TCMH, v.93: Keyboard Confessional
Thoughts on Road Trips and Aging and... Well, Pretty Much Those and That.
A couple of weekends back, we flew to St. Louis for an event called Archon. Last weekend, we’d intended on flying in for an event called Artica. Instead, we took a comp for the flight miles and drove north, mostly due to the fact that I suffer from DVTs, aka blood clots in the deeper veins. It’s a condition that affects both of my sticks with the right one more bothersome. A couple of days after those four short flights, my right leg began a familiar pain trajectory, the varicose veins swelling into the black-and-blue, raised map of an unruly river system. My leg modeling days seem over before they began, boo-hoo.
With a regular intake of drugs and a quasi-regular commitment to daily walking or cycling, I can keep the problem at bay for the most part, though between you, me and Substack, I’ve probably been to the ER at least two dozen times over the past 14 or 15 years, with a few clots detected over the years. The majority of those hospital trips, then, have involved wasted time, money, and medical talent and I’m currently carrying a $900 bill for my last ER visit, which was covered, in some part, by my very average insurance plan. If I walk or cycle daily, things are better and other, minor, lifestyle (and fashion) adjustments help, too. It’s a process. It’s life. It’s whatever.
Driving helps in that we can stop at a moment’s notice, allowing me to wander a bit, to stretch, jump, twist and act a bit weird on the parking lots of the mid-South. (There’re lots of unconventional behaviors on these lots, if not involving yogic poses.) Driving helps you to see the country in a different way, too; not always a better way, but definitely different.
Presenting to you a few quick vignettes from our most-recent ride from STL » NOLA:
One. On Monday morning, we ran a couple of St. Louis errands, then drove to the riverfront to collect some water from the Mississippi; there’s a longer story for “why,” and it’ll be told later. Suffice to say, we needed (really needed) that river water and parked on one of the many abandoned, cut-up streets on Laclede’s Landing, carefully walking down the broken “path” to the water. No lie: I was daydreaming about the vast, unfulfilled potential of St. Louis’ riverfront when I noticed a figure moving away from our car, seeing the driver’s side door wide open. We ran towards the car. Nearby, a dude stood near a fenceline, breaking eye contact while faux-kicking at his bike tires. A super-quick inventory showed that he hadn’t taken anything and, in an interruption of older patterns of behavior, I: considered this a win; said nothing to my fellow man; and got in the car, driving a few blocks to the Artica site for a couple day-after photos. Eventually, my heart rate even dropped. The computer I’m typing this ‘letter on right now is still mine and I’m more than a little thankful for that. Still! St. Louis! You’re so full of rascals.
Two. Because it’s October and we noticed a spot on the map called Transylvania, LA, and because we’d just watched The Rocky Horror Picture Show and because a three-hour detour’s not that big of a deal if you’re already spending a whole day traveling, we went to Transylvania. The Substack called Historiola! will detail that visit soon enough. Short version: the idea of visiting Transylvania’s more exciting than the reality. Oh: here’s a bat-themed water tower.
Three: If you don’t have a favorite restaurant and favorite dish in Jackson, MS, try the smoked chicken nachos at The Pig & Pint. On the way up to STL, we went there during the lunch rush and my order was smaller than usual; and, yes, having had it a dozen times, there’s an actual baseline. Then we went back a few days later, among the last diners to sit down before close. The plate came out in a heaping pile that yielded the next day’s lunch. This nacho plate came by the pound, no complaint. FWIW, there’s also an amazing record store just down the block, The End of All Music, if that’s the kind of thing that interests you. Your Jackson tour primer!
Four. There’s a radio station in Baton Rouge called The Eagle, offering your basic hard/classic rock programming in-between ads for Ronnie’s Boudin & Cracklin. We tuned in during our homestretch run through Pike County and heard Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “That Smell” pop up, quickly realizing that we were passing signage for the Lynyrd Skynyrd Monument nearby. Sure, coincidences do happen. But in a world in which a quick web search for “solar generators” brings you a month’s worth of ads for exactly that, the random nature of a road trip’s coincidences can still a li’l bit fun. And worth a blip in one’s lightly-read newsletter.
If reading to this point, I wish you both enduring leg health and full tires for the miles ahead (and may they be many).
Chatawanderings: Let’s change directions! On our drive up to St. Louis, we decided really make a real meal of it, stopping off in Jackson and Oxford, MS, as well as Memphis. That made a 10-hour trip stretch in to a langurous, 14.5-hour journey up I-55. The most surprising moment of the trip came during our pull-off into Oxford, which adds a half-hour dog leg to any trip. Each way. This time, though: traffic. A lot, way more than the usual Friday rush hour stuff, which already taxes that small city’s roadways.
Accidentally, we’d driven directly into a football weekend in an SEC town, finding ourselves walking amongst the thousands of Ole Miss fans in their matching khakis and flatbills and/or yoga pants and flatbills. Even though I wouldn’t have guessed that this was a roiling mass in search of new reads, Square Books was plenty full and Off-Square Books (the pre-owned sister store just down the block) had a few extra people drifting around.
To be honest, I can generally do without huge groups of football fans, whether or not a game’s underway. But I can’t do without bookstores, so the extra hour on the road was worth the trip. In the spirit of everything of late being somehow tied to age and aging, I bought a copy of Cicero’s How to Grow Old and a huge book on fandom called See You At San Diego. Many a page do I have to turn.
Mixed Media: New Orleans has been giving me major ennui of late. Sometimes, it’s pleasing to find someone from your general tribe checking in with similar moods and autumnal vibes. Thanks to
for this one…Nice to see Uncle Tupelo getting that anniversary love for Anodyne. (And, yes, I’m #teamjay if you really need to know.)…
A few years back, I got into coverage of comedy for some outlets in STL, and while I’ve largely shaken the bug, I do enjoy a nice, deep dive into the psychology of performing the art. This Atlantic piece delivers just that…
My love/hate relationship with Ghost Adventures is a real thing. Talking to Zak Bagans for this piece in the Salt Lake City Weekly was a real trip…
For our YouTube Lagniappe, a last mention of Rocky Horror for a bit. I had no idea that Richard O’Brien had written/produced/starred in something of a sequel called Shock Treatment. The trailer hits all of my ‘80s film-watching buttons and’ll go into the “watched” column sooner than later.
The Thank You Department: Next week, I’ll introduce a new approach for folks to support the “work” of this newsletter, which’ll start spilling into some standalone journalism projects, the kind hinted at by the Artica Ever After sub-page. But that’s next week. Please know that I appreciate you reading this corner of the web, which is, come to think of it, rapidly approaching a second anniversary.
I implore you to make a side trip one day to the Rest Haven, in Clarksdale.