Part two in a series
Another of my multitude of stories, slightly longer this time.
It's late afternoon and, after a day of absolutely breathtaking Colorado, where people just leave their amazing scenery lying around everywhere, we've finally crossed the border into browner, emptier, but blessedly flatter New Mexico. We're tired, thirsty, and down to less than a quarter of a tank, so I pull off to a gas station in the middle of nowhere, knowing that the likelihood of finding somewhere open is only going to decrease from here on out. After filling up the tank, I'm perusing the snack area, and I find something that's entirely too perfect not to buy:
What makes it even better is the dangerous eating instructions. It requires adult supervision.
So I bought it, of course. What better gift to bring home for your husband?
Satisfied with our purchases, we pile back in the car and continue south on I-25. It takes us almost 45 minutes to relize that we've completely missed our exit, there have been no signs of civilization for miles, and, like an idiot, I've neglected to buy a damn map. The most logical course of action seems to be to pull off at the next town and get directions, seeing as nobody really wants to backtrack all the way to Raton, so we enter the booming metropolis of Springer, New Mexico.
It's somewhere around 6 or 7pm, local time, on a Wednesday, but the streets are completely empty of human life and half the buildings are abandoned. It does NOT help that the Silent Hill 4 soundtrack is playing at this particular moment. I'm about to give up and turn around when one or all of us spots a sign for "Tourism Information". We have to circle the block a couple of times before finally figuring out which building it is, but find it we do, a converted schoolhouse with a vaguely official looking sign in front of it. As I approach the building, I notice that the enormous carved statue, a bearded man in a large hat with an even larger gun which looked perfectly normal from the road, is positioned with its head turned so that its beady little wooden eyes are staring directly at whoever happens to be coming up the walkway. I am also not comforted by the fact that next to him is a 15 ft high marble obelisque etched with the Ten Commandments.
The doors are locked and the tiny posted sign confirms that the building did indeed close at 4 pm. Defeated, we get back in the car once again to search for signs of life. There turn out to be only two buildings open in the entire town: a Mexican restaurant and a liquor store. After a bit of debate, we settle on the liquor store as a likely place to get directions, simply because there is the greatest likelihood of finding someone there who can devote their full attention and speak fluent English. When I pull in, we're the only car in the parking lot, but Alix and I are feeling brave, so we swallow our pride and head in, leaving Jeef with the car.
The first thing I see when I walk in is a very sedate yellow lab, which comforts me greatly. The second thing I see is a middle-aged woman behind the counter, whom I would describe as wearing drag queen makeup if it hadn't been uniformly brown, looking at me like I've just sprouted two heads. Fortunately, I am prepared with my very best customer service smile, and Alix and I explain the situation to her. She warms up quickly and, after finding that the free local maps on the counter won't do us a damn bit of good, digs about until she finds us an atlas. Continuing on our present course would eventually get us to where we needed to go, but it would involve passing through several major cities and probably add a good three hours to our trip, so she points out some back roads that we can take in order to get to the I-40, which will eventually bring us to Texas. Alix gets out a piece of paper and a pen and starts to write down the major roads we'll be taking, but the woman stops her and insists that she write down the name of every single tiny-ass town in between here and there, then read them back, just to make sure we have them. At the time, I was vaguely annoyed at how she was condescending to us, but later I realised that she believed us to be two young women travelling alone and lost through the wilds of New Mexico and was simply trying to protect us. At some point during the litany of town names, Jeef wanders in to check on us, but we were done quickly after that. Later on in the car, he confesses that he had been imagining horrible scenarios of the two of us being kidnapped by a swarthy, dirty man and his assistant, who had drugged us with chloroform and thrown us in a garbage truck, which he would have to follow to the hills outside of town and prevent the drunken cultists from burning us as sacrafice by stabbing them with his only weapon: a broken SoBe bottle.
Following the not-drag queen's directions, we head out of town and are soon travelling south on Highway 39. All around us is nothing. Beautiful nothing, but nothing all the same, it's starting to get dark, and the Silent Hill soundtrack has given way to Asilos Magdalena. Now that I'm driving, it's Jeef's turn to make up the creepy stories.
"You know what would be really creepy?"
"What's that?"
"A nun standing at the side of the road with no eyes or nose, just a giant mouth with huge teeth. She would sing to you and you would stop the car and if you touch her, you will learn her terrible secret. Once in posession of the secret, you will be compelled to take a journey across the dark highways of America, during which you too will lose your eyes and your nose and your mouth will grow and you will forever haunt the back roads, just like her."
". . . I think I would touch her."
"That's because you're a FOOOOL!"
"Well, yeah."
Eventually, the light fades completely, and after an hour or so, I realise that I really really need to pee. I'd seen a sign a couple of miles back advertising a town within the general area, so I speed up, hoping that somewhere they would have an open gas station. About ten miles later, the speed limit slows from 65 to 55 to 45 to 35 to 25 to 15, and we arrive in the town of Mills. Every building is dark and every street is empty, it's 8:30 on a Wednesday and there's not even anyone in the bar. This is the last damn place I want to stop. I do not obey the speed limit.
As we leave, I turn to Jeef. "There's a creature attached to our bumper now. That's why they made us slow down to 15, so it could latch on to us unsuspecting travellers."
He nods. "It has no legs, just huge forearms, and it's the color of ashes. Out of its mouth comes a spiky tentacle, which it uses to climb around to the window of the car, where it will sing to you until you go mad. Then, it will climb in the window, put the spike through your eye, and suck out both your brain and your soul."
Alix lookes up sleepily from the back seat. "But you can't try to run it over, because then it would be IN the car."
Thirty miles, a winding pass finally taking us down to something resembling sea level, and endless flat darkness later, we find Logan, where the gas stations are open and the citizens sit in their truck beds in the parking lot, screaming "QUE PASA?" to passers-by. I decide I've had enough driving for the night.
It's late afternoon and, after a day of absolutely breathtaking Colorado, where people just leave their amazing scenery lying around everywhere, we've finally crossed the border into browner, emptier, but blessedly flatter New Mexico. We're tired, thirsty, and down to less than a quarter of a tank, so I pull off to a gas station in the middle of nowhere, knowing that the likelihood of finding somewhere open is only going to decrease from here on out. After filling up the tank, I'm perusing the snack area, and I find something that's entirely too perfect not to buy:
What makes it even better is the dangerous eating instructions. It requires adult supervision.
So I bought it, of course. What better gift to bring home for your husband?
Satisfied with our purchases, we pile back in the car and continue south on I-25. It takes us almost 45 minutes to relize that we've completely missed our exit, there have been no signs of civilization for miles, and, like an idiot, I've neglected to buy a damn map. The most logical course of action seems to be to pull off at the next town and get directions, seeing as nobody really wants to backtrack all the way to Raton, so we enter the booming metropolis of Springer, New Mexico.
It's somewhere around 6 or 7pm, local time, on a Wednesday, but the streets are completely empty of human life and half the buildings are abandoned. It does NOT help that the Silent Hill 4 soundtrack is playing at this particular moment. I'm about to give up and turn around when one or all of us spots a sign for "Tourism Information". We have to circle the block a couple of times before finally figuring out which building it is, but find it we do, a converted schoolhouse with a vaguely official looking sign in front of it. As I approach the building, I notice that the enormous carved statue, a bearded man in a large hat with an even larger gun which looked perfectly normal from the road, is positioned with its head turned so that its beady little wooden eyes are staring directly at whoever happens to be coming up the walkway. I am also not comforted by the fact that next to him is a 15 ft high marble obelisque etched with the Ten Commandments.
The doors are locked and the tiny posted sign confirms that the building did indeed close at 4 pm. Defeated, we get back in the car once again to search for signs of life. There turn out to be only two buildings open in the entire town: a Mexican restaurant and a liquor store. After a bit of debate, we settle on the liquor store as a likely place to get directions, simply because there is the greatest likelihood of finding someone there who can devote their full attention and speak fluent English. When I pull in, we're the only car in the parking lot, but Alix and I are feeling brave, so we swallow our pride and head in, leaving Jeef with the car.
The first thing I see when I walk in is a very sedate yellow lab, which comforts me greatly. The second thing I see is a middle-aged woman behind the counter, whom I would describe as wearing drag queen makeup if it hadn't been uniformly brown, looking at me like I've just sprouted two heads. Fortunately, I am prepared with my very best customer service smile, and Alix and I explain the situation to her. She warms up quickly and, after finding that the free local maps on the counter won't do us a damn bit of good, digs about until she finds us an atlas. Continuing on our present course would eventually get us to where we needed to go, but it would involve passing through several major cities and probably add a good three hours to our trip, so she points out some back roads that we can take in order to get to the I-40, which will eventually bring us to Texas. Alix gets out a piece of paper and a pen and starts to write down the major roads we'll be taking, but the woman stops her and insists that she write down the name of every single tiny-ass town in between here and there, then read them back, just to make sure we have them. At the time, I was vaguely annoyed at how she was condescending to us, but later I realised that she believed us to be two young women travelling alone and lost through the wilds of New Mexico and was simply trying to protect us. At some point during the litany of town names, Jeef wanders in to check on us, but we were done quickly after that. Later on in the car, he confesses that he had been imagining horrible scenarios of the two of us being kidnapped by a swarthy, dirty man and his assistant, who had drugged us with chloroform and thrown us in a garbage truck, which he would have to follow to the hills outside of town and prevent the drunken cultists from burning us as sacrafice by stabbing them with his only weapon: a broken SoBe bottle.
Following the not-drag queen's directions, we head out of town and are soon travelling south on Highway 39. All around us is nothing. Beautiful nothing, but nothing all the same, it's starting to get dark, and the Silent Hill soundtrack has given way to Asilos Magdalena. Now that I'm driving, it's Jeef's turn to make up the creepy stories.
"You know what would be really creepy?"
"What's that?"
"A nun standing at the side of the road with no eyes or nose, just a giant mouth with huge teeth. She would sing to you and you would stop the car and if you touch her, you will learn her terrible secret. Once in posession of the secret, you will be compelled to take a journey across the dark highways of America, during which you too will lose your eyes and your nose and your mouth will grow and you will forever haunt the back roads, just like her."
". . . I think I would touch her."
"That's because you're a FOOOOL!"
"Well, yeah."
Eventually, the light fades completely, and after an hour or so, I realise that I really really need to pee. I'd seen a sign a couple of miles back advertising a town within the general area, so I speed up, hoping that somewhere they would have an open gas station. About ten miles later, the speed limit slows from 65 to 55 to 45 to 35 to 25 to 15, and we arrive in the town of Mills. Every building is dark and every street is empty, it's 8:30 on a Wednesday and there's not even anyone in the bar. This is the last damn place I want to stop. I do not obey the speed limit.
As we leave, I turn to Jeef. "There's a creature attached to our bumper now. That's why they made us slow down to 15, so it could latch on to us unsuspecting travellers."
He nods. "It has no legs, just huge forearms, and it's the color of ashes. Out of its mouth comes a spiky tentacle, which it uses to climb around to the window of the car, where it will sing to you until you go mad. Then, it will climb in the window, put the spike through your eye, and suck out both your brain and your soul."
Alix lookes up sleepily from the back seat. "But you can't try to run it over, because then it would be IN the car."
Thirty miles, a winding pass finally taking us down to something resembling sea level, and endless flat darkness later, we find Logan, where the gas stations are open and the citizens sit in their truck beds in the parking lot, screaming "QUE PASA?" to passers-by. I decide I've had enough driving for the night.