Footloose in America: Dixie to New England (9 page)

We spent a week in Jonesboro at the home of my friend Bob Wallace. I met Bob through his daughter Ginna. She was on a team with me that represented Hot Springs at the 1999 National Poetry Slam in Chicago. Ginna was a minor then, and because some of the venues were bars, she had to have a parent or a guardian with her. So her father came along. And after that week in Chicago, I felt I’d found a new friend.

While in Jonesboro we put on a show at Uncommon Blends. It was a coffee house on Main Street that had opened only two weeks earlier–this was their first event. More than thirty people showed up, and half a dozen
participated in the open mic session. Ginna was one of them. She kept a weekly reading going there for more than a year after that.

North of Jonesboro, we spent three days camped at Crowley’s Ridge State Park. The forecast was for temperatures near a hundred and five. Our shady campsite was near a spring fed lake, which was a great retreat from the heat. But there was no escaping the bugs. At night the mosquitoes were as bad as down on the Delta, and during the day the horseflies were horrendous. They didn’t bother Patricia and me very much, but poor Della. Some of those flies were almost as big as hummingbirds. Patricia called them “B-52s.” And bug spray didn’t faze them. Even when we sprayed it on their bodies, they’d just fly off, make a circle, come back and land on Della. Then the blood would start to ooze.

The horseflies were worse just before sunset. That’s when they’d swarm her, and the only way we could help was to kill them with our hands. Let the bastards land and smash them before they could bite. Patricia and I took turns smacking Della’s flies. And when your turn was up, the first thing you’d do was go to the hydrant and wash the blood off hands and forearms. We soon learned it was best to hit them with the center of our palms. That kept the blood from spraying up between our fingers and into our face.

Della quickly go got used to the nightly fly-smacking. She would stand completely still and not even flinch as we flailed away. She actually seemed to enjoy it. For Patricia and me, it turned into a contest to see who could kill the most in one smack. Patricia was the champion. She got three with one blow.

One evening, while I was smashing flies on Della, I couldn’t help but wonder about the horses out in the pastures around there. The ones who didn’t have someone to smack their flies. They must dread summer sunsets.

When I was a kid on vacation and riding in the back seat of our family car, every time we crossed a state line it felt like such a big deal. It seemed to me
that we should have stopped at each one and commemorated the occasion. But I knew that idea wouldn’t fly. So I simply celebrated those state lines in my own mind.

The St. Francis River separates Arkansas from the Missouri Boot Heel. I was standing at the Arkansas end of the bridge when I started to feel that same old state line excitement. Patricia was excited too. “Honey, I can’t believe it. We’re finally leaving Arkansas.”

These may be the
United
States of America, but they are all very different. The contrasts are often obvious the moment you cross the state line. When we crossed the river into Missouri, we found the Delta to be just as flat as it was in Arkansas. But the dirt was redder, and the highway shoulders were much wider than in Arkansas, which made walking a lot easier. But the roadsides in both states had one thing in common–litter. Both had plenty.

August in the Show-Me-State was as hot as it had been in Arkansas. The day we walked up Highway 25 through Malden the temperature was near 100 and so was the humidity. North of Malden, the surface of the highway had been ground off to prepare for re-paving. The road was rough and rutted, and in some places, only half of our lane had been ground off. So we had to walk with one foot on a surface that was two inches higher than the other. We stumbled along that way for nearly ten miles as traffic flew past us churning up grit that landed on our sweaty bodies. And because there was no wind to blow it away, the exhaust hung above the road in a suffocating haze.

We walked nearly twenty miles that day before finding a place to camp. It was a wide spot where a county dirt road intersected Missouri Highway 25. On that spot were huge mounds of pavement that had been ground off the highway–mounds that would eventually be melted to make a smooth new road surface. This place didn’t have much grass for Della and barely enough room for our camp. But it was late, and down in the Delta we needed to be in the tent before the sun touched the horizon. Because–as you know–after dark mosquitoes rule.

“You left the pee jar in the cart?” Patricia was outraged. “Now what?”

“I’ll just have to go out and get it.”

My wife was exasperated. “As soon as you unzip that door, half of the mosquitoes in the Delta will fill this tent. They can’t wait to get in here!”

“So what do you want me to do?”

“I have an idea.”

Then she started rummaging through the stuff next to her side of the bed. Suddenly with a flourish she pulled out a can of Raid and said, “I’ll count to three, you hold your breath, unzip the door, go out and zip it back up. Don’t breathe until you get away from the tent.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to cover you with this.” She shook the spray can at me. “When you come back we’ll do the same thing. Out there, you’re on your own, buddy-boy!”

“Oh great.”

Patricia snickered, “Hey, you’re the one who forgot the pee jar.”

Across the highway, about 150 feet from our tent, were two sets of railroad tracks with a crossing for a county road. Every locomotive blew its whistle several times as it approached. That night, at least once an hour, a train would barrel down the tracks.

“I’ll never forget
this
campsite.” My wife smacked a mosquito on her face. “Got ch’ya, you little bugger!”

Patricia said, “I’m not sure we should do this.”

From where we stood on top of the levee at Tootsie’s Landing, the Hickman Ferry looked like a toy in the churning brown Mississippi River. It was the only ferry still crossing the river, and we had just walked forty-two miles out of our way, down the Missouri Bootheel, to ride it.

“It’s so small,” my wife said. “What if Della freaks out and jumps off?”

The ferry was a small barge with a steel parking deck that had a tugboat attached to the downstream side. It had a low railing on the sides and chains across both ends. If Della freaked out and bolted, she could easily go overboard. I shared Patricia’s trepidation.

She said, “I’ll stay up here with Della, you go down and check it out.”

Right then, a man in an orange life jacket stepped out of the tugboat onto the deck of the ferry and motioned for us to come down. That’s all I needed. “Let’s go.”

Patricia yelled, “Wait a minute!”

“For what?”

Her voice wavered. “Well, I just think we need to check this out first.”

“If we don’t cross here what are we going to do?”

Patricia looked down at the ferry, then turned back to me. “It looks scary.”

“It’s just part of the adventure. Let’s go! Get in and work the brake.”

My wife grumbled as she climbed into the cab of the cart. “It’s just part of the adventure. You and your ‘It’s just part of the adventure.’ ”

The ramp down the levee to the river was concrete with ridges that ran perpendicular to the hill to give vehicles traction. With the tungsten-carbide cleats on Della’s shoes, and the concrete ridges, she had good footing. But there was loose sand on the surface that made the cart’s tires skid when Patricia applied the brake. So Della’s butt was hunkered down in the harness as she struggled to hold the load back. But our big girl had traction, so it all went well.

That is, until she stepped onto the ferry’s steel ramp. Then all traction was gone. The deck sounded like a stage full of tap dancers as her hooves scrambled for purchase on the smooth steel. I was scared that at any moment she would fall down. But within seconds she got her footing and we were standing solid in the middle of the ferry. Della was shaking, and so was I. From inside the cart, Patricia clapped and cheered. “What a good girl! That’s my girlie pie!”

The deck hand was raising the ferry ramp as I locked the brake and blocked the cart wheels. I asked, “Are we the only ones going across?”

“Yep. We’ve been expecting you. The captain said he’ll take it slow so we don’t scare your mule.”

The diesel engine on the tug revved up, black smoke swirled above the river and the barge slowly began to move. Della took a couple of nervous steps to the left as she turned her head to look at the tug. The stern of the
boat swung away from the barge churning up a wake of frothy brown water. While the tug turned around to face Kentucky, I could feel Della tense up–her legs were quivering.

I stroked her neck. “It’s all right, Big Sis.”

After the stern of the tug was secured to the side of the barge, we slowly sailed away from Missouri. That’s when Della began to relax. Soon she was looking up and down the river sightseeing. On her face I saw the same fascination she had for the marching band. But instead of music and twirling majorettes, it was boats in the roiling brown current that enthralled her. Several tugs pushing barges came close because our captain got on the radio and said, “Wait till you see what I’ve got on board.” Then reading from our flyer, he told them about us.

At one point–mid-river–the ferry slowed so a parade of them could pass in front of us. Every one of them blew their horns with all hands on deck waving and shouting. We couldn’t understand them, but it was obvious Della was a hit with the river folk.

For that half hour on the Hickman Ferry, Della was Queen of the Mississippi.

CHAPTER 4

T
HE
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TATE
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MERICA
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ENTUCKY