Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
able TVs, metal alarm clocks. Upstairs the bedrooms were just as Ike and Mamie had left
them. Mamie's personal effects were on her bedside table-her diary, reading glasses, sleep-
ing pills-and I daresay that if you knelt down and looked under the bed you would find all
her old gin bottles.
In Ike's room his bathrobe and slippers were laid out and the topic he had been reading on
the day he died was left open on the chair beside the bed. The topic was-and I ask you to
rememberforamomentthatthiswasoneofthemostimportantmenofthiscentury,aman
who held the world's destiny in his hands throughout much of World War II and the Cold
War, a man chosen by Columbia University to be its president, a man venerated by Repub-
licansfortwogenerations,amanwhothroughoutthewholeofmychildhoodhadhisfinger
on The Button-the topic was West of the Pecos by Zane Grey.
FromGettysburg,IheadednorthupUS15towardsBloomsburg,wheremybrotherandhis
family had recently moved. For years they had lived in Hawaii, in a house with a swim-
mingpool,nearbalmybeaches,beneathtropicalskiesandwhisperingpalms,andnow,just
when I had landed a trip to America and could go anywhere I wanted, they had moved to
the Rust Belt. Bloomsburg, as it turned out, was actually very nice-a bit short on balmy
beaches and hula girls with swaying hips, but still nice for all that.
It'sacollegetown,withadecidedlysleepyair.Youfeelatfirstasifyoushouldbewearing
slippers and a bathrobe. Main Street was prosperous and tidy and the surrounding streets
were mostly filled with large old houses sitting on ample lawns. Here and there church
spires poked out from among the many trees. It was pretty well an ideal town-one of those
rare American places where you wouldn't need a car. From almost any house in town it
would be a short and pleasant stroll to the library and post office and stores. My brother
and his wife told me that a developer was about to build a big shopping mall outside town
and most of the bigger merchants were going to move out there. People, it appeared, didn't
wanttostrolltodotheirshopping.Theyactuallywantedtogetintheircarsanddrivetothe
edge of town, where they could then park and walk a similar distance across a flat, treeless
parking lot. That is how America goes shopping and they wanted to be part of it. So now
downtownBloomsburgislikelytobecomesemiderelictandanothernicelittletownwillbe
lost. So the world progresses.
Anyway,itwasapleasuretoseemybrotherandhisfamily,asyoucanimagine.Ididallthe
things you do when you visit relatives-ate their food, used their bathtub, washing machine
and telephone, stood around uselessly while they searched for spare blankets and grappled
with a truculent sofa bed, and of course late at night when everyone was asleep I crept out
of my room and had a good look in their closets. (Nothing very interesting, I'm afraid.)
