Evolution on Route 66

It was a sleepy railroad town back then, the supermarket, tatty liquor stores, barber shop, tattoo parlor, hardware store, a battered Main Street with neon, eclectic mix of hillbillies, old bikers and retiree’s.

I came out here about a decade ago, LA was giving me claustrophobia.  The change looked good, rural, rustic and lacking in asphalt, something I needed.  The sky went on forever, clean mountain air, a million stars at night….and the silence, a scary silence as though you had one foot into the outer universe, bar the odd dog barking, or were those Coyotes?  At the time, it felt like the Edge of the World.  The realtor wore a Stetson, spoke with a drawl.  “I’ll take it, when can I move in?”

I met the neighbor, an eccentric named Ben, collected all kind of bottles, embedded them in cement in his front yard, called it Desert Art, he also kept a rusty refrigerator overturned by the gate.  His wife Barb, never saw her, she stayed in the house, often heard her scream at night, but we had plenty acres between us so what the heck. 

I left soon after, went to Central & South America, intoxicated by the exotic cultures I could not seem to get out, just quick weekly trips back every six months or so.  Nine years slips by, I’m back now, for a while I think.

It’s late morning, warm for May, I’ll dust down the old jeep, rev up the engine, drive the countryside, old memories. The jeep is dirty, grey and dented, very dull looking, does not fit into my fantasy for today, it’s all I got, so I go.  No more dirt, the road is paved now, the eccentric neighbor gone too, local gossip says the wife strangled him in the bathtub, she was never charged.  New people moved in, a sort of hip nuclear family, cleaned it up, erected a white picket fence, engraved their name on the gate in Times New Roman, mowed the lawn, even edged it.

I drive by the railroad, race the Santa Fe locomotive south, it’s an easy win for me.  Take the highway east to an area I used to hike, crest a summit, then hit by a misty view of terracotta tiled roofs cascading down the valley, hundreds of tract houses built in sub divisions.  It’s a sore sight, the mist is smog.  Entire new sub divisions walled in, a large billboard towers above NO DOWN 30 YEAR JUMBO.  There was a battle line here a decade back, an endangered species the Desert tortoise was 90% depleted.  Looks like No Down 30 Year Jumbo solved that problem.  I read somewhere the universe is all mathematics.   A car pulls out, cuts me off, young woman driving cell phone to ear, I hit the horn, she gives me the finger, bumper sticker on rear, SQUIRRELS, NATURE’S LITTLE SPEED BUMPS.  A few more late commuting stragglers pull out, heading for the freeway, down the pass, three hours to LA, punch in and ride the treadmill of Corporate America. 

Gotta go up, gotta get out of this.  I cruise a few miles, hit Route 66, climbing now into the Angeles forest, snowy peaks above, sandy desert below, the road falls behind away like a coiled rope, the flora is changing, Joshua trees everywhere.  Are they really trees or just cacti? Heading higher now. The air's thin and I'm not.  Descending, feeling nostalgic, wind in my face, huge desert mesa sweeps down across a plateau, buffed orange mountains that contrast with the bluest sky ever, change the stick shift into 3rd, over a ridge, coasting down in 4th, marvelous view, slight euphoria building….ASS UP, FACE DOWN, THE DICE MAN COMETH.  I slow, billboard, by the roadside in the middle of nowhere, billed as some comedian from Brooklyn, dressed in black leather, and he looks all in a rage.  Shift into 1st, drive on, the road straightens across the flat mesa all the way to Red Mountain on the horizon, I want to see a red convertible driving a straight line, sexy woman at the wheel, plume of desert dust in her wake, just like the movies….but I don’t, instead I pass a funeral home billboard saying THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX which has me thinking optimistically pessimistic until another mile, another  billboard, SUICIDE HOTLINE, CALL 800-.  The thought process halts.

Route 66 disappears off the map here, dead ends, sort of like the Mojave river that flows underground for miles only to resurface again.  I turn and drive east, the I-15 is up ahead, I take the frontage road and skirt the freeway, billboards proliferate, A FLOCK OF SEAGULLS, MAY 27th,  I hum the tune, and I ran, I ran so far away…isn’t that like 30 years ago?  Those pointed hairdo’s, they must be well into their 50’s,  Not sure if I feel old or young.  Middle Age New Wave on Route 66… I’ll go for that.  KENNY ROGERS APPEARING,  four hundred children and a crop in the field.  No wonder she left him.

Hooters casino BlackJack specials

vote GEORGE RUNNER & family values

checks cashed.  payday loans

Tarragona Estates from the high 200’s.  live with Nature in all her glory.

Feeling queasy, I exit down onto the old neon Main Street.  I’m not getting anywhere, traffic backed up, getting hot.  WALMART COMING SOON, to the left a STARBUCKS under construction, a status symbol your town has arrived.  Looking for a way out, I pull a sharp right down a dirt road into a Barrio, I head south, pass a Spanish Evangelical church in a dilapidated metal building, Yo Quiero Jesus, a handwritten sign advertises BINGO at 5pm, teenage latino boys with Real Madrid shirts play soccer in a dirt field.  Hardscrabble, but real.  

I head homewards, I want to leave the NEW change, get back to the OLD change…but I can’t, it’s gone.  Or is it?

 

Back when, I sought The Edge.

Distorted memory? absence?  The boundary has shifted.