Of Knees, Strangers, and Mustaches (Day 3)

The third day of the trip started bright and early to the raucous Krrrrr-ing of woodpeckers, busy after who-knows-what insects in the nutall oaks surrounding our campsite. In the light of day, we learned that we had camped right next to the Arkansas state champion nutall oak, a fact proclaimed by a giant sign hidden by the darkness the night before. It was our first morning having slept in our tent, so we took our time breaking down camp. The sky was alive with birds flitting back and forth between trees, swooping over the lake, and chattering back and forth to each other. An overwhelming sense of life surrounded us, different from the snowy frigidness we had gotten used to at Deep Creek Lake, where we started our journey.

One new species greatly impressed itself upon our minds: the cypress tree. They wade in the water like children afraid to fully submerge and stand resolute in their conquest of a very narrow niche. Their knobby knees stick out of the water—allowing the roots to breathe—while the rest of the root plunges into the shallows—anchoring the trunk and sucking nutrients from the murk. Imagine the process whereby an organism would develop such a specific strategy to outsmart encroaching rivers and a crowded water’s edge. Pretty epic.

From Lake Chicot, we drove south into Louisiana (Rachel’s 48^th state!) on rural two-lane roads, by far the best way to explore a region by car. We wound through tiny towns and outposts of mobile homes and what seemed to be crumbling, single-room houses. It was somewhere along these roads that we first started playing “Post Office Chicken,” or the game where we all want to go to a post office, are all looking for a post office, pass said post office a little too quickly, and don’t take the time to stop and turn around. This game continued until we were most of the way through Texas.

We stopped in Shreveport, LA (not “Treeport,” like one unnamed member of our group thought), in order to grab lunch at what we believed was Jerry’s sandwich shop. Jerry’s turned out, in fact, to be Gerald Savoie’s Cajun Restaurant, which was under construction and no longer in business. A little dejected (we were really excited to try one of Wes’s amazing food suggestions; he did, after all, introduce us to Herb’s), we found the nearest supermarket and bought on-sale roast beef and cheddar cheese from the super-nice woman at the deli counter. The veil between shopper and marketer was lifted from Annie’s eyes when she actually saw one of the deli workers announcing the chicken dinner special over the intercom. It was a watershed moment.

Ten minutes later, we munched on delicious sandwiches in the parking lot. A woman took in the scene from her car, and upon parking inquired, “Girl scout troupe or sorority?” We chuckled, and replied that we were neither but in fact simply a group of friends. She must have noticed the Obama and Hillary bumper stickers on Hank the All-American Hybrid’s backside (i.e. the trunk of the Escape), and started confiding in us as if we were long-lost friends. “The people down here just don’t understand. I’m not from here originally; I’m a transplant. I was talking to a lady in my church, and she made a big stink about him going to Harvard, and it was probably because her husband could only get into UT...blah blah blah.” It was pretty incredible. We were still munching away when the same woman returned. Before she left, we learned that her college roommate had gone to Sara’s high school and various other pieces of her biography.

We returned to the road with full bellies and passed into Texas, whose large state sign proclaimed “Home of President George W. Bush.” We laughed and then noted other hilarious Texas novelties: “Don’t Mess with Texas: Up to $1000 Fine for Littering” signs, free Wi-Fi in the rest areas, and a giant gravel mine (well, maybe that wasn’t hilarious—it was bizarre, though).

Our road ended in Austin, at Tara’s friend David’s apartment. We arrived exhausted and a little loopy (Rachel had a particularly steamy reaction to the toll way, confusing mixing bowls of I-35, and the ultimately unhelpful and misleading GPS system). We initially believed we were too tired to take advantage of the Austin scene, but hunger prompted us to action, and we left in search of a 24-hour diner called Kerbey Lane. Apparently a mainstay in local night-owl culture, it offered the wide array of breakfast, Tex-Mex, and vegan/veggie options one would expect of Austin. Our waiter met us in surprising (and suspicious) good spirits, it being nearly midnight, and asked us many questions ending in “love.” As in, “Can I top off your water, love?” Or, “Now, that comes with rice, would you like the tortillas as well, love?” Keep in mind that he was a rail-thin hipster Austin dude with little trace of a southern accent. Other memorable events at the diner included Sara pointing out a woman at the other end of the restaurant, telling us, “Look! That woman has a whipped cream mustache, and her friend isn’t telling her!” We practically fell over ourselves leaning and twisting around to see the woman and her insensitive friend. Gradually it dawned on us that the mustache was not, in fact, whipped cream, but instead a large butterfly Band-AID covering the woman’s upper lip. Yes, we’re going to Hell.

By the time we returned to David’s apartment, it turned out to be our latest day yet. Rachel couldn’t resist the internet, though, and spent a little while reading it (and updating the blog). We fell asleep tired, full, and happy, and a couple of us were even clean.