridge Mountains to Chattanooga. Its mascot, Yosef, no, not the Hebrew slave from the Torah, but one serious hillbilly from a deep hollow, struts around in blue jean overhauls, yellow-and-black checkered flannel shirt, scraggly gray beard and mustache, floppy wide-brim hat and corncob pipe. And their fans are damn proud of him, judging from all the cars and pickups plastered with huge logos of his snarling face. We saw grown men, students and five-year-old boys dressed just like ole Yosef.

On one side of the stands the maniacs, clad in black and yellow, would yell, “App!”
“State!” came the booming answer from the opposite side of the field.

“App!”
“State!”
“App!”
“State!”
“App!”
“State!”

This chant, midway through the third quarter, roared on for what seemed forever. At least ten minutes. Of course by that time the game was 35-14 in favor of the Mountaineers. U Del students — give ‘em credit, they stood on the aluminum benches the whole damn game — were reduced to ridicule.

“Go back to your hillbilly shack and smoke some more dope!”

“Get your 2.0 grade points off the field!”

“In five years you’ll be working for us!”

“What’s the three fingers for?” (App State was on its way to winning its third straight national championship.) “Is that how many spliffs you can smoke at once?”

“This has got to be the worst officiated game in the history of football!”

“They screwed us when they said Omar didn’t score on that play in the first quarter. That changed the whole game. I’ve gotta see that replay on TV.”

“I’m not watching this game again. I’m burning my tape.”

Appy scored the first three times it got the ball, going up 21-0 with less than five minutes gone in the second quarter. One was a 99-yard drive that started after Delaware failed to punch it in from less than a yard out on third and fourth down, following the refs’ ruling that Omar’s knee hit the ground before he lunged over the goal line. That would be the aforementioned screw job. It took Appy all of one minute and 26 seconds to go those 99 yards.

Then right before halftime, Delaware finally got on the board, making it 21-7, with about a minute left in the half. “They’ve got to get out of the half without App State scoring again,” said Steve. He was right, but Delaware got it wrong. It took Appy a mere 21 seconds to score this time. Going 72 yards in two plays.

The guy in front of Steve, with the blue Delaware jersey and the flaming yellow spiked hair wig, sat down for the first time and buried his head in his hands.

Before the opening kickoff, the vastly outnumbered but determined U Del fans yelled again and again, “We’re not Michigan! We’re not Michigan!” This cheer alluded to the almost exact similarity between Delaware and Michigan football helmets, blue with three yellow stripes and yellow wing tips, and App State’s opening season 35-32 upset of Michigan that shocked the football world and put Appy on the cover of Sports Illustrated. Down 28-7 going into the half, someone in back of us muttered, “We are Michigan.”

Actually, it would get worse. In the second half App State went up 35-7. Then Omar scored to make it 35-14. But ASU put two more touchdowns on the board to go up 49-14.

“Look. K.C. (Delaware’s coach) has put his mic behind his neck. It’s that bad. He doesn’t even want to talk to anybody.”

“Where the hell was Flacco all night?” (Joe Flacco, Delaware’s six-foot five-inch towering quarterback, expected to be drafted next spring by the NFL, didn’t complete 50 percent of his passes tonight.)

Meanwhile, some U Del fans were damning App State’s flashy sophomore quarterback, Armanti Edwards, with faint praise indeed. “Look how skinny his legs are. My wrists are bigger than his calves.” Once Edwards had his helmet knocked off. “Look at that prison hairdo!” Kate turned and said, “Don’t they know every team has guys with dreadlocks now?”

When you’re getting blown out of a championship game, everyone is fair game for abuse: the other team, of course, the refs of course, your coach, your quarterback. Even Delaware’s band.

“Their band is way better than ours.”

“Where’s our band been all night? Maybe the wind’s blowing the wrong way, but I haven’t heard ‘em all night.” “The halftime show was terrible.”

We left, along with most of the 3,000 or so Delaware fans, mid-way through the fourth quarter when Appy scored to make it 42-14. “Tra-vel safe-ly, tra-vel safe-ly,” the App State fans serenaded us on the way out. Our timing was good. We missed the Mountaineer Maniacs storming the field with about three minutes left. They completely surrounded it except for the Delaware bench. Then when Delaware scored on a kickoff return, we missed the sight of the return man crossing the goal line and hurling the ball, apparently aiming for an App State fan, but instead nailing a policeman.

It was that kind of night for Delaware.

Almost History

2009-01-20T06:16:00.000-08:00

Last Saturday night… I had just put down a beer when the phone rings. “Hello, dad, can you come pick us up. Mike’s car ran off the road.”

“Are you OK? Is everyone alright?”

“Yeah. I might have a black eye but everyone’s alright.”

Off I go, figuring to find some kids next to a car stuck in the mud. As I get close to where they’re supposed to be, a line of idling cars is backed up. Sirens wail and it looks like a couple of fire engines and police cars are up ahead, strobes flashing. Shadowy figures are setting down flares.

I pull into a driveway, hop out of the car, and jog down to ask a patrolman directing traffic where the kids are. He points down an embankment. Three or four teens are shivering in the snow, next to a smashed, totaled sedan flipped on the passenger side. I ask where Kate, my daughter, is. They point to the ambulance.

She’s sitting inside, getting her “vitals” measured. “You sure you feel alright?” the EMT asks. Her face is pale. “If you get home and start feeling bad, call 911 or you can go to the hospital,” says the EMT, smiling. As Saturday night calls go, this one is a relief. Close, but amazingly, no injuries.

“Dad, I thought I was going to die,” said Kate. “Everything seemed to happen in slow motion. All I heard was breaking glass.

“I think Mike saved my life,” Kate said as we drove home. “He told me to put on my seat belt. I wasn’t going to because it was a short drive. But he made me.”

If I hadn’t seen the run-over mail box, the grazed telephone pole, the uprooted and hammered speed limit pole, and the severed wires that sent a transformer crashing to the ground, I don’t think I would’ve appreciated how close her escape was. The kids told the story one way to the police (“The car pulled out in front of me, sir”), for the parents (“I’m sorry, I’m really sorry”) and for each other (“It happened right by the high school. We knocked the lights out while the play was going on! I was never so scared in my life.”)

“Why did the police ask so many questions,” asked Kate.

“I’m going to get a five-hour lecture tomorrow,” said one of the boys in the car. “But you didn’t do anything wrong.” “That’s just the way my parents are.”
“Don’t think about,” a parent told me after hearing the story. “Those things happen. That’s why you wear seat belts. That’s about all you can say.”

Kate and her girlfriend said they’d never get in a car again unless their mom or dad was driving. That was right after the crash. A day later, spirits returning, she protested new rules about when and where she could drive with friends. Controls, more rules, this is what her close call got her. But I could have been driving her honesty with me into hiding.

What do we take from close calls? Everyone reacts with their own philosophy. All we can do is try to nurture the right response.

“What did you learn from it?” I asked Kate. “What do you mean?” “What would you do different the next time?” “Oh. I don’t know. I mean nobody did anything wrong.”

“What about wearing seat belts?” “Duh, well of course.”

Concessions and lessons come hard. We drove back to the crash scene the next day and I deliberately slowed to the speed limit — 35 mph. “Oh, we were definitely going faster than this. A lot faster,” she said.
Of course a line of cars was stacked up behind me. No one goes the speed limit on this stretch of road. When we got out to look at the damage from the night before, cars whizzed by going 50, 60 mph. “Look, everyone’s speeding,” Kate said.

Lightning Strikes

2009-01-20T06:14:00.000-08:00

Came home from a run in Valley Forge Park one evening not long ago and as I got out of the car a neighbor came up on me quickly. My daughter had fallen off a bike, she said, and was at a dentist with her mom getting her teeth checked out. Turns out Kate busted her jaw in four places, necessitating a steel wiring job that made her "look like a monster," as she put it after surgery.

I've been writing about workplace injuries for years, but working in the friendly confines of a publishing company has not been conducive to first-hand reporting. After this wipe-out on the home front a couple of themes from past writing unfortunately came to life.

How fast the routine can turn into a night to remember, for example. A kid goes for a ride around the block with friends before dinner like a hundred nights before. Then she comes running home crying, bleeding, holding her head. Lightning strikes, and it's never expected.

All the doctors and nurses said it could've been worse if she hadn't been wearing a helmet. Too bad it wasn't a football helmet with face cage and chin strap — might have saved the jaw. Still, the protective equipment worked like an insurance policy you never expect to cash in on.

After Kate came home from the hospital and phone calls from family, friends, and neighbors tailed off, the finger-pointing began. Who's fault was this accident? After the worry subsides the anger kicks in. Was it the neighbor who was timing the kids to see how fast they'd go around the block? Kate and her friends were vague about what happened, not wanting to "get in trouble."

Accidents will happen, said some consoling friends. President Clinton said the same thing after tumbling down a few steps and ripping up his knee. But there are explanations, usually more than one.

The corner Kate skidded out on had loose gravel and could use some repairs — poor community housekeeping you might say.

She was on a friend's bike she hadn't ridden before, in a sense operating unfamiliar equipment.

The kids were racing — a fine form of peer pressure.

The worse the accident, the stronger the anger, guilt and other feelings. I have an inkling of how that works now. And also fresh respect for how fragile we are.

Between Angels and the GPS

2009-01-20T06:10:00.000-08:00

"This is all about safety and security," I declared to my wife as the mission unfolded.

Whenever your 18-year-old daughter is traveling back roads far from home you better be talking safety and security. I've railed against crotchety lectures for years, but when it comes to your own kid, I see nothing wrong with exerting some command and control.

At least taking a stab at it.

The mission in this case was one of those teenage declarations of independence. And as history teaches us, declarations of independence carry with them an element of risk. This one was no different.

Kate was on a mission, your typical determined teenager, to drive to visit her boyfriend at his college some 200 miles away. MapQuest pegged the driving time at four hours and six minutes.

So before mission launch, naturally we reviewed the safety/security checklist:

Gas tank full? Yes.

Cell phone charged? Yes.

Seat belts buckled? Check.

Global positioning system operational? Not installed in this typical college freshman's used compact.

Should we rent a car with GSP? "Dad, you've got to be kidding."

Co-pilot, navigator, another warm body along for the ride? Negative. No room at the inn. Boyfriend's roommates won't allow it. Everyone eligible bailed. Pick your excuse. This would be a solo adventure

We reviewed the MapQuest directions. Too complicated for my liking, vague, confusing and open to multiple interpretations, like federal regulations. Too many turns, merges, towards, becomes — as in MD-5 becomes MD-5 S becomes MD-235 S. Twenty-eight steps, all told.

Kate was resolutely confident. "I get it, dad. Not a problem."

As she pulled away from the house, I thought of Peter Sandman, the risk communications expert, who recalled in an interview his eldest daughter once informing him: "Dad, if I’m optimizing only for safety then I'll never get out of the driveway. (Peter was paraphrasing I'm sure.) I have to compromise safety with getting somewhere.” Said Peter: "She was just flat out right. No one wants to optimize safety by shutting down."

Don't you hate it when the kids are "just flat out right"?

You can't shut 'em down; you just turn 'em over to the angels, as my brother says, who's raised a couple of hard-headed teenage boys.

Kate's mission from Philadelphia down to the southern tip of Maryland's western shore on the Chesapeake Bay went according to plan for, oh, about three hours.

Then my cell rang.

"Uh, dad, I missed my exit."

Outside it was becoming dark. I knew she had left too late. I stammered to her mother: "Why'd you let me let her leave when we knew it was getting too late?"

Our dining room became NASA's mission control, or the command bunker from the TV series "24." I only wish we had a counter-terrorist unit's cutting edge computerized surveillance tracking equipment. Instead, an old road atlas map of Maryland would have to do.

"OK, where are you?" I asked, my failing baby boomer eyes squinting at the impossibly small route numbers.

Turns out she was somewhere between Odenton and Bowie in Maryland. I was ready to abort the mission. But getting her to re-trace her steps, in the dark, to get back home would be no less risky than getting her on the road to her destination. Time for another safety/security check:

Windows rolled up? Check.

Doors locked? Check.

Cell phone battery OK? Check.

Night vision contacts in? Check.

From our mission control dining room table, her mom and I directed her, like some wayward astronaut in the night, back on course. But to confirm she was indeed on the right road (of course there were no road signs when needed) she'd have to pull into a 7-11 and ask at the counter. This was not my idea of "optimizing for safety." I didn't like the picture in my mind of this 18-year-old girl, tanned and looking fresh from spring break, stopping her car anywhere in the dark to question strangers.

"Keep your cell phone with you, Kate. What are you doing?" "I'm getting out of the car." "Now what are you doing?" "I'm waiting in line." "And now?" "Still waiting, dad."

How would the master risk communicator Peter Sandman have handled this?

We ended up on the cell phone with Kate for two hours, until the moment she drove into the Pizza Hut parking lot and saw her boyfriend's car, waiting to lead her the rest of the way. "Are you sure it's his?" "Yep." "Check again. Do you see him?" "Dad!" said Kate, exasperated.

I put away the map and stared at the clock. It was after ten. Somewhere between the angels and the GPS, I thought, there are things about your kid’s life you just can't control.

Choosing Day

2009-01-16T12:00:00.000-08:00

That’s Walt Whitman’s term, by the way, not mine. Election Day fun, Kate coming home to vote for the first time and all, started the night before, about 8:15 pm. “Ah, dad, I’m up around Temple,” she calls on her cell. “We want to get to South Street and cheese steaks. I’m not where I should be, right?”

Roger that. Somehow, someway she’s one block off Broad Street in a bombed-out neighborhood. I hear J, her boyfriend, over the cell, “K, you have no idea where you are.”

“Whatever it takes, K, get back on Broad,” I say. Silence. “Are you on heading for City Hall? Do you see City Hall?” Silence. “I think so.” Then J says, “Mr. Johnson, we’re OK. We just got turned around.”

Election Day morning, nearing noon, I open the door to my home office, aka sleepover central, and it’s clear Kate is not ready to pull any levers. She’s propped up on pillows on the floor, playing a Super Mario video game. Still in her jammies. “Well, I’m going to vote now, Kate. I’ve seen some long lines at the polls. You can go with mom later.”

As an exercise in political awareness or whatever, Steve has the day off from school. Had to step over him to get the morning coffee. He likes to sleep on the floor when he can sleep in, with the dogs in front of the TV, which often will still be on from the night before. So what do you do when you’re trapped in a 1950s ranch house, with three kids sleeping on floor? You get out of Dodge. After checking to see that Kate wasn’t awake enough to decide who the next most powerful man in the world should be, I escape for a few hours. Came home to find Steve on his cell, trying to make something of his day off. “I don’t know man, I’m kind of broke, too. Yeah. Well, peace.” Then he returns to ESPN’s Sports Center.

Kate casts her ballot and she and J head back to the U of Del running late, and thus smack into rush hour traffic. They pull out of the driveway and Steve wheels right in, Wawa sandwich crammed in his mouth. Does he have plans for tonight? One sure bet: he won’t be hanging on the election returns.

That’s a pastime for pre-Internet adults. Katie Couric interviews PA Governor Rendall about 8:30 pm. “McCain will be buried in this state,” the guv grins ear to ear. The pundits pontificate on the national significance of the Philadelphia “exburbs” voting in record numbers and swinging PA’s Electoral College votes to the Big O, which might push him over the top. They get down to the specifics of small towns 15, 20, 30 miles surrounding downtown. Who’d of thunk it, Audubon at Ground Zero of the presidential election.

In another room, Steve’s watching the Suns and Nets on ESPN, or The Family Guy, or The Office, He handles the remote like a wizard, whizzing through hundreds of channels. Some textbooks and notebooks open on the sofa. “What’d ya, think about the election, Steve?” I ask. “Looks like it’s going to be a landslide,” he replies, not taking his eyes off the screen. How the hell does he know what’s going on? Ah, but the kids always know more than they let on.

Into Oregon

2009-01-16T11:58:00.000-08:00

Part of Oregon’s attraction has always been so far away. Even in 2008, if you stay off the interstates and away from the malls and the chains, you don’t travel far to find how untrammeled and wild much of the state remains. Yellow-and-black highway sign alone language tells the tale: “Rocks.” “Open Range.” “Snow Zone.” “Tsunami Area.” “Elk.” “Deer.” “Logging Trucks.” “Rough Road.” “Snowmobiling.” “Truck Rollover Danger.”

Hazards obviously aren’t what they were in 1846, but still, signs warn you: “Search and rescue or recovery costs will be paid by you or your heirs.” “Ocean bacteria levels have been measured high.” “Don’t pass snow removal trucks on right.” “Sharp turns ahead.” “Steep drop off.” On the back of a parking meter in Portland: “Hate is Hazardous.”

Oregon feels more remote and barren, more dangerous for a visiting Easterner, in February. No tourists beyond the snow enthusiasts. No one hundred-plus windsurfers out on the Columbia River by Hood River. February is not the postcard month for sun and color. What you will find: 111 inches of snow on the ground at Crater Lake. Roiling seas and storms off the Pacific pounding away at rocky beaches. Roads closed. Away from interstate commerce there’s a stillness that comes with deep snow. Plenty of hotel/motel vacancy signs. Along with rain, fog, and low-hanging cloud cover.

I lucked out. The road to Crater Lake is closed about 50 percent of the days in winter, according the lonely gift shop cashier the day I visited. That day the sky was such a peacock blue it was startling, with all shades of blue mirrored across the smooth as glass lake. I had the lake to myself, standing atop a 30-foot high snowy hill. No wind. Pure serenity, if not for the constant churn of an orange snow removal truck.

Next day on Mount Hood it was 62 degrees, zero wind, blinding sun, and ski instructors wearing tee shirts.

Very easily I could’ve flown the 2,860 miles from Philadelphia and seen neither the lake nor the mountain, if the winter clouds and fog and mist rolled in as usual. When the sun disappears the only colors in the gloom are black rocks and rivers, brown trees, dirt, various shades of gray — and most fortunately the green of the fir and pine woods. Deep dark forest green radiates a richness when the sun shines. The skies, rivers and lakes take on a brilliant blue, snow glistens and shadows dance. If you’re not so lucky with the weather, bring along only black and white film and do your Ansel Adams best.

No matter the time of year, Oregon offers up its craggy Pacific coastline, sand dunes and sea lion dens, the Cascade Range, the Columbia River Gorge, fossil beds, lava beds, buttes, caves, canyons, forests as far as the eyes can see, high desert country, grasslands and waterfalls. Most of all is space, the openness, and quiet solitude. It is a delightful peacefulness to roam an empty two-lane blacktop, with 30-40 mile vistas off in any direction, under an immense sky, on a day with ample sun.

It’s more than enough to lure a romantic and gridlocked Easterner like me almost 3,000 miles. So too the wind surfers, mountain climbers, hikers, runners, cyclists, skiers, hunters, fishermen, snowmobilers, sea captains, snow boarders, clam diggers, naturalists, spiritualists, individualists, nomads, ranchers, farmers, adventurers, entrepreneurs, artists, craftspeople, bead stringers, all “gone crazy.” Each bring their own reasons for coming here..

Lewis and Clark’s expedition came through the Cascade Mountains in canoes down the Columbia River past what’s now Portland in December 1805. For my mode of transport I choose a Toyota Rav4, a compact SUV with four-wheel drive, light gold before covered with road grit, from Dollar Car Rental at the Portland airport.

My solo expedition begins with a few days in Portland, taking care of business, since my magazine covered the airfare. The assignment: report on the annual gathering of the National Hearing Conservation Association, about 300 noise, sound and audiology techies, all seemingly on a first-name basis with each other. Filmmaker Gus Van Sant calls Portland “its own universe. Still a frontier town.” Several of his free-form films (“Elephant,” “The Last Days,” “Paranoid Park”) have been shot around Portland. The city of 568,380 or so doesn’t appear an outpost, with its sleek, glassy modern skyline. But at street level there is a certain “free form” to it. Folks meandering streets and parks and riding the transit make Portland seem to be America’s largest college town. Casual, hang loose, hip, funky, nerdy. There’s many a book reader holed up here. One bookstore in Eugene offers free buttons: “Readin’ in the rain 2008. Read more!” Portland also has a strong skateboard culture, featured in Van Sant’s “Paranoid Park.” And girls in vintage long sweaters, short skirts, black tights, scarves and sandals or boots. Guys in mirrored shades. Guys in black chic. Goth girls. Of course if you hang at Powell’s City of Books, the department store-sized bookstore at NW 10th and Burnside, you’ll see this laid-back fashion parade day and night. In wintertime, though, Portland takes on The North Face conformity. It pours rain days on end, just like the winter of 1805-06, when Lewis and Clark camped further west in what’s now Astoria.

Friday afternoon I escape my cushy downtown riverfront Marriott, take rail transit to Powell’s, then return, hop in my rental, and cruise out through the Gorge in the cloudy afternoon fading light to Hood River, about a 100-mile roundtrip. Cross the Columbia to into Washington and almost immediately get called out by a relaxed police officer in shades, sitting in his black and white patrol car. He observes that I’m standing on railroad tracks snapping photos, right beyond a “Warning: No Trespassing” sign. “Two or three photographers have been killed here,” he says. Then with a slight smile: “We try to keep people alive.”

I’ve brought my old manual Nikon fm 10, with two lenses: a 35-70mm standard lens and a 60-300mm zoom. Since I’m not digital, I’ve got film canisters with ISO speeds from 100 to 800, depending on the light. I don’t carry much else. About 20 CDs, a backpack with two books I won’t open, and a large Under Armour gym bag with gloves, thick socks, heat packets, wool cap, jeans, couple of shirts and tees, hygiene essentials, and a cardboard box to keep the conference business attire somewhat professional.

I bring along a few basic rules as well: don’t check bags at an airport, exit the interstates soon as possible, stay away from malldom, no global positioning system and its pushbutton predestination — let’s improvise — and try not to retrace your steps. Eighty to 90-percent of this trip of about 700-800 miles total will be on two-lane state roads. I don’t step near a mall, take a few wrong turns without the GPS, and rarely go down the same road twice. Mission accomplished.

The Gorge, even on a solid gray day, is flat-out grand. Sharp-rising cliffs and forests with moss-covered white ash, pines and varieties of fir. You smell the pines and feel the dampness. Falls rush over rocks, plunging hundreds of feet, flowing down through stone-strewn creeks. The view from the Washington side is preferable to me, though you’re further from the falls. This is mandolin pickin’ and grinnin’ country, or Merle Haggard or Willie or Waylon. Two fiddle players provided the soundtrack for the Lewis and Clark Corps of Discovery, after all. Route 14 in Washington twists and turns through tunnels, S curves and up and around hills, past the old white-painted steel truss Bridge of the Gods. The span has a total cantilever length of 1,131 feet. It’s a startling man-made contrast to the natural magnificence surrounding it. Route 14 nearly brushes the front porch of the Cook House Cafe general store and diner in Stevenson, with local business cards pinned to the bulletin board, and then beyond the Gorge, takes a straight flat line west, back to Portland.

The next morning I bid farewell to the hearing conservationists and head south to Corvallis. A classic Greyhound Bus sign stands on the main drag. Low, boxy buildings are anchored by a square with an impressive white, red tile roofed county courthouse and clock tower. Oregon State U is a few blocks to the west, through a tree-lined residential neighborhood. There’s a rugby match going on, not much else. The sun is dancing in and out. OSU’s shimmering stainless steel and glass football stadium dominates the quiet campus. I lunch at small deli with a surf theme, The North Shore, downing a turkey “Pipeliner.”

Head west to Newport on the Pacific, with whale bones set out on a beach park and a Vietnam Memorial Stone right off the sand, with perhaps 25 names engraved. It’s fully overcast now, windy, with the strong smell of salt water. Then it’s south on the swerving Pacific Coast Highway as night falls to Florence, with a stop off at Seal Rock Beach. I’m on the cell with my wife when I tell her, “I’ve got to pull over and see this beach before the sun sets.” The bluffs 30 or 40 feet above the beach and tidepools are thick with old growth fir, spruce, oak and maple, rising steeply across the PCH. There is something primal about those black, jagged rock outcroppings, the whitecaps crashing in. A dad can’t get his young five or six-year-old boy off the gray beach. There’s something primal, too, about young boys loving to toss stones, and the beach is thick with handy , smooth stones. The Seal Rock monolith, moss-covered, rounded with age and perhaps 70 feet high, is close enough to touch at low tide. A lone red cedar log perhaps 25 feet long stretches out diagonally on the sand. At some point I pull over on PCH, roll the windows down, turn off the engine, and listen to the black ocean’s dull roar. About 6:30 pm the last light disappears over the cloud-laden horizon. What makes for that constant rushing roar? Then I get what I’d call an Oregon moment of freedom and it strikes me, don’t analyze. Just take it in.

Dinner in Florence, a sea town that jumps in the summer, is at the cozy Firehouse, lined with fire department caps and tee shirts from around the country. The co-owner, a man of about 60, sits at the next table with friends. They talk of the new casino up the road, changing times, fishing, the no smoking in restaurants ban, past vacations in Mexico, vacations to come. “Casino killed my bar business,” says the co-owner. “Had one guy who’d spend $50 a day. Gone. To the casino. I think it’s time for me just to go fish.” There’s talk I can’t decipher. Then: “You fear for your grandkids, don’t you?” Another snippet: “We ran out of common sense a long time ago.” He grabs hold of his manager. “See that woman slip by the bathroom. She all right?” “Yeah, I picked her up. Said she still liked her dinner.”

Drive in a drizzle east in the dark to Eugene on Route 126, listening to Carley and Lurrie Bell play the blues. Takes some patience on these twisting two-lane tree-lined roads when you’re behind laggards, especially at night in the rain. I notice a pattern though: Just about when you’ve run out of patience the sign appears, “Passing lane one mile.” Roll into the Best Western in Eugene and the drizzle has turned to steady, cold rain.

Rain or drizzle all the next day in Eugene. Eugene is a tale of two towns. One is the official downtown, with civic center, office buildings, parking garages and a pedestrian/consumer open mall. The other is the U of Oregon campus a mile or two south, with a typical college main street (E. 13th Avenue) of shabby coffee shops, Mexican take-outs, outdoor wear apparel, the U bookstore on a corner, pizza shops, a head shop with showcase bongs, and a hip American Apparel store my college junior daughter would love. Streets all have designated lanes for cyclists. This is the Eugene for me, ramshackle off-campus houses and all. A small church has been converted into a movie house. Tonight the Oscar Awards are being shown for free, starting at 5 pm. The House of Records, with a commendably large collection of surf and rockabilly CDs, is crammed into an old bungalow. I go for a local band, “The Sugar Beets,” woodsy mandolin, violin, guitars and harmonies, I picked up on in a Eugene weekly “scene” paper. Also a northwest band, “Floater,” that the paper mentioned, a thick-sounding metal trio. And “Surfme’n’tal” by the Brazilian self-described metal-surf-punk instrumental band, “Estrume’n’tal.” Fodder for my archaic CD collection that confounds my iPod-loving kids. Download Brazilian surf-punk-metal, go ahead. Actually, I’m sure you can.

Eugene is like Boulder, Colorado, with its official chic downtown pedestrian mall with chain restaurants and upscale boutiques, and then the shaggy U of Colorado campus main street up a hill. Same kind of post-‘60s easy-going vibe. Same feeling that the outdoors is essential. Similar mix of extreme sports stores, new-age bookstores, gray-haired ponytailed hippies, lean jocks in training, and plenty of java to go.

Both towns are running, climbing, hiking, cycling meccas. At nine on a Sunday morning in Eugene runners are out in the thin fog and rain, in wool caps or not, in shorts or tights, in pairs or alone, running the sidewalks. It’s raw, about 40 degrees. In the 82-year-old U of O gym, McArthur or Mac Court, there’s a three-on-three half-court roundball tourney going, Black-Eyed Peas hip hop echoes off the ancient rafters on the PA during warm-ups. The Mac has three decks, like the old Boston Garden. Wood seats crammed together. A single wooden door opens with a single door knob to the restroom. After another two seasons or so, it will be replaced by a $200-million gym, the largest college basketball arena in the country.

Down an alley from the Mac I catch a glimpse of a lacrosse game. I end up on the sideline next to Paul A. Bilder, M.D., from Cottage Grove, south of Eugene. He’s an old goalie from upstate New York, forced between the pipes by a bum ankle, played lacrosse in Utah while in pre-med, started the first high school lacrosse program outside of Portland down in Roseburg some years ago. Another Oregon pioneer. Paul’s seldom at a loss for words, as he’ll tell you, and he educates me on lacrosse’s western expansion. Cheery, smiling beneath his ball cap, Paul looks to be in his early 60. Says he’s cut back on his work, only 50 hours a week instead of 100. He’s also the U of O ice hockey club’s unofficial doc. One of the players calls his cell, complaining of a sore throat. Come on over to the game, says Paul. The kid wanders over, Paul steps away, they talk, I hear Paul on his cell calling in an antibiotic prescription. Then another call, from a diabetic with a low sugar count. Meanwhile, U of O’s club team is clobbering Washington State; the score ends up 30-0. “Won’t get worse than this,” one of the WSU guys says taking off his uniform after the game.

Next door is Hayward Field, the historic old track with roofed grandstands on opposite sides of the field where Steve Prefontaine, Phil Knight, co-founder of Nike with track coach Bill Bowerman, and the Men of Oregon won many titles. The field’s fenced in and locked up, under re-construction for this summer’s U.S. track and field Olympic trials.

In the rain, just at dusk, I get lost and then find Autzen Stadium, home of the U of O Ducks football team. It’s on the opposite side of the Willamette River from downtown and the campus, a bowl built into the ground with a huge green O lighted outside one end zone. Super boxes, sky boxes, club lounges have been recently added on, and the stadium is locked down with surveillance cameras and sensors like Fort Knox. Across a walkway are the glassy modern athletic offices, a huge barn-like indoor turf field and training center, a souvenir shop, groomed outdoor practice fields surrounded by shrubs and locked fence, and a plaza with a flaming torch. This multi-million-dollar compound has risen to impress old alums with deep pockets, dawn-to-dusk game day tailgaters, and teenage recruits with size and speed. Peering up at the flame through the rain splatter, it hits me: Eisenhower in the ‘50s warned of the dangers of the military-industrial complex; today, we don’t do industry in America, now we’re overwhelmed by the 24/7 sports-entertainment complex.

On 91.9 KRVM a disc jockey named Rome conducts a humorous, fawning interview with a faux humble Yale grad who left law behind in Thailand to start sing pop jazz. She’s flattered when he compares her to Joni Mitchell. “Really? No one’s ever told me that before.” Everyone’s in show biz, no mater where you are. Over on 88.1 KWVA the U of O station plays African tribal tunes from 6-8 pm. I try to find my way back to the Best Western in the rain, the dark, beating the steering wheel to the tribal drums.

Out of Eugene early, 7 am, the next morning after grabbing a large coffee at one of the many drive-thru java huts and a stop-off at a grocery store for a water bottle and turkey roll up for lunch. Then it’s I-5 south to Route 58 east. Try a short cut off 58 to get to Crater Lake’s north rim, head round a bend of dry road and make a quick turn to the right only to plow through a low snow bank that catches me by surprise. The Rav4 rolls slowly to a stop on a snow-packed road in the woods that hasn’t been plowed. Move the Rav4 up the road about 20 yards in low gear, then shift into reverse to blast through the snow bank and get out before Georgia-Pacific security guards come to my rescue. So now it’s the long roundabout way to Crater Lake: 58 to Route 97 south to Route 138 east to Route 230 south to Route 62 east up to the lake. Snow is piled high on the ridges. Groves of thin aspens coated in white form walls of dense frozen columns. The north rim is closed during winter, so I’ve circled the lake to come in the only other way, from the south. The national park’s tremendous snowfall is a result of its position at the crest of the Cascade Mountain Range.

Some people cry when they climb to the top of the rim and look across the lake’s placid expanse. That’s their second reaction. First comes: “Holy shit, that’s a 900-foot drop straight down to the lake!” The opposite rim of the crater is almost six miles away. The lake is more than 1,900 feet deep, the deepest in the U.S. I clomp up a snow bank in sneaks to get my look. To my immediate right is the rustic Crater Lake Lodge, dating back to 1914, closed in winter, with long jagged icicles hanging along roof ledges. A 33-mile road encircles the crystal clear, deep blue lake along the rim, but it too is closed in winter. I didn’t have room to pack the boots needed to hike; the snow is almost knee deep. It’s about 29 degrees at high noon but it doesn’t feel cold in the sun and fresh, clean air. I don’t want to move, just meditate. Tranquility Base with three inches of fresh powder from last night. Evergreens are crushed by the weight of heavy snow, many twisted and bent at odd angles. Bare outstretched tree limbs form white skeletons. Stands of pines and firs rising on the rim’s ridges seem dusted with a powdery blanket of crystal white.

Head back down from the lake with snow walls 8-10 feet high on either side of the narrow road, wet with melting snow. Like a bobsled run. The Rav4 is in neutral, coasting pretty much the whole way, except for the snow and slush curves when I shift to low gear. No cars anywhere. Get back on 62 east across flatlands. Funny, an hour ago up on the rim I felt like the only person on earth; now I’m on my cell listening to my daughter Kate, from her apartment at the University of Delaware, describe in detail the plot of movie she saw last night. “You’re not going to see this, right? OK…”

62 meets up with 97, where I turn and drive north for a long stretch to Bend, hitting the gas and passing as many trucks and cars as I can when those passing lanes open up. Most of the way The Staples Singers are clapping and crooning ‘60s and ‘70s civil rights soul music. Civil rights seem somehow out of place where nature so dominates, but I enjoy the contrast between song and scenery. Stop for gas at a Chevron station in tiny Chemult with the needle just about on E. No self-serve in Oregon. An overweight young woman in a white tee walks out to pump the gas while I get out to put on my wet sneaks. “Oh, you drive like me,” she says. “Socks are more comfortable.” Another woman inside says, “Great day for a drive.” She would know. Bright days with ample sun and 50 degree temperatures in central Oregon are seldom seen in winter. All the more to illumine the barren, dusty plains dotted with sagebrush, windswept wheat-colored grasslands, sandy ravines and small canyons. Barbed wired and wooden fence posts run along the road. Horses, deer, sheep, cattle and rusted barns and farm equipment are a few hundred yards off 97; one or two farms have rotting yellow school buses planted in weeds. Signs highlight summer rodeos. These barren central plains seem the epitome of Oregon’s “do your thing” independence — whether it’s skateboarders, windsurfers, artists, Mount Hood climbers, ranchers, farmers, long distance runners or small businessmen. “You know them up in Salem,” I remember one of the guys at the next table at the Florence Firehouse saying while they discussed the no smoking ban in restaurants, referring to the state capital. Oregon wasn’t made for them bureaucrats.

My cells rings and it’s my wife. “I wasn’t going to call you, but I thought I might have missed your call.” All’s quiet on the home front. “It’s beautiful out here today.” “Too bad you can’t stay out there longer.” Right.

Before the trip I reserved a room in Bend, but found the Shiloh Inn was across from a mall. Forget that. So I cruise on past La Pine, then Bend, to Route 20, taking a left to head west into the sun. I had read in the Portland Sunday Oregonian about a town, Sisters, that sounds like a more natural place to spend the night. Sisters sits at the base of The Three Sisters Mountains in the Cascade Range. Population 1,706. I wind up at the FivePine Lodge and Conference Center, only a year old, all red cedar logs and stone, a business and weekend summer getaway retreat for well-off Portlanders. I get room number one. Right off the arched lobby with the grand fireplace and granite floor.

Smallest room they have, the young desk clerk says, comes with a king-size bed that could sleep a family of four, about a dozen pillows, a 42-inch plasma flat screen TV hidden above the electric fireplace, which can be viewed through open doors from the soaking tub. The Italian tile shower could easily fit a basketball team. Wood plank floor with Oriental rugs, hand-crafted Amish wood desk and nightstands, black leather easy chairs and foot rests by the fire, recessed lighting, tiffany lamps. “Health. Balance. Adventure,” is the FivePoint motto. The owner’s wife is a massage therapist, and you can stroll over to the Shibui Spa to get one. So much for being in the middle of nowhere. Actually, it’s about three hours southeast of Portland. And perhaps is there no nowhere anywhere anymore. I’ve read where a string of luxury golf courses has opened in Vietnam, the Ho Chi Minh Golf Trail.

They best milk this eco-tourism while they can. Oregon’s beaches are eroding, maybe because of warm air from Japan sent over the Pacific has stirred up some monster storms. And up on Crater Lake they get almost 200 inches less of snow now each winter than in the 1940s.

The Sunday paper also mentioned Bronco Billy’s restaurant in Sisters, so it’s ribs and a much too-large dish of ice cream and shortcake dessert at Billy’s. Posters of Clint Eastwood westerns hang from the wood-paneled walls. Next morning starts with 26 miles going back eastward on Route 126 to Redmond. Turn left onto 97 again and head north through high desert country. No snow across these plains. It’s like northern Wyoming, brown jagged hills, ranches, sand and gravel; a nice coat of road grit covers the car’s windows. To the left off 30 miles or so are The Three Sisters, each snow-capped at about 10,000 feet, and Mount Jefferson, which I first mistook for Mount Hood, standing at 10,497 feet.

At Madras a left turn puts me on Route 26, through the Warm Springs Indian Reservation. A typically desolate western rez. Route 26 aims straight as an arrow at Mount Hood, rising 11,239 feet to a near-perfect snow cone peak. That’s when it’s visible. I’ve got another rare sunny February day and Hood can be seen from more than an hour’s drive away.

I leave 26 to take the Timberline Road turnoff, going up the mountain’s southern flank about six miles to the Timberline Lodge. Climbers launch their assaults on the peak from here, but today it’s all skiers and snowboarders. From a snowy parking lot I follow footsteps in the powder snow along a ridge, ducking into a few surprisingly roomy ice caves, I suppose dug out for training demonstrations. They are only a quarter-mile or less from the lodge.

As lonely and still as Crater Lake was yesterday, the parking lot is packed at Mount Hood’s Timberline Lodge. The place buzzes with lunching skiers. It’s as though a freak “sun day” holiday was called in Portland and families, grade schoolers and college kids, middle-aged businessmen and women all drove out to the slopes. I’m very likely the only fool on the Hood wearing sneakers. And yes, I’ve never skied a day in my life.

After two hours or so clomping around extremely whiteness, sunglasses being de rigueur, I throw two soaked sneaks on the back seat, put on a fresh pair of dry socks, and the Rav4 rolls back down the lodge turnoff and west on 26, past Government Camp and Zigzag and farms in the Huckleberry Wilderness Area. One has a rickety wooden wheel barrel with cut evergreen branches in the front yard. Another showcases a piece of true rural roadside sculpture: a red rusted-out Harley Davidson, with skeleton wheels and frame and a rusted skeleton rider fashioned from metal parts, one fist raised above his helmeted skull, American flag flapping in the rear. But civilization looms. Portland’s suburbs stretch out to the town of Sandy, and the last hour of the drive is familiar stop-and-go early rush hour slowdowns past shopping centers and fast food chains.

There’s time for a last trip into town to Powell’s City of Books. I want to go back to the rack of “zines” and pick up some of these personalized blogs in bound print that certainly aren’t stocked at Border’s — “Reality Ranch,” “Survivalism (by a soldier in Iraq),” a series of “Four Hundred Words” of autobiographies, and “Sufism,” with the cover line: “The present time is history in its truest form.” How can you resist such a promise? It also hits me I’ve taken ten rolls of film with nary a shot of a human being. So I lean against a column at one of Powell’s entrances and shoot cars and couples and streetwalkers as the sun sets on office windows across the intersection. Nature’s not private, there’s no invasion taking natural shots. People, though, see the camera and duck. And my shots will turn out pedestrian, figuratively and literally. Then it’s back to the airport, to a Country Inn & Suites, to drop off the rental and to learn the second leg of my flight back tomorrow, from Chicago, has been cancelled. “Hello, can I get a four o’clock wake up call?” The United flight to L.A. leaves before dawn, and then it is the long haul back.

Ghosts on a 5/8 Mile Oval

2009-01-16T11:53:00.000-08:00

“You got no business bein’ up there. I’m callin’ the sheriff.”

With that, the young large woman in white shorts trundles back into her trailer.

Is he going to show? How many minutes have we to escape? Won’t be hard to find us in this little town. I look down at her trailer, and parked in front of it our flaming red Hertz Ford Mustang we rented from the “Fun Collection” for the hell of it. No, it won’t be hard to spot that Mustang.

Steve, my 16-year-old son, and I look at each other. “We better make our getaway,” I say. We’re maybe 30, 40 feet up, atop the ruins of the North Wilkesboro Speedway. The view is outstanding, and I keep clicking pictures. We’re standing on the splintering black wood planks of the spotter’s perch above the press box. It’s about 97 degrees, mid July, in the Northern High Country of North Carolina. Some call it the soul of NASCAR nation.

For a huge nation, it’s got a small soul, and it’s not easy to find. North Wilkesboro’s population is about 4,100. “Out there,” is how the locals describe the Northern High Country, where Carolina’s coastal expanse rises into rolling hills and then, further west, the Blue Ridge Mountains. No major highways lead into the high country. Not much in the way of fast food, motels and malls. Just red roof barns, pastures, apple orchards, churches and more churches. Old cabins, lonesome homes, rivers, ravines, hollows, valleys dipping and rising, hills, hard red clay, and thick forests of pines, birch, ash, oaks and maples. Everything, trees, telephone poles and lines, billboards, abandoned cars, drapped in kudzu, like an ever-growing blanket of thick leafy vines.

Perfect for hiding the old creek-side moonshine stills that made surrounding Wilkes County the self-described white lightning capital of America in the 1930s,‘40s and ‘50s. A number of the bootleggers hauling more than 100 gallons of ‘shine out of the foothills, outgunning treasury agents in supercharged, turbocharged Fords, Dodges and Chryslers that roared across Route 421 up to 115 miles per hour, became NASCAR’s earliest racers.

I imagine the trailer woman on the phone. “The kid looks like a surfer, sheriff, lanky with a mop of blond hair. The father’s smaller ‘n he’s wearin’ a pink tee shirt with palm trees on it.”

We clamber down the press box’s stairs, search for the quickest way out. “I want to take one more look,” says Steve. I snapped a couple last shots. We climb over a chain link locked gate. No barbed wire luckily. Jump in the Mustang and leave the trailer and the track in the dust.

Fifteen minutes later we’re safely eating lunch in the Mustang in a Food Lion parking lot — bananas and bottled water, typical grab-and-go road trip grub. We look at all the pickups. Not a mini-van in sight. So what are a couple of Yankees from the suburbs of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, doing parked in a Food Lion shopping center keeping an eye out for the sheriff?

It’s a secret pilgrimage.

Why the secrecy? NASCAR’s fan and revenue growth have exploded wildly in the past 15 years. Attendance at races averaged 127,000 in 2006, according to Forbes magazine. (The NFL averaged 67,000 that year). Sponsors shelled out $650 million in ’06 to have their logos painted on NASCAR’s top 35 cars. Races deserted the likes of the homey confines of North Wilkesboro Speedway in the mid-‘90s for modern tracks across the country, from New Hampshire to Los Angeles. Still, stock car racing carries a stigma, no more so than in the East Coast megalopolis.

A sportswriter in Philadelphia prints a NASCAR quote of the week, in which he finds a driver saying something about fried bologna sandwiches being his favorite, to make the point one more time that the sport (which he fails to dignify as a sport) is overblown, unfathomable hype full of sixth-grade dropouts, tire changers, and Bud-swilling, pot-bellied rednecks.

So to be a NASCAR loyalist in a suburban East Coast enclave calls for going underground. Otherwise you’re an alien from Alabama or someplace else covered in kudzu. If Steve is watching a race on a Sunday afternoon and his friends come knocking, he hops up, goes to door, and talks with ‘em outside. Sometimes he just tapes a race and watches it that night. When his buds troop through the house, the F1 Racing, Racer, Speed Sport News, and MotorSport magazines are stashed away. Nothing much he can do about the 12-inch wide, 27-inch diameter bald Goodyear Eagle tire sitting at the foot of his bed. He got it at the Las Vegas Speedway once and rolled it through the Vegas and Philly airports. I’ve had my own scrapes with the stereotype. Not long ago my wife made me strip off from our familymobile’s windows about a half-dozen NASCAR team numbers (every driver’s car has the same number plastered on both sides all season). “I’m not driving that car,” she protested. “People think we’re hillbillies.” This is a smart, liberal, reasonable woman, mind you.

Growing up, none of my friends were aware of my interest in hillbilly racing. In the late ‘60s, a few years after my father died and I was a few years younger than Steve, one of the things I did to pass time was glue together plastic model stockers, paint ‘em, and stick on the numbers and sponsor decals. I watched NASCAR races on ABC’s Wide World of Sports, with the legendary Chris Economaki barking his reports from the pits. He wrote his first racing column when he was 14, in 1934. At 87 he still writes his column in Speed Sport News.

So what’s the fascination with watching 43 very fast, wildly painted cars make left turns for four hours? Could be any number of things. Speed pure and simple. Noise, the roar from the track. What’s called “tradin’ paint” or running “door to door.” A driver trying to wrest control of his car fish-tailing at a 100 miles an hour ‘round a tight turn. Watching a mad racer tear through the field, passing cars high and low. Cars racing “three wide.” Spin outs, cartwheels, T-bone collisions. Blown tires, engines and tempers. Ten-second tire changes, refuels and body adjustments. Bumper-to-bumper drafting. Sometimes two cars coming down the stretch for a nose-to-nose finish.

Maybe it’s the culture. You get it or you don’t. Us versus them. Makes you feel like you own something that’s just yours.

Or it could go beyond the oval. Maybe it’s the names of racers down through the years. Junior Johnson, a North Wilkesboro native who spent 11 months in a federal penitentiary in Chillicothe, Ohio after his arrest at his daddy’s still. Fireball Roberts. Cale Yarborough. Richard “The King” Petty. Dale “The Intimidator” Earnhardt. Earnhardt Junior. Benny “BP” Parsons. Maybe it’s the rivalries. The duels between King Richard and David Pearson. The infield fist fight between Cale Yarborough and the Allison brothers, Donnie and Bobby.

Or how racing gets in a family’s blood lines. Four generations of Pettys have raced: Lee, Richard, Kyle and Adam. Early on there were the four Flock siblings: Ethel, Tim, Bob and Fonty. Ned and Dale Jarrett, father and son. The Earnhardts. Darrell “DW” Waltrip and his brother Michael. Rusty and brother Kenny Wallace, and now Rusty’s son Steve.

Or perhaps it’s the romance of some of the hallowed tracks themselves. Rockingham, “The Rock,” now gone from NASCAR’s schedule. North Wilkesboro, shuttered in 1996 after 50 years. Darlington, “Too Tough to Tame,” in South Carolina. Bristol, “Thunder Valley,” in Tennessee. Martinsville, with its paper-clip shaped oval, in Virginia. Talledaga’s superspeedway in Alabama. For a sport second in TV ratings only to the NFL, can anyone find these places on a map? Then of course there’s Daytona in Florida, where they raced on the beach before building a speedway.

Pilgrimages are part of sport. Life-long baseball fans go to the Bronx, to Yankee Stadium, to sense the grandeur of the sport’s past. The more timid might settle for Boston’s Fenway Park or the Cubs’ Wrigley Field. NFL fanatics find their way up to Green Bay’s Lambeau Field. These shrines aren’t exactly Stonehenge. Yankee Stadium will be razed after this season. For ice hockey cultists, the old Maple Leaf Gardens, Montreal Forum and Boston Gardens are history.

So Steve and I slipped out of Philadelphia without a trace early one Sunday morning (needless to say, mom stayed home) to track down the roots of the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing — NASCAR. Before prime time TV coverage, the Speed Channel, the Car of Tomorrow (the universal car design forced on every team to improve safety and lower costs). Before multimillionaire track owners purchased places like North Wilkesboro solely to shut them down and move their races to new frontiers like Kansas City or Chicagoland. Before smiling Earnhardt Junior’s Wrangler commercials. Before the sponsor millions poured in — Home Depot, Lowe’s, Target, DuPont, 3M, M&Ms, the U.S. Army, Bass Pro Shops, Alltel, Best Buy, Cheerios, Caterpillar, Dewalt, Jack Daniels, and obviously, Budweiser.

We cruised up I-77 one morning from our base in Mooresville, North Carolina — about 25 miles north of Charlotte, sitting on the sprawling and glittering Lake Norman, and called “Race City USA” because of the 30-50 team corporate offices and garages in the area. What exactly we were going to find in backwoods North Wilkesboro was a mystery. We knew the speedway still existed, mothballed by its current owners, Bruton Smith and Bob Bahre, who refuse to sell out. (Smith needed an extra security detail when he left the speedway after the last race in 1996.)

I had been there twice before: dragging my wife through the town on our honeymoon to the Smokey Mountains 25 years ago, and passing the track at a distance on a very remote sales call about 18 years ago. “What kind of business did you call on out here?” wondered Steve, looking out the window at nothing but brush and farmland. “An old glove factory full of women at knitting machines. Called Golden Needles. Long gone.”

After barreling about an hour north on the interstate, we turned left on Route 421, and headed west 14 miles. Three miles from the track we stopped to read the recently planted roadside historical marker. “North Wilkesboro Speedway. Pioneer NASCAR dirt track built in 1946; paved in 1958. Hosted sanctioned events, 1949-96. 5/8 mile oval. 3 mi. W.”

The adrenaline kicked in. And then minutes later, damn, there’s the track, still standing. Many pilgrims in the past dozen years have made this trip and stood where we were now. Some actually have camped out on the grounds. Most snap photos from the highway. But from a distance you could be looking at the remains of an oversized high school football stadium. A tattered “NASCAR Winston Cup Series” billboard invites us up the half-paved, half gravel entrance road. We take it slow and the Mustang bounces along.

“We gotta get in,” I said, surveying for an opening. Steve stared at me. “Aren’t we trespassing?” For a second I considered my role model obligations. But it was easy to rationalize: The boy is 16. Hell, when Junior Johnson was 16 he left plowing a mule and planting corn to start running ‘shine for his dad. “We came this far,” I said, “and it’s still here standing. What, are we just going to get back in the car?” Seeing nothing but rusted locks at every gate, I eventually found a cinder block wall with the toehold and heaved myself up and over. Steve shrugged and scampered over.

We had the speedway to ourselves. Sixty thousand empty seats. Single tier concrete stands with gray metal fold-back chair seats anchored in long rows still ring the track. The “North Wilkesboro Speedway” sign stretches beneath the dark and empty press box, its red background and white lettering framed in black. The infield, with large swaths of dirt patches, is overgrown with wild grass. The electronic black scoring tower still rises atop a pole, as does the familiar “76” orange and blue circular gas sign next to the one remaining infield garage. The pit lane is divided by low concrete walls, with white paint cracked and peeling. The red and white Winston Cup Series lettering, red and white Coca-Cola letters, and the black and white North Wilkesboro Speedway signs on the outer pit wall are gouged and faded by the relentless Carolina summers.

The paved oval track, with its 14-degree banked turns and the front straightaway that dips slightly and the back straightaway that slopes up, still has white lane makers and a wide white finish line. But the region’s sudden, drenching storms over the years have opened up cracks everywhere. Rows of grass run up and down either side of the finish line and zig-zag along the track in long stretches.

Truman “Fonty” Flock, a Georgia bootlegger, won the first race here when it was a dirt track on May 5, 1947. Brother Bob Flock won the first NASCAR-sanctioned race in 1949, taking home a purse of $3,800. One year Dale Earnhardt and Rusty Wallace drove side-by-side for around ten laps straight dueling for the lead. In ’72, Bobby Allison and Richard Petty traded the lead 13 times in the Wilkes 400. In ’88, Earnhardt and Ricky Rudd banged fenders for the final 41 laps. Both were black-flagged for rough driving and sent to the back of the field. A fight in the infield got out of hand once and track officials threw a yellow flag to slow the race so one of the pugilists could be tossed in a car, driven around the track and out of the speedway. King Petty won here 15 times, the record. One of those times he was attacked by a drunk in victory lane. In all, North Wilkesboro featured 73 NASCAR races in 50 years.

After we get the warning the sheriff is coming, we stand at the top of one of the faded blue concrete aisles to take a last look around. Weeds sprout up between the steps. There’s nothing much to say, like walking a graveyard or a battlefield.

An hour later, banana peels tossed in the back seat, lunch finished, we head out of the Food Lion lot aiming to head south to Taylorsville. Steve’s not much of a map reader, something of a lost art with the GPS generation. I think I know our way, but not for long. The narrow two-laner we’re on starts twisting and turning up and down the Brushy Mountain ridges, an isolated spur of the Blue Ridges. Soon we’re absolutely lost in the Wilkes County apple country. I’ve driven the Pacific Coast Highway twisting through Big Sur. Down a steep gravel road on the side of a southern Utah canyon with the family horrified. Nothing compares to this unknown, unnumbered county road in the North Carolina Piedmont for S curves, one after another after another, for a half hour or so at least.

No wonder Junior Johnson was once quoted saying stock car racing was a comedown compared to running moonshine. I couldn’t imagine racing these curves in the night without searchlights. Junior would take them sideways, clipping mailboxes and newspaper boxes — with the headlights off. He was famous, as Tom Wolfe described in “The Last American Hero,” for the “bootleg turn” or “about face,” where, coming up to a “revenuer” roadblock, he’d throw the car into second gear, twist the wheel, hit the accelerator, and make the car’s rear end skid around in a complete arc, then tear back up the same road he came down.

“It’s official, Steve.” “What?” “I have no idea where we are.” “You sure?” “Sooner or later we’ll hit a road with a number. Right now we’re off the map.” The maps shows nearby towns like Thankful, Love Valley, Hunting Creek, Boomer. We’ve driven more than an hour without coming to a stop light or stop sign. The only people we’ve seen are road crews. Every so often we get a fleeting glimpse through the pines of the Blue Ridges, maybe 10-15 miles to the west, then we lean into another tight curve. Somewhere nearby is Brushy Mountain Township, population 524, where the most common job is driving a truck and the median age is 43. The “Brushies” as the natives call these hills usually rise from 300 to 800 feet. Hickory Knob. Walnut Knob. Fox Mountain. Asbury Mountain. It’s isolated. Slow. Very green.

Or as an Internet blogger posted when I was researching the trip, “First and foremost, Wilkes County is BACKWOODS country. You have backwoods people who live miles from anyone and may or may not have luxuries such as electricity. There is absolutely positively nothing to do in all of Wilkes County.”

The family calls Steve the mystery man because he’s the quiet type, laid back like a surfer dude. Maybe he’ll respond with a Marlon Brando mumble sometimes. He is 16. But he doesn’t brood. He’s a pleasant traveling companion. Unless we’re stuck in traffic (“Isn’t there another way?), on a long road trip (“Couldn’t we have flown?”), or there’s static on the radio (“Mind if I turn that off?”). iPods have no static.

I don’t own an iPod, despite the urgings of Steve and his sister Kate. “You got to get one. You got to get one. We’ll get one for you.” No thanks. I’m a tactile person. I have hundreds and hundreds of CDs. I like pulling them out, pulling out the liner notes and reading about the musicians and where the music was made. I like to look at my collection, like a library of books.

Once Steve accepted that we were off the map and his dad had no idea where we were going, he settled back and we listened to music to soothe our frustrations. Old-timey mountain music would have been the most appropriate soundtrack, but show me a 16-year suburban boy who’ll listen to fiddles, mandolins, banjos, maybe wooden spoons, a washtub and an autoharp. So it was The Clash’s “London Calling.” Clash alums Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros, and Mick Jones and Carbon/Silicon. The Band. The Roots. Bob Marley. The Strokes. The Libertines. With music as with racing, the kid appreciates his history. He’s got more than 1,000 iTune songs on his Mac, half of them must be from the ‘60s and ‘70s. That would have been like me at 16 listening to Benny Goodman, Glen Miller and the Andrews Sisters. Last thing I wanted to hear was my parents’ music. Maybe there is something to this classic rock hype.

“Why do you think Sgt. Pepper’s was the Beatles’ best album?” asks Steve at one point. How do you answer something that profound? Particularly when you’re lost on unmarked roads. “I don’t think it is. I’d go for Revolver.” “A lot of people say Sgt. Pepper.” “It was the album cover. Had all these famous people on it. Tarzan. Bob Dylan. W.C. Fields. Laurel and Hardy.” “Who?” “A doll wearing a ‘Welcome the Rolling Stones’ sweater.” “On an album cover?” “Believe it, Steve. Album covers used to mean something.”

We finally emerge from the wilds of the Brushies totally by chance not design, and hang a right onto the Wilkesboro Highway, which takes us in short order to I-80, east to Statesville, and back down I-77 south. It’s all familiar again. Interstates are interstates. We’re back in the land of the homogenized. But for a while there we were chasing ghosts, moonshine ridge runners and oval daredevils. And about that threat of a call to the sheriff, mom never will know.