The Flatlands

Traveling east on the Route 66, we overlapped this historic road with the current route 40. The New Mexican highlands were slowly descending back to the Great Plains. We were now on the same longitude as Sioux Falls, South Dakota and the scenery started to seem more and more familiar and equally as HOT! Coming in to the flatlands the temperature rose by 20 degrees from Albuquerque.

We stopped in Santa Rosa, New Mexico to the site where Coronado crossed a river traveling west. It is marked with a historic bridge. Nearby I stopped so the kids could take swim in Park Lake near the highway. This is a naturally occurring lake that is very deep but not very wide. They started swimming in the cold spring water but became a bit freaked out when they noticed they were swimming with fish that were almost as large as they were! The “lake” was as big as a pond back home so these fish are extremely closed in like it was an aquarium. Many years ago this was a fish hatchery so these forgotten descendants have been enjoying the peace and quiet in their deep pool.

We drove a half-mile to see Blue Hole. The “hole” is a spring that is 81 feet deep and 30 feet wide! The water temperature is always 61 degrees as it overflows from the water table into a stream. I have never seen anything like it even in Florida. This was remarkably deep and unexpected. Southwesterners who are looking for scuba certification must use the Blue Hole for training. I couldn’t imagine descending into that deep, cold, dark hole. I would have lost my mind after about three feet down. The white squares under the water are the scuba platforms that are measured for certification.

Marley and Cole slowly got used to the water and took underwater pictures with our camera of the deep blue. The water took their breath away and Marley said it was so numbing that her body began to bloat to keep herself warm. They swam around the Blue Hole though and for that they could be proud of themselves! It would be here at the Blue Hole that I would hear the first of the Texas/Southern accent in the people around me. New Mexicans have a strong accent but it’s more like a Navajo/Mexican accent. It doesn’t sound “southern” at all. Texans have an accent that is different from the rest of the south so I wouldn’t qualify it strictly as “southern”. I told the kids, “Better get used to that accent. It’s going to be with us until we reach Pennsylvania again.” It’s remarkable how delineated this way of speaking the English language is. It’s almost as if you could mark the states who practiced slavery and say, “They will have a southern accent” and all the states that didn’t practice slavery will have more varied accents like New Yorkers, Bostonians, Pennsylvanians (my husband), Minnesotans, etc. Southern accents are regional too but they still all have a “twang”. Sometimes I don’t mind the accent and sometimes I do. I guess I have to be “in the mood” to hear it.

We continued east into Texas. Now, my sister says that Texas is the worst state in the country because they constantly think they are too good for the rest of America. Texas recently even tried to pass a referendum to “Secede from the Union”. (Do we really want to go back to 1841?) Texans have tried to be their own country many times. It’s the Texas shtick to threaten to become their own country and in fact, the Texas flag is flown larger and higher than the American flags I have seen here. I say, let them secede and charge them for American imports. If I wouldn’t be so worried about how human rights issues might dissolve in Texas I might be inclined to help them out of the states!!! This would be a great state for Tea-Partiers to completely take over and then MOVE THERE after we help “American” refugees out!

The Texas Panhandle is unbelievably flat in a way I couldn’t even imagine. For example, as I was driving past a long flat stretch there was a tree on the farthest horizon that seemed to be moving! This was because it was SO far away and tall that I could see it for a long distance like the way the moon seems to follow you. The dust from the fields would kick up into the atmosphere and turn the sky rusty. This is one of the places where the Dust Bowl would begin in the 1930’s. This is August in a particularly wet year and still it is a dusty place.

Amarillo is the only large city in the Panhandle and it is only 200,000 people strong. It also has my vote for the most “corporate American restaurants” per square mile than anywhere else in the country. I have never seen anything like it. Within a five-minute drive you can find a dizzying glut of IHOPs, Olive Garden, Texas Roadhouse, Cracker Barrel, Denny’s, Famous Dave’s, Dairy Queen, and any other “freezer to table” cuisine you can think of. There were no local places at all along I-40 as far as I could tell. The reason is because Amarillo attracts rural people as far away as Kansas who come in to town to do some celebrating, dining, and getting away from their remote existences. The excitement of hundreds of neon signs calling them from the plains must be a major sensory overload. I could see how exciting it might look to someone who has nothing but sky and sand to look at.

The best part of being here was seeing my three cousins Lisa, Damien, and Steve. Damien and his wife Mary were so kind to invite us to their home for a barbeque dinner. Damien loves to use his smoker in the backyard and we feasted on tender and savory chicken. Lisa is sweet and nice and her daughter Mary Sue was happy to visit with us. Steve is planning a big European trip so we all had a lot to talk about. My cousins are the most Native American looking of the family and I love having my picture taken with them. In a few days I would be visiting with their sister Denise in Arkansas! They always have open arms and I am grateful that they are so welcoming. (Damien also has a lovely grassy backyard and it occurred to me that I haven’t seen a lawn since Minnesota!)

The next day we went to the American Quarter Horse Museum. This is a remarkably beautiful place especially if you like horses. Marley felt like she was viewing a chapter from her life looking at all the introductory films about horsing and disciplines. It was a nice way to pass the early morning. It made me very interested in seeing American Quarter Horses in action back at Radnor Hunt. I don't think I ever understood the differences in them from Thoroughbreds. American Quarter Horses are a distinctively "American" breed.

We started out for Oklahoma and I was again fairly amazed at the flat landscape. It was remarkable how FLAT it was! I have never seen land behave this way, not even in Minnesota and I considered that flat. This went on longer than I felt was possible. My cousins told me that Kansas is FLATTER! How is that possible to be flatter than flat? Here are 3 pictures taken about a half hour apart. You have to stay very alert driving on this kind of road because it's easy to be distracted with nothing to keep your interest! At one point Cole said, "Mom, I think I see Dallas!" I couldn't help laughing. Because even small things that are far away are visible for long distances, he saw a grain silo! He said it couldn't possibly be a grain silo but, alas, it was. Grain silos get your hopes up. Interestingly, the sky on the horizon in all of Texas and Oklahoma is slate gray.

We stopped to make a picnic lunch south of Pampa and we sat at some godforsaken picnic table in the middle of the high plains. The sun is strong and the winds are relentless. There are enormous grasshoppers that were all around us and the tin roof of the “shelter” was squeaking furiously. This reminded me of (again) of poor Laura Ingalls Wilder and her remembrances of living in Kansas. Her shelter was no better than my picnic hovel. We were adjacent to the McClellan National Grasslands and there were features to the land that made it more interesting with gullies and water sources.

We passed into Oklahoma and the soil became so red and vibrant that I was surprised at the incredible difference. Oklahoma is also green (but of course in this El Nino year it is different than what’s normal) and there are small trees everywhere. This is a significant change from Texas and I could see how we were beginning the change from the Southwest to the South proper. We stopped at a very disgustingly dirty Studio 6 in what I would learn later was called Barrio Eighteen. A Barrio is a Spanish word for “slum”. This was a ghetto for sure. The people have adopted a “gangster” kind of persona that is understandable. This kind of place is where teenage girls get pregnant (furthering their poverty), young children are raised by psychological children who do not know how to discipline correctly, and the streets are unsafe and occupied by people bordering on mental illness. (A man in a bathing suit kept circling me asking me if I had “a light” for his cigarette). We had to do laundry and we were nervous about the neighborhood when night was falling. Apparently so was the Asian lady who owned ‘the shop with mostly broken machines’ who kept locking the doors, locking herself in to a room and wouldn’t come out unless we knocked, and who got disgruntled with the smallest request. She didn’t speak English so she was even doubly infuriated because she had no idea what I was saying. It wouldn’t be wise to learn English either because everyone in the laundry was Spanish!

Before we did laundry however we did see the beauty of Oklahoma City. Oklahoma City will always be a place of tragedy until the memory of the bombing fades with time. If you remember it, the word Oklahoma City will always be linked with the bombing by White Supremacist, Timothy McVeigh. We stopped first at the Memorial to the victims of the bombing. This was a very spiritual National Memorial. The Park Ranger was very helpful and explained the empty chairs, the reflecting pool and the monolithic entrances. There is also a museum (that was closing) just next to the memorial and a Survivor’s Tree (that survived the blast). Ten years after the blast and the Memorial is a beautiful testament to the victims and the American people. It is such a shame that the 9/11 site is not remotely near completion (or even an agreement of what should be done with it).

I felt so much anger at Timothy McVeigh that it surprised me. Here was a “Survivalist” who believed that the government was taking away his liberty because they resorted to firing after a 51-day standoff with the delusional Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas. He believed that killing innocent people in the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City would be a way to exact revenge on the government (killing many children who were in day care at the time). He was a compassionless, self-righteous, White Supremacist Arizonan who bombed his own country. The best news is that after that act of violence, American security has become much better and 60 similar plots have been quelled since.

We spent the early evening in “Bricktown” which was a lovely venue of restaurants and entertainment. There is a small winding man-made river that offers rides along the canal, a movie complex, and very international offerings of food. We ate at a lovely Spanish Tapas restaurant overlooking the river. Bricktown is a great idea for a city that might not have other things to draw people downtown. One point of interest is that Oklahomans in the city do not have southern accents. This is surprising. I am sure it’s not like this all over Oklahoma. The other interesting thing (and forgive me for this) is that the good people of Oklahoma City are the 'Worst Dressed' people that I have met throughout the whole trip. I am not a fashion plate by any stretch of the imagination but I can say without hesitation that these people make me look like a fashion diva! There are outfits that couldn’t be imagined together unless you couldn’t see color and pattern. It wasn’t a “funky” decision either to put two unlike things together, it was a conservative choice. It was weird to say the least. Even 12 year old Cole noticed it so it wasn’t something just in my head! Some people come to Oklahoma City from the country of course and the rural-ness of Oklahoma might be the reason for the fashion choices. It was almost like the women were trying too hard (too tiny zebra/leopard print dress and rhinestone pumps with a pale green chiffon scarf and pale pink hat to go to the movies?) and the men just had no idea in their cut up t-shirts, raggedy shoes, and belted jean shorts wearing wrestling caps! No one looked like they belonged together. They were all super nice though and so that's all that mattered to us in the end.

We had a great time though in Oklahoma City but it was time to get moving and get to the South – Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, and Virginia. We still had two weeks to go!