Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
it all became a little repetitive after a while. Once you have looked through the windows
of fourteen log cabins, you find yourself approaching number 15 with a certain diminution
of enthusiasm, and by the time you reach number 20 it is really only politeness that impels
you onward. Since they've taken the trouble to build all these cabins and scour the country
digging out old rocking chairs and chamber pots, you feel that the least you can do is walk
around and feign interest at each one. But in your heart you are really thinking that if you
never saw a log cabin again you'd be pretty damn pleased. I'm sure that was what Lincoln
was thinking when he packed his cases and decided not to be a backwoods merchant any-
more, but to take up a more rewarding career emancipating Negroes and being president.
Down at the far end of the site, I met an older couple plodding towards me, looking tired.
The man gave me a sympathetic look as he passed and said, “Only two more to go.” Down
the path from where they had come I could see one of the two remaining cabins, looking
distantandsmall.Iwaiteduntiltheoldercoupleweresafelyoutofsightaroundabend,and
then sat down beneath a tree, a handsome oak into whose leaves the first trace of autumn
goldwasdelicatelybleeding.Ifeltaweightliftingfrommyshouldersandwonderedwhyit
was that I had been so enchanted by this place when I was five years old. Were childhoods
so boring back then? I knew my own little boy, if driven to this place, would drop to the
ground and start hyperventilating at the discovery that he had spent a day and a half sealed
inacaronlytocomeandseeabunchofboringlogcabins.Andlookingatitnow,Icouldn't
have blamed him. I mused for a few moments on the question of which was worse, to lead
a life so boring that you are easily enchanted or a life so full of stimulus that you are easily
bored.
But then it occurred to me that musing is a pointless waste of anyone's time, and instead I
went off to see if I could find a Baby Ruth candy bar, a far more profitable exercise.
After New Salem, I took Interstate 55 south, and drove for an hour and a half towards St.
Louis.Itwasboring,too.OnaroadasstraightandaswideasanAmericaninterstate,fifty-
five miles an hour is just too slow. It feels like walking speed. Cars and trucks coming
towards you in the opposite direction seem to be traveling on one of those pedestrian con-
veyerbeltsyoufindinairports.Youcanseethepeopleinside,getalong,lingeringglimpse
intotheirlives,astheyslidepast.Andthere'snosenseofdriving.Youneedtoputahandto
thewheeloccasionallyjusttoconfirmyourcourse,butyoucantaketimeouttodothemost
intricate things-count your money, brush your hair, tidy up the car, use the rearview mirror
to search and destroy blackheads, read maps and guidebooks, put on or discard articles of
clothing. If your car possessed cruise control you could just about climb in the back and
take a nap. It is certainly quite easy to forget that you are in charge of two tons of speeding
metal, and it is only when you start to scatter emergency cones at roadwork sites or a truck
Search WWH ::




Custom Search