Footloose in America: Dixie to New England (2 page)

I knew from experience, it wasn’t always going to be a walk in the park. In the 1970s, with a pack pony and dog, I spent three and a half years traveling 8,000 miles of America’s highways and byways on foot. From eastern Pennsylvania, I walked to Pacific City, Oregon, down the coast across the Golden Gate Bridge then east to my mother’s home in Hot Springs, Arkansas. I was struck by lightning in South Dakota, got my feet frost bit on the Continental Divide in Montana and was literally blown down to the ground by a wicked westerly in the Columbia Gorge.

But never did I have such a miserable sweat as Patricia and I experienced our third day on the road. By noon we had perspired so much it looked like both of us took a shower with our clothes on.

We were walking north on Arkansas Highway 9, which traversed the eastern slopes of the Ouachita Mountains. Unlike the Rockies, the Ouachitas weren’t soaring highlands with imposing stone peaks or rugged promontory precipices. They’re older mountains that time has worn down into rounded large humps, green with pine, oak and other deciduous trees. The range runs east and west. So the highway went over the ridges with lots of ups and downs that, in a car, would have felt like a roller coaster. None of the hills were monumental, but to us sweaty, middle aged tenderfoots, each subsequent climb was a greater challenge than the last one. While the day sweltered on, we became acutely aware of how out of shape we really were. Sure, we may have practiced hiking the mountains and steep country lanes around our house, but now we were on the road really doing it. And today the slopes were one after another.

Late in the afternoon, we came to a hill that I thought we’d never get to the top of. Those hot humid miles had wilted our cadence with Della. The cheerful cajoling of “Come up Della! That’s my girl!” had been sizzled and scalded to, “Dammit, we’re almost to the top of this stinking hill–quit poking along!”

At the summit, we could see where the highway crossed Alum Fork River on a long bridge. On the left side of the road was a wide gravel area where fishermen would leave their vehicles while down on the river. It looked like a good place to park the cart and pitch our tent. Below it was a large grassy area for mule grazing. Our camp would be up on the public right-of-way, but the grass was on private property. So I hiked to the nearest house and got permission to tie Della out in that field for the night.

The post we tied her to was about fifty yards from where we pitched the tent. After we gave her some grain and water, Della began to peacefully graze. But as the sun settled onto the horizon she got restless. First, she pawed the ground and tossed her head about like she was angry. Then Della commenced to pace around the post she was tied to. Within minutes, the rope was so tightly wrapped around the post she couldn’t move. I was unwinding it when I said to Patricia, “For a mule who was so tired on that last hill, she’s certainly full of energy now.”

“I think she wants to be up there with us.”

“What?”

My wife said, “Without Jim, we’re all she’s got.”

Della had been in our lives for less than six months. Originally, we planned to start this journey a year earlier with a mule named “Buck.” For fifteen of the twenty-five years that I had dreamed of this journey, Buck was going to be the traveling mule. But three weeks before our scheduled departure, we discovered he had cancer. Buck is now buried on a hillside behind our home in Hot Springs.

It was several months before I could bring myself to go looking for another mule. Eventually, in Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, we found a pair of big Belgian mules named Jim and Della. They were sorrel colored with flaxen manes and tails, and Della was the prettiest mule I had ever seen. She was
also very much the alpha-female and dominated Jim. We nicknamed her “Big Sis.”

She had been Jim’s teammate for most of her six and half years, and we had to buy them both to get her. We sold Jim to my little sister. I knew she’d give him a good home.

Patricia said, “We’re Della’s herd now. She’s lonely down here by herself.”

“But there’s no grass up there by us.”

“Maybe if we moved her closer she’ll settle down.”

Halfway between that post and our camp I tied her to a small tree in the middle of a patch of tall grass. Then we stood and watched her graze for about ten minutes. Finally my wife said, “She seems to be happy. Let’s go back to camp. I need to finish making up our bed.”

Just as I stepped over the guardrail onto the highway shoulder, I heard a ruckus behind me. I turned around in time to see Della come to the end of her rope in the middle of a leap. It pulled her front legs out from under her and sent her crashing down on her side.

She rolled over and up onto her feet with the rope wrapped around her torso. Then she tossed her head around and started bucking until she came to the end of the rope. Again, it jerked her to the ground. This time when she rolled, the rope got tangled in some small bushes and wrapped around both of her back legs. Della tried to stand but couldn’t. She had hog-tied herself. So she began to thrash around on the ground trying to get free from the rope.

I jumped over the guardrail and yelled, “She’s going to break a leg!”

Both of us ran down the hill screaming, “Della, no!”

When I got to her, she was still flailing about trying to get her legs free. I didn’t want to get kicked, so I stopped a few yards from her and squatted down. Then in as soothing a voice as I could muster, I said, “Settle down, big girl. I’ll get you loose.”

Patricia’s was shaking when she ran up behind me. “Do something!”

I reached up, took my wife’s hand and pulled her down beside me. “Looming is only going to make her more scared. First thing we’ve got to do is calm her down.”

“Gotchya.” Then Patricia softly said, “It’s all right Della. We’ll help you.”

In a couple of minutes Della was lying still, and I was able to untangle the rope. After she got up on her feet, we checked her for injuries. Other than a few scratches from the bushes, and a small rope burn on her left rear leg, she was fine.

“It may be further away, but I think it’s safer by the post,” I said. “No bushes there.”

Patricia nodded. “You’re probably right. I’ll sit with her for awhile.”

She stayed with Della until it was too dark to see. Several times during the night I got up, and with a flashlight, hiked down to check on her. Every time I showed up, she would nicker and rub her head against my shoulder.

Della never got tangled like that again.

It took us a week to reach a town that had more than one store and was listed on the map as having a population. According to the sign on the highway, 1,458 people lived in Perryville. It had several stores, a court house and a Laundromat.

During that week Spot completely recuperated from being run over, and Della had gotten used to being tied out at night away from us. The only thing that hadn’t improved was the weather. The heat and humidity was getting worse. Over the past seven days, perspiration had become our constant companion, a and we had lots of dirty, sweat-soaked clothes. So in Perryville, the Laundromat was our first stop. I tied Della to a telephone pole out front, and toted our dirty duds inside. While Patricia did the laundry, I set one of our camp chairs next to Della and went to work on my journal.

I had only written three sentences, when a woman in her mid-twenties got out of a mini-van and introduced herself as a reporter for the
Petit Jean Country Headlight
. “The phone has been ringing off the wall about you folks.”

“Really?”

She pulled a digital camera out of her purse. “It’s a small town. You know how small towns are. Everybody’s got to know everybody else’s business.”

While I explained what we were doing, she jotted notes on her pad. At one point she looked up at me and asked, “What’d you do before starting this trip?”

“The past four years I ran a coffee house in Hot Springs called ‘The Poet’s Loft.’ Before that I owned the Mule Line Trolley and gave tours of the city and national park. I’ve been a disc jockey, a time share salesman and I wrote for a weekly newspaper.”

The reporter turned a page on her note pad as she asked, “What about your wife?”

“Patricia owned a dog-grooming business in Hot Springs for nine years. Before that she managed a trust company in Dallas, and before that she was a cop and legal secretary in northern Illinois.”

She nodded and grinned as she scribbled in silence for a few moments. Then she looked up and said, “You guys have had an interesting life. So what do your children think about you doing this trip?”

“I haven’t any. Neither does my wife.”

“Huh?” Confusion riddled the woman’s face.

“We’re newlyweds.”

Although Patricia and I had been together for a couple of years, we didn’t get married until New Year’s Eve 2000 on the stage at the Poet’s Loft. Both of us were fifty-one, and when we took those vows we promised to make this journey the grandest of all honeymoons. We hit the road six months later.

When I told the reporter that, I left out a few facts: Patricia was my seventh bride, and the second one to strike out on this adventure with me.

Like Patricia, the previous half dozen all wanted to do it, but either they changed their minds or tried to change mine–except wife number six. Sue and I got married and hit the road in May 1996 with a pair of mules and a gypsy wagon that I had built. We returned home three days
later–initially because the wagon broke down. We stayed there because our relationship was broken too.

Sue was beautiful. An artist with black hair that draped halfway down her slender back. She was fifteen years younger than me, and when she smiled her whole being glowed. Sue really radiated when she talked about the journey. “A vagabond artist. I like the sound of it.”

On the surface, Sue was perfect. But there were a couple of problems that I just couldn’t get past. One of them was her smile. After we got back home I never saw it again, privately. When we were around other people the smile came easily–she was always positive and upbeat. But at home, Sue’s glass was always half empty, destined to be dry. Then when we discovered the problem with the wagon was in my design, it triggered geysers of criticism. And not just of me. It got so that to her, no one seemed do anything right. She would talk kindly to people in person, but verbally slash them to ribbons behind their backs. It felt like I was drowning in a sea of negativity.

And then there was our love life, which was non-existent. When we first got together the sex was okay. Not great, but I figured it would get better with time. Instead, it got to where she seemed to just be indulging me. Then she quit doing that.

I know the marriage vows are, “For better or worse,” but if worse is all I’m going to get, then it’s time for me to get going. Sue and I were married less than six months.

I vowed then, “Never again! It’s going to be just me and the mule.”

Then along came Patricia. She was a little older than me. (I was fifty-one at the time.) She had a hardy laugh, a sharp tongue and an opinion on everything. Her know-it-all attitude really grated on me. She was not at all the kind of woman I had dreamed of making this journey with. But doing things with Patricia was more fun than anybody I had ever known. Hiking, dining, swimming, camping it was all better with her. And as a lover, Patricia was what this man had always dreamed of.

This was scary. A person can’t have so many failed relationships without thinking,
Something is wrong with me
. I finally concluded that my obsession to see the world on foot was my problem. That question, “Do
you want to go with me?” had broken a lot of hearts. Mine the most–because I was both the repeat offender and victim. The past two decades of emotional scars now were calluses. And I had learned that it was best not to shed them, because the flesh underneath is going to be real tender. But
now
I was having the time of my life with someone I really loved being with. That question–“Do you want to go?”– could ruin it.

But eventually I did ask, and Patricia said, “Yes, but you don’t have to marry me. We’ve got a great thing going here–let’s keep it that way.”

When she said that I felt like I’d been let off the hook. No commitment meant no responsibility. If everything worked out, great! If not, she could go her way and I’ll just get on the down the road with the mule. But as I watched Patricia throw herself into making it happen, that bulwark began to crumble.

She shut down her business, auctioned her home and sold most of her worldly possessions. Her car, golf clubs, big screen TV, antiques, jewelry and stuff she’d been saving for decades–it all went for pennies on the dollar so she could live with me in a tent on the road with a mule.

Someone who was willing to do all that to make my dream come true deserved a commitment from me. The question was, “Can I keep it?