Finally we drive into New Orleans, which is amazing! Even though I'm in pretty bad shape we go downtown to Mother's to eat Cajun food for lunch. Alex had a Po Boy sandwich and I had some Jumbalaya. It is SO good but my appetite is gone and I can't eat much more than a few bites. After that we decide to wander into the French Quarter to have a few drinks before we go back to the motel. On every block in the Quarter there are at least three houses for sale. Most of the stores that aren't on Bourbon Street are closed down. We did get to go into the Voodoo Store and Museum while we were there and we got a drink at LaFite's Blacksmith Shop, a blacksmith shop that was turned into a bar in the 1700's and where vampires have been known to drink.
The next day we wake up and plan our day. We're going to get doughnuts at Cafe Du Monde, then walk to St Louis I Cemetery and see the Voodoo Queen's grave, then go to the Garden District to see its layout and houses, then go to Bourbon Street for drinks, then go on the Vampire Tour, then go get more drinks on Bourbon Street.
When we get to Jackson Square it is filled with people reading Tarot cards. There is even an older man and lady playing music. The Cafe has a line around the block for doughnuts and Alex doesn't want to wait in the line so we start walking toward the cemetery. On the way we find Community Coffee House where we both get coffees to go and I get a bagel to eat because I'm hungry. While eating I see a nightlife magazine and pick it up because it has a list of all the best bars in town.
Coffees in hand, we walk to the cemetery. It is falling apart. Even the graves that have been restored are just plastered over with stucco. I felt strange as I walked through all the above ground tombs, brick piles falling apart. At one time while I was in the protestant section I heard a woman screaming to her boyfriend in an apartment not 200 feet from the edge of the cemetery. There was rap music playing. I thought, what a contrast. Nevertheless I was excited to find out that the architect of the Capitol building in Washington DC was buried there with his son. And Plessy of Plessy v. Furgeson was buried there too. He was the man who in about 1900 defied the separate but equal laws on the trains and sat in the white section only to be imprisoned. At the time the supreme court upheld the laws but reversed it in Brown v. The Board of Education.
After the cemetary we walk down to Bourbon street and get drinks at the Olde Absinthe Bar. After this we check out the Garden District only to find that not much is going on. The houses are beautiful to see though and there are so many trees! When we return to Bourbon Street we go back to the Absinthe Bar and have a few beers, spending the rest of our cash. After the beers we go back to the hotel and make some dinner only to return in an hour for our Vampire tour.
When we get to the tour there are probably 75 people waiting, so they split us up into three groups. Our guide's name is Louis and he's a fourth generation New Orleanser. He tells us great stories about vampires in the French Quarter and I love walking through those streets at night. There are gas lanterns still glowing outside of houses and you can see inside the huge windows into the parlors of the old houses. The yellow light reflects off flowers and vines growing on black fences, and drunken people stumble down the street singing songs. At the end of the tour Alex has written down some things for us to look up online and we're both feeling better and happy to have come to New Orleans at last.
Oct 17, 2009
Oct 15, 2009
One Giant Long Motherfucking Drive
So, it started on Wednesday in Montana.
It was snowing, lovely sleet snow. I was sick, really fucking sick. Candice drove the ENTIRE width of Montana in sleet snow that day, but we made it across the border into Wyoming. Unfortunately, that left us in 32 degree snow, but we had factored this and had planned to get a motel room. No point being sick and cold at the same time. We bathed that night, just beautiful.
The next day, Candice drove again, all the way to Nebraska, across the corner of Wyoming.
Wyoming, even though the weather was disgusting, is a pretty dismal place. Temperature wasn't much better when we got there, still snow, still cold. But, we managed to stay in a really seedy motel that had a nice collection of drunks scattered around, and what I think was a crack den in the next room. Oh, and I was still sick, getting worse, and finding it hard to do anything and breath at the same time. So much fun.
Friday, even though I was sick and unable to breath and move, I decided I could drive, so we split the driving through Nebraska. Thank fuck for that. Candice told me her dad had driven through Nebraska and never, ever wanted to do it again.
I share his feelings on this matter.
I NEVER, EVER want to have to visit Nebraska again, let alone drive any part of it. It's flat, depressing and boring. So much so that there was not one bumper sticker in the TWO State Parks, or any gas station we stopped at. Apparently, even Nebraskans think their State isn't worth celebrating on the back of a car.
Once into Kansas, it was getting late and we needed to get to a campground. This achieved, I started to set up the tent. It took me 10 mins to get two tent pegs in as I just couldn't catch my breath. Candice had to help me finish putting the tent up! She made up Chicken Noodle soup, I was hungry but I didn't have any appetite. Four spoonfuls and I was done. I looked at my phone and this was when we realized we would be in for a long night.
Wunderground said the temperature was going to get down to about 25, with winds up to 25 m.p.h; oh, and freezing rain in the morning.
We went to bed at 5 pm knowing it was going to be rough. And it was. I got half hour naps here and there, huddled under all the blankets with Treacle, constantly worried the tent was about to tear off the top of us! When we woke in the morning there was a sheet, yes a sheet, of ice covering the whole tent, and it was seriously fucking cold.
I was a mess and couldn't even help her put down the tent, I just had to sit in the car as it warmed up, trying to catch my breath. We then just started driving again and made it through to Missouri, and warmer temperatures.
We stayed at this massive campsite, filled to the brim with giant RV's. Even thought we were exhausted, and needed the rest, we could only stay one night there because they were booked up for the weekend. We decided to hit up Branson, and then camp just over the state line in The Ozarks, Arkansas.
"Just over the state line" ended up being a three hour drive through The Ozarks, but we eventually found a campsite in a forest on the top of one of the hills in the mountain range. It was great until we couldn't light a fire because all the wood around was wet from the previous week of rain, and then the next installment dumped on us. We spent the next 36 hours in the tent, in varying degrees of rainfall, but we needed to not be driving. By the second night, everything in the tent was wet, sorry, soaked. We sat reading, I read Bill Clinton's autobiography, which worked out handy the next day! By 7 in the morning we were done and just threw everything in the car and headed to Little Rock.
In Little Rock is the William J. Clinton Presidential Library. A seriously Fucking Awesome place!
I can't explain here how great this place is but I URGE you to take time out of your life to go there. (Those of you who know me know that I don't say that about very many places at all.) It is an experience that person should have. They have his Mustang and Presidential Limo, correspondents between him and many famous peeps, and a recreation of his Oval Office and Cabinet Room! When you look at how much he achieved in those eight years, it's truly humbling, and gives hope for the next eight years.
We dried all our stuff at a laundromat and stayed at a motel in Hot Springs, childhood home of Bill Clinton.
Hot Springs is run by the National Park Service. It's a strip along the street that contains the bathhouses that used to operate there. They were more like old school spas that catered to rich people wanting to fix their ailments. One of them has been restored to look like it did at the peak in the twenties and is a museum you can wander around. It's interesting to get a snap shot of life at a different time.
Although it was a pretty warm day, it was not going to last and we were completely done with the weather by now and decided to head to New Orleans, and bizarrely the quickest way was back up through Memphis and then straight down. So off to Memphis we drove.
We stopped there for a drink on Beale St and talked to a bartender who told us a few things we should see in New Orleans then it was back on the road again. The weather report said it was going to rain, again, pretty much all night, so being limited on funds and tired of getting soaked, we slept in the car and a State fishing reserve. Not the most comfortable nights sleep, but we were dry when we woke up. Funny enough, so was everything outside, it hadn't rained at all. Fucking figures! I got out the car to make us some coffee on the burner in the crisp, cloudy morning air. The water was just about to boil, when everything around me went completely silent and then I heard a hiss getting increasingly louder. "Oh no," I thought.
Yep, you guessed it. The heavens opened and ten tons of rain dumped on me. I ran under a tree, and that didn't help at all. A minute later it was over, I was wet, and it was another great start to the day.
If we weren't done before, we certainly were now. Candice was getting sicker, I was getting better, and we had both had enough of the God damn world.
After finding a State Park in Louisiana, we drove on, preparing ourselves for another happy night in the tent. We made it to Tickfaw State Park, dealt with the retard at the front desk and paid $15 for a campsite in the middle of a swamp.
I know that I am prone to exaggeration, but unfortunately, I'm not this time.
The guy at the front desk was really simple, let me recount the story:
We pull at the office and I wind down the window as he opens his window.
"Yes?" he asks.
"I want a campsite for the night," I reply.
"Tent?" he says inaudibly.
"What?" I need him to repeat.
"Tent?" he says again.
"Yes," I reply, looking out behind the car to make sure I haven't been dragging someone else's RV across two states.
"OK," he gives me a look like I'm seriously insane, asks for I.D. and then stares at his computer screen with a look of confusion and constipation. "Have you been here before?"
"Nope."
He sighs, not the answer he wanted, "Would you like to be near the bathrooms or... not?"
"Near would be fine," I answer.
Lots of sighing, clicking and constipated looks follow. "Here's a map, and the gate combination."
I was slightly confused as to why I needed a combination to a gate I had already entered through, but I didn't want to trouble his already overloaded, simple brain with the question, and so on we drove to find our campsite.
It tuns out that the campsites are in the middle of a swamp and arranged in a circle, so technically everyone of them is close to the bathrooms. When I say swamp, I really mean swamp. I could stand by the tent and spit into the middle of the swamp. The swamp had been fitted with overflow pipes to keep the water level down, very handy, but the overflows poured right into the campsites. There was a small square sand box for us to put the tent on and everything else all around us was stagnant swamp, filled with mosquitoes. They weren't west coast mosquitoes, you know the small annoying ones that buzz around you head and occasionally bite you. These were mother fucking giant African mosquitoes, the size of thumbnails, that given the chance would suck every ounce of blood out of you, and they try to!
The campsite we had been designated was just too damn swampy for us to even put a tent on, so we moved to the next site along. Whilst getting some stuff together, the guy from the front desk dove by us and I flagging him down. He looked confused and in pain even before I had said anything. I told him that the site was way too swampy and that we had moved over one site. He looked at the two sites, got even more confused, and then informed me that I had to go to the front desk and tell them we had moved. I figured that this was only because his little brain would explode if he had to try to retain this small piece of information for more than a few seconds.
Fine. I got in the car and drove back round to the front desk. No sooner had I walked in through the door a chubby blonde girl screamed at me.
"Can I help you?!"
"Yes. I'm staying in site 32, and I've moved next door to site 34. I'm just letting you know."
A look of pure disgust covered her face, "You just can't do that. Let me see if it's free."
Baring in mind that we were the ONLY people staying in the campsite, I didn't foresee this being a problem, but you never know when dealing with such simple people.
She clicked away at her computer and without even turning round to face me said, "36 is taken."
"Excuse me?" now I was confused.
She sighed, they must get training in sighing here. "You're in 34 and want to move to 36. 36 is taken."
Did this really have to be this hard?
My turn to sigh, "No. We're in 32 and want to move to 34."
"Oh," more sighing, "I didn't understand you. That should be O.K., but don't do it again."
On any normal day I would have happily spent the next 20 mins berating her on her stupidity, but luckily for her, I just wasn't in the mood. I just left and headed back to the tent.
Candice is really sick, I knew how she felt, I'd been there a few days earlier. She just crawled up in a ball in the tent whilst I made beef stew for dinner, and the mosquitoes feasted on flesh. By this time it had got dark and I looked up to see half the sky periodically lit up with the impending thunderstorms. It looked beautiful, but I knew we were going to be in for another rough night. Tired of being dinner for another life form, I climbed into the tent and started to write this blog entry. I managed to get to Arkansas before i had to stop. There was a lot of clattering going on on the table where I had left our dinner bowls.
I wasn't aware of the wildlife situation in Louisiana, and didn't know what was outside finishing off our stew. I got my boots on, grabbed my axe and flashlight, and looked outside. Thankfully it was only a racoon munching away on the beef Candice hadn't eaten. I shooed him away, stuck the bowls in the car and headed back to the tent, but I had lost my inspiration to continue writing.
I don't know what time the thunderstorm got to us, but it just lit up the sky and dropped bucket loads on us for hours. Within no time at all everything in the tent was wet, yet again. We huddled together on the only dry part and tried to sleep. When morning came everything was again soaked through, but there was a laundry room by the bathrooms which allowed us to dry it all out, once Candice had driven miles out of camp to get change because they didn't have any at the front desk. Fucking retards.
This done we packed up and headed to New Orleans and a few nights in a hotel. Typically the weather was now getting better.
It was snowing, lovely sleet snow. I was sick, really fucking sick. Candice drove the ENTIRE width of Montana in sleet snow that day, but we made it across the border into Wyoming. Unfortunately, that left us in 32 degree snow, but we had factored this and had planned to get a motel room. No point being sick and cold at the same time. We bathed that night, just beautiful.
The next day, Candice drove again, all the way to Nebraska, across the corner of Wyoming.
Wyoming, even though the weather was disgusting, is a pretty dismal place. Temperature wasn't much better when we got there, still snow, still cold. But, we managed to stay in a really seedy motel that had a nice collection of drunks scattered around, and what I think was a crack den in the next room. Oh, and I was still sick, getting worse, and finding it hard to do anything and breath at the same time. So much fun.
Friday, even though I was sick and unable to breath and move, I decided I could drive, so we split the driving through Nebraska. Thank fuck for that. Candice told me her dad had driven through Nebraska and never, ever wanted to do it again.
I share his feelings on this matter.
I NEVER, EVER want to have to visit Nebraska again, let alone drive any part of it. It's flat, depressing and boring. So much so that there was not one bumper sticker in the TWO State Parks, or any gas station we stopped at. Apparently, even Nebraskans think their State isn't worth celebrating on the back of a car.
Once into Kansas, it was getting late and we needed to get to a campground. This achieved, I started to set up the tent. It took me 10 mins to get two tent pegs in as I just couldn't catch my breath. Candice had to help me finish putting the tent up! She made up Chicken Noodle soup, I was hungry but I didn't have any appetite. Four spoonfuls and I was done. I looked at my phone and this was when we realized we would be in for a long night.
Wunderground said the temperature was going to get down to about 25, with winds up to 25 m.p.h; oh, and freezing rain in the morning.
We went to bed at 5 pm knowing it was going to be rough. And it was. I got half hour naps here and there, huddled under all the blankets with Treacle, constantly worried the tent was about to tear off the top of us! When we woke in the morning there was a sheet, yes a sheet, of ice covering the whole tent, and it was seriously fucking cold.
I was a mess and couldn't even help her put down the tent, I just had to sit in the car as it warmed up, trying to catch my breath. We then just started driving again and made it through to Missouri, and warmer temperatures.
We stayed at this massive campsite, filled to the brim with giant RV's. Even thought we were exhausted, and needed the rest, we could only stay one night there because they were booked up for the weekend. We decided to hit up Branson, and then camp just over the state line in The Ozarks, Arkansas.
"Just over the state line" ended up being a three hour drive through The Ozarks, but we eventually found a campsite in a forest on the top of one of the hills in the mountain range. It was great until we couldn't light a fire because all the wood around was wet from the previous week of rain, and then the next installment dumped on us. We spent the next 36 hours in the tent, in varying degrees of rainfall, but we needed to not be driving. By the second night, everything in the tent was wet, sorry, soaked. We sat reading, I read Bill Clinton's autobiography, which worked out handy the next day! By 7 in the morning we were done and just threw everything in the car and headed to Little Rock.
In Little Rock is the William J. Clinton Presidential Library. A seriously Fucking Awesome place!
I can't explain here how great this place is but I URGE you to take time out of your life to go there. (Those of you who know me know that I don't say that about very many places at all.) It is an experience that person should have. They have his Mustang and Presidential Limo, correspondents between him and many famous peeps, and a recreation of his Oval Office and Cabinet Room! When you look at how much he achieved in those eight years, it's truly humbling, and gives hope for the next eight years.
We dried all our stuff at a laundromat and stayed at a motel in Hot Springs, childhood home of Bill Clinton.
Hot Springs is run by the National Park Service. It's a strip along the street that contains the bathhouses that used to operate there. They were more like old school spas that catered to rich people wanting to fix their ailments. One of them has been restored to look like it did at the peak in the twenties and is a museum you can wander around. It's interesting to get a snap shot of life at a different time.
Although it was a pretty warm day, it was not going to last and we were completely done with the weather by now and decided to head to New Orleans, and bizarrely the quickest way was back up through Memphis and then straight down. So off to Memphis we drove.
We stopped there for a drink on Beale St and talked to a bartender who told us a few things we should see in New Orleans then it was back on the road again. The weather report said it was going to rain, again, pretty much all night, so being limited on funds and tired of getting soaked, we slept in the car and a State fishing reserve. Not the most comfortable nights sleep, but we were dry when we woke up. Funny enough, so was everything outside, it hadn't rained at all. Fucking figures! I got out the car to make us some coffee on the burner in the crisp, cloudy morning air. The water was just about to boil, when everything around me went completely silent and then I heard a hiss getting increasingly louder. "Oh no," I thought.
Yep, you guessed it. The heavens opened and ten tons of rain dumped on me. I ran under a tree, and that didn't help at all. A minute later it was over, I was wet, and it was another great start to the day.
If we weren't done before, we certainly were now. Candice was getting sicker, I was getting better, and we had both had enough of the God damn world.
After finding a State Park in Louisiana, we drove on, preparing ourselves for another happy night in the tent. We made it to Tickfaw State Park, dealt with the retard at the front desk and paid $15 for a campsite in the middle of a swamp.
I know that I am prone to exaggeration, but unfortunately, I'm not this time.
The guy at the front desk was really simple, let me recount the story:
We pull at the office and I wind down the window as he opens his window.
"Yes?" he asks.
"I want a campsite for the night," I reply.
"Tent?" he says inaudibly.
"What?" I need him to repeat.
"Tent?" he says again.
"Yes," I reply, looking out behind the car to make sure I haven't been dragging someone else's RV across two states.
"OK," he gives me a look like I'm seriously insane, asks for I.D. and then stares at his computer screen with a look of confusion and constipation. "Have you been here before?"
"Nope."
He sighs, not the answer he wanted, "Would you like to be near the bathrooms or... not?"
"Near would be fine," I answer.
Lots of sighing, clicking and constipated looks follow. "Here's a map, and the gate combination."
I was slightly confused as to why I needed a combination to a gate I had already entered through, but I didn't want to trouble his already overloaded, simple brain with the question, and so on we drove to find our campsite.
It tuns out that the campsites are in the middle of a swamp and arranged in a circle, so technically everyone of them is close to the bathrooms. When I say swamp, I really mean swamp. I could stand by the tent and spit into the middle of the swamp. The swamp had been fitted with overflow pipes to keep the water level down, very handy, but the overflows poured right into the campsites. There was a small square sand box for us to put the tent on and everything else all around us was stagnant swamp, filled with mosquitoes. They weren't west coast mosquitoes, you know the small annoying ones that buzz around you head and occasionally bite you. These were mother fucking giant African mosquitoes, the size of thumbnails, that given the chance would suck every ounce of blood out of you, and they try to!
The campsite we had been designated was just too damn swampy for us to even put a tent on, so we moved to the next site along. Whilst getting some stuff together, the guy from the front desk dove by us and I flagging him down. He looked confused and in pain even before I had said anything. I told him that the site was way too swampy and that we had moved over one site. He looked at the two sites, got even more confused, and then informed me that I had to go to the front desk and tell them we had moved. I figured that this was only because his little brain would explode if he had to try to retain this small piece of information for more than a few seconds.
Fine. I got in the car and drove back round to the front desk. No sooner had I walked in through the door a chubby blonde girl screamed at me.
"Can I help you?!"
"Yes. I'm staying in site 32, and I've moved next door to site 34. I'm just letting you know."
A look of pure disgust covered her face, "You just can't do that. Let me see if it's free."
Baring in mind that we were the ONLY people staying in the campsite, I didn't foresee this being a problem, but you never know when dealing with such simple people.
She clicked away at her computer and without even turning round to face me said, "36 is taken."
"Excuse me?" now I was confused.
She sighed, they must get training in sighing here. "You're in 34 and want to move to 36. 36 is taken."
Did this really have to be this hard?
My turn to sigh, "No. We're in 32 and want to move to 34."
"Oh," more sighing, "I didn't understand you. That should be O.K., but don't do it again."
On any normal day I would have happily spent the next 20 mins berating her on her stupidity, but luckily for her, I just wasn't in the mood. I just left and headed back to the tent.
Candice is really sick, I knew how she felt, I'd been there a few days earlier. She just crawled up in a ball in the tent whilst I made beef stew for dinner, and the mosquitoes feasted on flesh. By this time it had got dark and I looked up to see half the sky periodically lit up with the impending thunderstorms. It looked beautiful, but I knew we were going to be in for another rough night. Tired of being dinner for another life form, I climbed into the tent and started to write this blog entry. I managed to get to Arkansas before i had to stop. There was a lot of clattering going on on the table where I had left our dinner bowls.
I wasn't aware of the wildlife situation in Louisiana, and didn't know what was outside finishing off our stew. I got my boots on, grabbed my axe and flashlight, and looked outside. Thankfully it was only a racoon munching away on the beef Candice hadn't eaten. I shooed him away, stuck the bowls in the car and headed back to the tent, but I had lost my inspiration to continue writing.
I don't know what time the thunderstorm got to us, but it just lit up the sky and dropped bucket loads on us for hours. Within no time at all everything in the tent was wet, yet again. We huddled together on the only dry part and tried to sleep. When morning came everything was again soaked through, but there was a laundry room by the bathrooms which allowed us to dry it all out, once Candice had driven miles out of camp to get change because they didn't have any at the front desk. Fucking retards.
This done we packed up and headed to New Orleans and a few nights in a hotel. Typically the weather was now getting better.
Oct 13, 2009
Into the South
We check out of the Hot Springs National Park in the morning after drying out some more of our stuff with the heater in our hotel room. Hot Springs National Park is a collection of Bath Houses along a street in a town in western Arkansas. I think there are 10 buildings, and the NPS has restored one of them to what it was like in the early 20th century when bathing was at its peak. People like Al Capone went to this bath house where men's and women's bathing was separate. The bath house had separate bathing stalls for everyone, a gym, changing rooms that included a vanity and a bed for resting, and separate deck spaces for men and women to enjoy the sun. At that time people went to bath houses to cure their physical ailments.
From there we went to Beale St. in Memphis, Tennessee and had a drink at a bar there. The bartender told us about Marie Leveau the Voodoo Queen and how we should go see her grave in New Orleans. He'd lived there when he was going to school. He also told us to check out these French doughnuts at Cafe du Monde in Jackson Square.
When we checked the weather we found that it was going to rain again and having almost no money, we couldn't get another hotel room. So we slept in the car in the parking lot of a State park while, as fate would have it, no rain poured down that night.
It did start pouring at about 8 in the morning though, so it's good we didn't set up the tent because everything would have been soaked in trying to get it to the car. From there in Northern Mississippi we travel south to Jackson and then take the Natchez Trace all the way to Natchez. On the way I finally get my Sausage McMuffin and it doesn't taste nearly as good in reality as it did in my head. The Natchez Trace is a very old trail that goes from Natchez (on the Mississippi in the South) to Kentucky in the North. Originally it was a native american trail used for herding bison, then when white people colonized the area and started growing crops, they would sail to Natchez with their goods, sell them and set off back home on the Trace. Once steamboats started going up the Mississippi people stopped using the Trace, but it was turned into a National Scenic Highway and there are plenty of interesting stops along the way. We stop at a waterfall, an old inn and plantation and a trail that goes through an old part of the trace (you can see how travelers wore it down into a small canyon, almost like an empty creek bed but about 3 times as deep).
That night we stop at the Tickfaw State Park in Arkansas where I'm feeling really bad and Alex is feeling okay and it rains so hard it soaks through all our bedding in 3 hours. During the first hour I can feel it on the edge of my sleeping bag. During the next hour I have to move off half the bag because it's soaked. The next hour I feel everything wet at my feet, puddles of water were accumulating. Then by the end of the fourth hour everything was wet again except a little high spot on Alex's side. I sit up and say, "why is your side always dry and mine is always soaked? It's not fair! I hate this fucking rain and this swamp!" Alex tells me to sleep where he's sleeping and takes my side of the tent. I say no at first but I'm feeling too bad to sleep in the wetness all night. Even sleeping there, my feet were wet all night and I had only a wet blanket to cover me. The next day I'm a bit delirious from not sleeping and from being sick and cold. I'm not making much sense and all my efforts to help just annoy Alex. We get all our stuff dry in the laundromat at the state park after I have to drive 10 miles to get change from a gas station for the laundry machines.
From there we went to Beale St. in Memphis, Tennessee and had a drink at a bar there. The bartender told us about Marie Leveau the Voodoo Queen and how we should go see her grave in New Orleans. He'd lived there when he was going to school. He also told us to check out these French doughnuts at Cafe du Monde in Jackson Square.
When we checked the weather we found that it was going to rain again and having almost no money, we couldn't get another hotel room. So we slept in the car in the parking lot of a State park while, as fate would have it, no rain poured down that night.
It did start pouring at about 8 in the morning though, so it's good we didn't set up the tent because everything would have been soaked in trying to get it to the car. From there in Northern Mississippi we travel south to Jackson and then take the Natchez Trace all the way to Natchez. On the way I finally get my Sausage McMuffin and it doesn't taste nearly as good in reality as it did in my head. The Natchez Trace is a very old trail that goes from Natchez (on the Mississippi in the South) to Kentucky in the North. Originally it was a native american trail used for herding bison, then when white people colonized the area and started growing crops, they would sail to Natchez with their goods, sell them and set off back home on the Trace. Once steamboats started going up the Mississippi people stopped using the Trace, but it was turned into a National Scenic Highway and there are plenty of interesting stops along the way. We stop at a waterfall, an old inn and plantation and a trail that goes through an old part of the trace (you can see how travelers wore it down into a small canyon, almost like an empty creek bed but about 3 times as deep).
That night we stop at the Tickfaw State Park in Arkansas where I'm feeling really bad and Alex is feeling okay and it rains so hard it soaks through all our bedding in 3 hours. During the first hour I can feel it on the edge of my sleeping bag. During the next hour I have to move off half the bag because it's soaked. The next hour I feel everything wet at my feet, puddles of water were accumulating. Then by the end of the fourth hour everything was wet again except a little high spot on Alex's side. I sit up and say, "why is your side always dry and mine is always soaked? It's not fair! I hate this fucking rain and this swamp!" Alex tells me to sleep where he's sleeping and takes my side of the tent. I say no at first but I'm feeling too bad to sleep in the wetness all night. Even sleeping there, my feet were wet all night and I had only a wet blanket to cover me. The next day I'm a bit delirious from not sleeping and from being sick and cold. I'm not making much sense and all my efforts to help just annoy Alex. We get all our stuff dry in the laundromat at the state park after I have to drive 10 miles to get change from a gas station for the laundry machines.
Oct 12, 2009
The Rusty Humpfrey Show
A few days ago, while we were in the Ozarks, I took out our wind-up radio and searched for something interesting to listen to. I landed on Mountain Dog Radio which was playing the Rusty Humpfrey Show. He started off his show by shaming all the other radio shows for their coverage of Columbus Day which he believe they paint in too negative a light, "I can't believe what you all are doing to Columbus. The man that started this great nation. It is because of him that we have anything at all." He went on to say that civilization is better than running around in deerskin. That there are better kinds of civilization and the West's is the best.
Next he went on to Global Warming, where he says, "IT DOESN'T EXIST!" Then he goes on to list a number of temperatures in the US, all amazingly cold for this time of year. Wyoming 29 degrees, Helena 9 degrees, Kansas 35 degrees, etc. "We've been in global cooling for three years. Now, Global Warming is great: more sun means longer growing seasons which leads to more food which lowers the cost of food, which leaves more expendable income. Now, global cooling now thats a real problem because it leads to shorter growing seasons, less food, higher prices and no disposable income because you've spent all your money on food and gas and housing."
Later, he had on Larry Klayman author of the book "Whores: Why and How I Came to Fight the Establishment". During the show this guy self-titled himself a legal revolutionary. He believes that, "the state of the United States during the 2008 election was similar to Germany before they elected Hitler". He said that, "We have a socialist in the whitehouse who's using us for his own pleasure." He also believes that we need to stage a Second American Revolution. That we need to take the government out of control and reinstate a new one. He has a website: freedomwatchusa.org.
Also, you can get the Rusty Humpfrey Show podcast for 10/12/09 if you'd like to listen to the show.
Next he went on to Global Warming, where he says, "IT DOESN'T EXIST!" Then he goes on to list a number of temperatures in the US, all amazingly cold for this time of year. Wyoming 29 degrees, Helena 9 degrees, Kansas 35 degrees, etc. "We've been in global cooling for three years. Now, Global Warming is great: more sun means longer growing seasons which leads to more food which lowers the cost of food, which leaves more expendable income. Now, global cooling now thats a real problem because it leads to shorter growing seasons, less food, higher prices and no disposable income because you've spent all your money on food and gas and housing."
Later, he had on Larry Klayman author of the book "Whores: Why and How I Came to Fight the Establishment". During the show this guy self-titled himself a legal revolutionary. He believes that, "the state of the United States during the 2008 election was similar to Germany before they elected Hitler". He said that, "We have a socialist in the whitehouse who's using us for his own pleasure." He also believes that we need to stage a Second American Revolution. That we need to take the government out of control and reinstate a new one. He has a website: freedomwatchusa.org.
Also, you can get the Rusty Humpfrey Show podcast for 10/12/09 if you'd like to listen to the show.
Oct 11, 2009
The Bill Clinton Land
The next morning we find out that the campsites are actually all booked for the weekend so we can't stay any more days there and have to move on. We decide to go to the Ozarks in Arkansas because they're close and we can see the showtown of Branson on the way.
It takes Alex 2 hours to drive to Branson, about 1 hour longer than we thought it would. When we get there we're not feeling good and we're getting dangerously short with each other about everything. When we're there I keep asking Alex what he wants to do and he doesn't give me an answer and asks me what I want to do but I don't give an answer because I don't know if he wants to do what I want to do and I don't want to hear him sighing at me. Plus I'm tired and sick and really just want to get in the car and find a place to camp for two days and rest. After checking out Old Downtown Branson, home of 200 theaters we head for the Ozarks. Alex drives for 3 hours into Arkansas before we get to a campsite in the Ozarks. This is about 2 hours longer than we though it would take. When we get to the campsite everything around us is wet. We're both exhausted and sick and can't go any further so we set up camp. Then we check the weather and find out that it's going to rain. As the sun is going down Alex tries to light a fire and as the small thing dwindles and dies in its infancy all hope leaves me and I fall into despair: everything we have is going to get wet, I can barely do anything because my body is so tired, the weather just won't let us be, we're running out of food, I'm fucking cold, in short everything is horrible. I totally break down in the tent and Alex consoles me, "It's not so bad, everything's going to be fine. We'll dry everything out. And we'll stay here for a couple days so we can rest." Bad idea us.
After the first night half of everything is wet. All day long it rains off and on but not nice rain. It's big droplets and the humidity is about 96% so everything is wet if it's outside. To cheer us up we read our books and play with the hamster. We let her run over everything in the tent and she makes us both feel a lot better. We make our food in the tent that night and after dinner we assess the wetness and listen to really really conservative radio. Since basically everything below our knees is wet we decide to use our one dry sleeping bag to cover our legs and use the damp comforter to cover our upper halves. This works pretty well until the rain starts dumping down in the middle of the night soaking everything under and around us except a little part of ground under Alex. I stay as long as I can in the tent but soon my knees and ankles start to ache from the wetness and the cold so I go to the car at about 3:00 AM. I can't go back to sleep after 7 so I listen to NPR to see what's happening in the world. Healthcare was the big issue that morning. At about 8:30 Alex starts toward the car with some things from the tent. I jump out and start helping him bring stuff in, everything is totally soaked. It is so wet outside that I take off my jacket and wear as little as possible because it's all getting drenched. We squeeze out as much water as we can from the stuff and throw it all in the car hoping to dry it at a laundry sometime soon.
From the Ozarks we head to Little Rock to the William J. Clinton Presidential Library. The library is huge and includes two of Clinton's cars plus recreations of his Oval Office and Cabinet Room. It also chronicles everything that he did during his presidency, which is just so much it's amazing, and it has letters between the president, first lady and many famous and interesting people. One of my favorites was from Mother Theresa to the First Lady. It was still pouring rain when we leave the library and go to a laundromat. At the laundromat I am being argumentative because I'm sick of this whole trip and Alex and I have a big fight over coffee. I know, coffee. We go get the damn coffee and then make up while the stuff is going through its second cycle. I'm being argumentative. You're being pessimistic. . . I'm sorry.
From there, since we know it's going to rain again, we pay for a hotel in Hot Springs, Arkansas the boyhood home of Bill Clinton.
That night I'm feeling really sick and we find out that the quickest way to New Orleans is by going through Memphis, Tennessee.
It takes Alex 2 hours to drive to Branson, about 1 hour longer than we thought it would. When we get there we're not feeling good and we're getting dangerously short with each other about everything. When we're there I keep asking Alex what he wants to do and he doesn't give me an answer and asks me what I want to do but I don't give an answer because I don't know if he wants to do what I want to do and I don't want to hear him sighing at me. Plus I'm tired and sick and really just want to get in the car and find a place to camp for two days and rest. After checking out Old Downtown Branson, home of 200 theaters we head for the Ozarks. Alex drives for 3 hours into Arkansas before we get to a campsite in the Ozarks. This is about 2 hours longer than we though it would take. When we get to the campsite everything around us is wet. We're both exhausted and sick and can't go any further so we set up camp. Then we check the weather and find out that it's going to rain. As the sun is going down Alex tries to light a fire and as the small thing dwindles and dies in its infancy all hope leaves me and I fall into despair: everything we have is going to get wet, I can barely do anything because my body is so tired, the weather just won't let us be, we're running out of food, I'm fucking cold, in short everything is horrible. I totally break down in the tent and Alex consoles me, "It's not so bad, everything's going to be fine. We'll dry everything out. And we'll stay here for a couple days so we can rest." Bad idea us.
After the first night half of everything is wet. All day long it rains off and on but not nice rain. It's big droplets and the humidity is about 96% so everything is wet if it's outside. To cheer us up we read our books and play with the hamster. We let her run over everything in the tent and she makes us both feel a lot better. We make our food in the tent that night and after dinner we assess the wetness and listen to really really conservative radio. Since basically everything below our knees is wet we decide to use our one dry sleeping bag to cover our legs and use the damp comforter to cover our upper halves. This works pretty well until the rain starts dumping down in the middle of the night soaking everything under and around us except a little part of ground under Alex. I stay as long as I can in the tent but soon my knees and ankles start to ache from the wetness and the cold so I go to the car at about 3:00 AM. I can't go back to sleep after 7 so I listen to NPR to see what's happening in the world. Healthcare was the big issue that morning. At about 8:30 Alex starts toward the car with some things from the tent. I jump out and start helping him bring stuff in, everything is totally soaked. It is so wet outside that I take off my jacket and wear as little as possible because it's all getting drenched. We squeeze out as much water as we can from the stuff and throw it all in the car hoping to dry it at a laundry sometime soon.
From the Ozarks we head to Little Rock to the William J. Clinton Presidential Library. The library is huge and includes two of Clinton's cars plus recreations of his Oval Office and Cabinet Room. It also chronicles everything that he did during his presidency, which is just so much it's amazing, and it has letters between the president, first lady and many famous and interesting people. One of my favorites was from Mother Theresa to the First Lady. It was still pouring rain when we leave the library and go to a laundromat. At the laundromat I am being argumentative because I'm sick of this whole trip and Alex and I have a big fight over coffee. I know, coffee. We go get the damn coffee and then make up while the stuff is going through its second cycle. I'm being argumentative. You're being pessimistic. . . I'm sorry.
From there, since we know it's going to rain again, we pay for a hotel in Hot Springs, Arkansas the boyhood home of Bill Clinton.
That night I'm feeling really sick and we find out that the quickest way to New Orleans is by going through Memphis, Tennessee.
Oct 8, 2009
My dad has always told me that he never EVER wants to drive through Nebraska again. When he was in college he purposefully went around it to the north or the south just to avoid the boring state. I didn't think that was possible, I thought that there had to be some interesting things about it. I was mistaken.
We left the seedy crack motel in the morning and I drove to Chimney Rock. When I finally saw it I was pretty excited. When we left, I had no idea that I was leaving the most interesting scenery in Nebraska behind us only to be confronted with flat fields for the next two days. Alex does over half the drive today because I'm really starting to come down with it. At times my whole body is so sore that all I can do is sit in my seat trying to relax and gaze blurredly out at the fields passing my window. Every time I cough I sit in pain for about 5 minutes as my body recovers from the movement.
When we get to Kansas Alex has used up most of his reserves and can barely breathe in the cold air. He manages to put two tent pegs in the ground alone and then I help him put in the other two and put up the tent. I make us some chicken noodle soup and fried bread hoping that'll make us feel better. Alex has a few spoonfuls and then can't eat anymore. This is when we look at the weather and find out that it's going to be 25 degrees tonight with 25 mph wind and freezing rain. We have very little money and there's nothing around so we go to bed at 5 saying that if it gets too bad we'll sleep in the car or pack everything up and head south.
Everything is okay for a few hours, but then the wind picks up and the way it blows through the trees it sounds like the entire ocean dumping waves down 10 feet away. Crash, crash, woosh! The tent is periodically blasted with a huge gust, and I spend most of the night looking at the tent cover worried that I'm gonna have to go outside and find it if it blows off. Then I remember that we left our burner with a pot on it outside and I worry that I won't be able to find that in the morning. Then the freezing rain starts. It blasts the sides of the tent over and over. It's steadily getting colder and Alex and I are holding each other to keep from freezing. At about 5 in the morning it lets up a bit and Alex and I sleep for maybe 3 hours. When we go outside we find the ENTIRE tent covered in a thin sheet of ice. I hit the outside of the tent and shards of ice break off and fall to the ground.
We decide to split up the labor, me outside packing things up and Alex inside the car packing things in. We decided on this because I felt a lot better than he did after that horrible night. I get everything inside the tent packed up and to him. As I'm putting the tent away, with no gloves, my hands start to freeze. I look at them, they're not the colour they should be and I run back to the car and start to cry. Alex says, "Let me go out there and finish the tent."
"No" I say through tears, "you're sicker than me. You stay here and I'll go finish the tent." Putting away the stupid tears, I hate being a Cancer sometimes, I get Alex's gloves and go back out into the 20 degree weather to put away the tent. I get so frustrated with the tarp when it won't roll up that I throw it down on the ground and yell at it. Finally I get everything in the car and start driving. To where exactly I don't know but I'm getting out of this fucking cold TODAY.
For two hours I drive down highways in Kansas. Everything is covered in ice and the car likes to drift back and forth on the asphalt. At about 11:00, in the middle of Kansas we stop at an IHOP and get breakfast. I figure even though we have limited resources, this is a time when a hot meal made by someone else is in order. We must have looked like death when we walked in: pale with rings around our eyes from not sleeping, our clothes three days old, our hair a mess under our hats. I have chorizo with eggs, hashbrowns and tortillas; Alex has the Breakfast Sampler which has eggs, hash browns, pancakes, bacon and sausage. We drink 3 cups of coffee each before we decide it's time to get back on the road again.
After another 4 hours of driving we stop in Wichita for Mochas at a Starbucks. Oh sweet mochas! They give us enough boost to keep going the next 3 hours into MIssouri. In those three hours we start to see trees on the landscape. Not just your normal trees either, fall coloured trees. The landscape gets a little more hilly and we find ourselves in the Mark Twain National Forest well after the sun has set, putting up our tent to in the light of the car's headlamps.
We left the seedy crack motel in the morning and I drove to Chimney Rock. When I finally saw it I was pretty excited. When we left, I had no idea that I was leaving the most interesting scenery in Nebraska behind us only to be confronted with flat fields for the next two days. Alex does over half the drive today because I'm really starting to come down with it. At times my whole body is so sore that all I can do is sit in my seat trying to relax and gaze blurredly out at the fields passing my window. Every time I cough I sit in pain for about 5 minutes as my body recovers from the movement.
When we get to Kansas Alex has used up most of his reserves and can barely breathe in the cold air. He manages to put two tent pegs in the ground alone and then I help him put in the other two and put up the tent. I make us some chicken noodle soup and fried bread hoping that'll make us feel better. Alex has a few spoonfuls and then can't eat anymore. This is when we look at the weather and find out that it's going to be 25 degrees tonight with 25 mph wind and freezing rain. We have very little money and there's nothing around so we go to bed at 5 saying that if it gets too bad we'll sleep in the car or pack everything up and head south.
Everything is okay for a few hours, but then the wind picks up and the way it blows through the trees it sounds like the entire ocean dumping waves down 10 feet away. Crash, crash, woosh! The tent is periodically blasted with a huge gust, and I spend most of the night looking at the tent cover worried that I'm gonna have to go outside and find it if it blows off. Then I remember that we left our burner with a pot on it outside and I worry that I won't be able to find that in the morning. Then the freezing rain starts. It blasts the sides of the tent over and over. It's steadily getting colder and Alex and I are holding each other to keep from freezing. At about 5 in the morning it lets up a bit and Alex and I sleep for maybe 3 hours. When we go outside we find the ENTIRE tent covered in a thin sheet of ice. I hit the outside of the tent and shards of ice break off and fall to the ground.
We decide to split up the labor, me outside packing things up and Alex inside the car packing things in. We decided on this because I felt a lot better than he did after that horrible night. I get everything inside the tent packed up and to him. As I'm putting the tent away, with no gloves, my hands start to freeze. I look at them, they're not the colour they should be and I run back to the car and start to cry. Alex says, "Let me go out there and finish the tent."
"No" I say through tears, "you're sicker than me. You stay here and I'll go finish the tent." Putting away the stupid tears, I hate being a Cancer sometimes, I get Alex's gloves and go back out into the 20 degree weather to put away the tent. I get so frustrated with the tarp when it won't roll up that I throw it down on the ground and yell at it. Finally I get everything in the car and start driving. To where exactly I don't know but I'm getting out of this fucking cold TODAY.
For two hours I drive down highways in Kansas. Everything is covered in ice and the car likes to drift back and forth on the asphalt. At about 11:00, in the middle of Kansas we stop at an IHOP and get breakfast. I figure even though we have limited resources, this is a time when a hot meal made by someone else is in order. We must have looked like death when we walked in: pale with rings around our eyes from not sleeping, our clothes three days old, our hair a mess under our hats. I have chorizo with eggs, hashbrowns and tortillas; Alex has the Breakfast Sampler which has eggs, hash browns, pancakes, bacon and sausage. We drink 3 cups of coffee each before we decide it's time to get back on the road again.
After another 4 hours of driving we stop in Wichita for Mochas at a Starbucks. Oh sweet mochas! They give us enough boost to keep going the next 3 hours into MIssouri. In those three hours we start to see trees on the landscape. Not just your normal trees either, fall coloured trees. The landscape gets a little more hilly and we find ourselves in the Mark Twain National Forest well after the sun has set, putting up our tent to in the light of the car's headlamps.
Oct 6, 2009
Through Wyoming
We wake up and I make some coffee on our burner in the room. We don't eat breakfast because I want to get on the road and Alex isn't hungry. Then we pack everything in the car and I start driving to Nebraska because Alex is still too sick. After driving for about an hour I start to get hungry and I really really want a sausage and egg McMuffin; my family used to eat them in the morning when we moved. So I ask Alex if he wants to go to McDonalds. He says yes and when we get there breakfast is over so we get chicken McNuggets, but my craving continues. Eastern Wyoming is a succession of hills covered in snow. Hill after hill, nothing but snow. Very few houses let alone towns.
As I drive on we are consistently dropping elevation and as we drop the snow gets thinner and thinner. The white hilly expanse gives way to a yellow hilly expanse. We turn off the freeway onto a county highway and make our way towards Scottsbluff and Chimney Rock. I've always wanted to come here since I played the Oregon Trail game on the computer when I was young. You know, you were robbed by bandits and they stole 2 oxen and 1 wheel. I always loved getting to Chimney Rock in the game and always wanted to see it with my own two eyes.
When we get to Nebraska the temperature is 39 degrees, about the same as Sheradin, and 10 degrees warmer than Helena. I look online for a cheap Motel in Scottsbluff and find one on the outskirts of town. We drive by it the first time because it looks really seedy. There are three buildings built in the shape of a U with a parking lot in the center. Outside of the rooms are barbeques and groups of 2-3 guys smoking. The parking lot is filled with cheap cars and trucks. I ask Alex if it's okay and he says "Yes" he's really tired from the road and anywhere with a bed is good to him. So I drive back and park up outside the office. When I go in there's a really haggard looking woman behind the counter smoking a cigarette and she asks me, "Can I help you?"
"How much would a queen room be for tonight?"
"$56"
"How about with a AAA discount?"
"I could maybe go to $51."
I should haggle with her but I don't; "Okay." I fill out the papers and get the key and drive us to the room.
This is when I find out that we have $100 left of everything we made in Helena. A lot of it was used but I had no idea it was that much. When I park I just sit there for a minute and put my head down on the driving wheel. Alex makes a little "Oh" noise and puts his hand on my back and leans over and kisses the back of my head. I'm exhausted from driving 700 miles in the snow and cold for 2 days. At the beginning of the trip I was trying not to get sick, but all the moving has made that impossible. For the past day I've just been trying to hold it off but it looks like now it's gonna happen. I pull myself out of the car with my camera, some Heinz tomato soup, the brew back and my sweatpants. Alex also gets out of the car and we go and lie down on the bed. I take a bath and transfer money from my bank account to my credit card before I fall asleep, now we have $400 until my grandmothers check comes through when my parents get back from Hawaii. Next door some Iraq war Vets are having a party with people coming and going all night. They keep me awake. By morning I'm a bit delirious as the sickness begins.
As I drive on we are consistently dropping elevation and as we drop the snow gets thinner and thinner. The white hilly expanse gives way to a yellow hilly expanse. We turn off the freeway onto a county highway and make our way towards Scottsbluff and Chimney Rock. I've always wanted to come here since I played the Oregon Trail game on the computer when I was young. You know, you were robbed by bandits and they stole 2 oxen and 1 wheel. I always loved getting to Chimney Rock in the game and always wanted to see it with my own two eyes.
When we get to Nebraska the temperature is 39 degrees, about the same as Sheradin, and 10 degrees warmer than Helena. I look online for a cheap Motel in Scottsbluff and find one on the outskirts of town. We drive by it the first time because it looks really seedy. There are three buildings built in the shape of a U with a parking lot in the center. Outside of the rooms are barbeques and groups of 2-3 guys smoking. The parking lot is filled with cheap cars and trucks. I ask Alex if it's okay and he says "Yes" he's really tired from the road and anywhere with a bed is good to him. So I drive back and park up outside the office. When I go in there's a really haggard looking woman behind the counter smoking a cigarette and she asks me, "Can I help you?"
"How much would a queen room be for tonight?"
"$56"
"How about with a AAA discount?"
"I could maybe go to $51."
I should haggle with her but I don't; "Okay." I fill out the papers and get the key and drive us to the room.
This is when I find out that we have $100 left of everything we made in Helena. A lot of it was used but I had no idea it was that much. When I park I just sit there for a minute and put my head down on the driving wheel. Alex makes a little "Oh" noise and puts his hand on my back and leans over and kisses the back of my head. I'm exhausted from driving 700 miles in the snow and cold for 2 days. At the beginning of the trip I was trying not to get sick, but all the moving has made that impossible. For the past day I've just been trying to hold it off but it looks like now it's gonna happen. I pull myself out of the car with my camera, some Heinz tomato soup, the brew back and my sweatpants. Alex also gets out of the car and we go and lie down on the bed. I take a bath and transfer money from my bank account to my credit card before I fall asleep, now we have $400 until my grandmothers check comes through when my parents get back from Hawaii. Next door some Iraq war Vets are having a party with people coming and going all night. They keep me awake. By morning I'm a bit delirious as the sickness begins.
Oct 5, 2009
"Alex"dote: Cold
Anyone that knows me will know I do not care for snow; too damn fucking cold. It may look pretty and fall in a wonderful 'Yay! It's Christmas!' kind of way, but it's cold, freezing cold. I mean snow is frozen rain, when it's too cold to even become rain to begin with.
Too damn fucking cold.
Woke up Monday morning to find an inch and a half of snow outside. Still looks pretty, still too damn fucking cold.
Too damn fucking cold.
Woke up Monday morning to find an inch and a half of snow outside. Still looks pretty, still too damn fucking cold.
Through Montana
After picking up some supplies in Wal-Mart we head off toward Wyoming. I am driving because Alex is too sick to sit up straight let alone drive 150 miles. Once we get out of Helena we find ourselves heading straight into a snowstorm. Big snowstorm. I drive through this storm for 2 hours and have to stop and get coffee. I pull off the road at a little town in the middle of nowhere in Montana that has a gas station, a gift shop and a beauty salon/coffee shop. I prepare myself for the snow and dash through it into the beauty salon/coffee shop. When I get in the door, to my right women are getting their nails done, to my left is a beauty gift shop, in the middle of the building is the coffee counter, past that are women getting their hair cut, and past that behind a wall are the tanning beds. Its like a warm ball of pink fluffiness exploded inside the building expelling all the dismal cold outside. The woman behind the coffee counter took 20 minutes to make 2 mochas. 20 minutes. I guess they don't get a lot of coffee customers. And when she gave me back my change she miscounted and only charged me $2 for the drinks.
I dodge back through the snowflakes and deep puddles, coffees in hand and get back on the road. After another hour of driving the snow finally stops and we stop at Little Bighorn Battlefield to see it. But once we get there it starts to snow again and Alex is in no position to be outside in it so I keep driving. We cross over into Wyoming as it's getting dark. When we get to Sheradin we drive around town, Alex is feeling horrible, until we find a Motel 6 and get a room for the night. When we get to the room we bring in as little stuff as possible and get Alex into the bath. While he's taking a bath I look outside to see it snowing all over everything. Everything is covered in white. It must have been snowing here for at least a week. We watch some TV and pass out.
I dodge back through the snowflakes and deep puddles, coffees in hand and get back on the road. After another hour of driving the snow finally stops and we stop at Little Bighorn Battlefield to see it. But once we get there it starts to snow again and Alex is in no position to be outside in it so I keep driving. We cross over into Wyoming as it's getting dark. When we get to Sheradin we drive around town, Alex is feeling horrible, until we find a Motel 6 and get a room for the night. When we get to the room we bring in as little stuff as possible and get Alex into the bath. While he's taking a bath I look outside to see it snowing all over everything. Everything is covered in white. It must have been snowing here for at least a week. We watch some TV and pass out.
Leaving York
On Tuesday Alex and I clean the camper and pack the car. This entails getting dried bacon grease off the stove we've been using and reconsolidating all our stuff. After that's all over, Tuesday night we make steak with rosemary, garlic, salt and pepper for dinner. We know it's gonna be our last good meal for awhile so we decided to make it good. The steak was really yummy and we used up the last of our butter on the baked potatos. Satisfied with our meal and needing rest for the next day we go to sleep only for Alex to start to get sick. At about 12:00 his eyes hurt, then he gets the shivers, then he starts coughing and can't sleep. By 4:00 AM he can barely put one foot in front of the other enough to get to the bathroom.
When we get up at eight in the morning, he's still feeling terrible. I don't know where he gets his strength from, but somehow he packed the rest of our stuff in the car while I finished cleaning everything in the camper. At about 10, we go to Bill's house and give him a card and cookies to thank him for everything he did for us. We tell him that we'll send him postcards and as we pull out of the driveway we write down his address. When we get to York I go into the bar and Naomi is working. I tell her that we're leaving and she gives me one of the warmest hugs I have ever had. She gives me the bar's address and I tell her that I'll write soon.
Then we stop at Steve's place before leaving town. I bring him cookies and a card too. We all sit together and he gives us his friend Beaver's number. Steve says, "He's the nicest guy who ever broke my jaw. And he knows some English people down in Florida. He says he'll make you feel at home." Steve gives Alex and I a hug and then we set off from York.
When we get up at eight in the morning, he's still feeling terrible. I don't know where he gets his strength from, but somehow he packed the rest of our stuff in the car while I finished cleaning everything in the camper. At about 10, we go to Bill's house and give him a card and cookies to thank him for everything he did for us. We tell him that we'll send him postcards and as we pull out of the driveway we write down his address. When we get to York I go into the bar and Naomi is working. I tell her that we're leaving and she gives me one of the warmest hugs I have ever had. She gives me the bar's address and I tell her that I'll write soon.
Then we stop at Steve's place before leaving town. I bring him cookies and a card too. We all sit together and he gives us his friend Beaver's number. Steve says, "He's the nicest guy who ever broke my jaw. And he knows some English people down in Florida. He says he'll make you feel at home." Steve gives Alex and I a hug and then we set off from York.
Oct 4, 2009
"Alex"dote: Snow
We stood smoking under the shed to cover ourselves from the snow fall.
"It's snowing!" she gleefully cried, grinning from ear to ear and jumping up and down on the spot.
She stops, "My cheeks hurt!"
I smile, then walk over to the car, gather some snow from the roof into a ball and walk back toward her.
I throw the ball at her, making contact with her chest, and smile again.
"You hit me with a snowball!" she smiles, cutely. "It's snowing!"
"It's snowing!" she gleefully cried, grinning from ear to ear and jumping up and down on the spot.
She stops, "My cheeks hurt!"
I smile, then walk over to the car, gather some snow from the roof into a ball and walk back toward her.
I throw the ball at her, making contact with her chest, and smile again.
"You hit me with a snowball!" she smiles, cutely. "It's snowing!"
In Helena Today
The radio tells us most everything these days: it told us about the bowling alley, the sale at Power Townsend (the local hardware store), and most importantly the weather. It said yesterday that the snow level would drop to 4300 (we're at 4500) feet last night after midnight. It said the high today would be 48. In actuality, it didn't snow until this morning and the high was 39.
I woke up at 10. I don't know why, but I sleep in really late if I can in the camper. I think it's the bed; I know I won't have one much longer so I want to enjoy it while I can. Anyway, when I woke up Alex told me to come outside. When I did, it was as cold as an ice rink and little snowflakes were falling and melting on the ground. "We'd better get into town soon; I have a feeling once this starts it's not gonna stop." So we started the car, went inside, collected all our laundry, made fresh coffee and started out for Helena.
The car making a little ticking sound we drive the dirt road toward York. We pass Bill's neighbors, the house with a courtyard and a pond, the house that looks like a mansion and belongs in the South, the road bends and bends and then we come to the paved road. This curves past a homestead with 10 cattle, a few smaller houses and finally bursts out into York with it's collection of about 20 houses along the road and stretching out for about 2 miles. Between all the houses are wooden fences or yellowing trees and on all the land green grass still grows.
Then we pass the home with the greenhouse, hydroponic greenhouse that is, with it's chicken coop across the yard. From there rock cuts down to the road on the right side, and the sun where it breaks through the clouds shines brilliant rose, yellow and blue colours from normally gray stone.
From there the land opens up into a vast valley covered in cattle ranches. The sky is soft, a deep gray and I'd like to take a plane up through those clouds and see the sun on the other side. The grass is the same yellow it is before the sun sets. The river, once deep blue as the ocean is now grayer than the asphalt road. No one is out in Helena. It's the first day of winter, and people are cozying up in bars, coffee shops, homes and friend's homes.
We jump out of the car and get the laundry going in a laundromat near downtown. Then we jump back in the car and drive to our coffee shop where we order mochas and relax on the comfy couch and check up on life in the connected world. I leave after 30 minutes and change the lanudry, then come back and get back down to the mocha and internet.
Soon, we'll go to the sale at Power Townsend where people are stocking up on weatherizing products. Here people put anitfreeze in boats, RVs and cars. Here people paint their porches for the winter so they don't rot. Here, they need weather stripping on their doors and caulk little holes because they let the freezing cold into their houses. Here, you actually need a heater or a fireplace, it's not a luxury. Here people are huddling down for the long long winter while we're planning to head south. South to the warmer climes. Out of the land where you need to drink whiskey in your cider to keep warm at night, where it's too damn cold to go out and smoke after dark and where the people are the most friendly I've ever known.
I woke up at 10. I don't know why, but I sleep in really late if I can in the camper. I think it's the bed; I know I won't have one much longer so I want to enjoy it while I can. Anyway, when I woke up Alex told me to come outside. When I did, it was as cold as an ice rink and little snowflakes were falling and melting on the ground. "We'd better get into town soon; I have a feeling once this starts it's not gonna stop." So we started the car, went inside, collected all our laundry, made fresh coffee and started out for Helena.
The car making a little ticking sound we drive the dirt road toward York. We pass Bill's neighbors, the house with a courtyard and a pond, the house that looks like a mansion and belongs in the South, the road bends and bends and then we come to the paved road. This curves past a homestead with 10 cattle, a few smaller houses and finally bursts out into York with it's collection of about 20 houses along the road and stretching out for about 2 miles. Between all the houses are wooden fences or yellowing trees and on all the land green grass still grows.
Then we pass the home with the greenhouse, hydroponic greenhouse that is, with it's chicken coop across the yard. From there rock cuts down to the road on the right side, and the sun where it breaks through the clouds shines brilliant rose, yellow and blue colours from normally gray stone.
From there the land opens up into a vast valley covered in cattle ranches. The sky is soft, a deep gray and I'd like to take a plane up through those clouds and see the sun on the other side. The grass is the same yellow it is before the sun sets. The river, once deep blue as the ocean is now grayer than the asphalt road. No one is out in Helena. It's the first day of winter, and people are cozying up in bars, coffee shops, homes and friend's homes.
We jump out of the car and get the laundry going in a laundromat near downtown. Then we jump back in the car and drive to our coffee shop where we order mochas and relax on the comfy couch and check up on life in the connected world. I leave after 30 minutes and change the lanudry, then come back and get back down to the mocha and internet.
Soon, we'll go to the sale at Power Townsend where people are stocking up on weatherizing products. Here people put anitfreeze in boats, RVs and cars. Here people paint their porches for the winter so they don't rot. Here, they need weather stripping on their doors and caulk little holes because they let the freezing cold into their houses. Here, you actually need a heater or a fireplace, it's not a luxury. Here people are huddling down for the long long winter while we're planning to head south. South to the warmer climes. Out of the land where you need to drink whiskey in your cider to keep warm at night, where it's too damn cold to go out and smoke after dark and where the people are the most friendly I've ever known.
Oct 2, 2009
Time to Leave
I looked up at the sky last night and saw glimpses of the full moon creeping behind the thick rain clouds, and I thought back to a month ago and the full moon I saw in Washington. It doesn't seem like we have done a lot since then, but we have experienced so many things and interacted with a variety of awesome and interesting people.
It's getting damn cold in Montana. Too cold for me and my joints. Too many aches in this kind of weather. Time to head south for the winter.
And now it's almost time to move on, to head onto the road again, racing the weather, on our way to the next stop; Kentucky.
It's getting damn cold in Montana. Too cold for me and my joints. Too many aches in this kind of weather. Time to head south for the winter.
And now it's almost time to move on, to head onto the road again, racing the weather, on our way to the next stop; Kentucky.
Oct 1, 2009
Advice to my young cousin. . .
I was crocheting a hat yesterday, and I started thinking about my young cousin who I'm making the hat for. She's a teenager now and I started thinking of a list of advice that I would have given myself if I were that age again, such an old person thing to do hehe. But here's the list, I don't think I'll ever give it to her, what do you think about it?
Listen to the news.
Get out of the country as soon as you can.
Feel deeply the joys and heartaches of your life.
Don't worry.
Support your opinions with fact.
Read.
Learn to do something useful with your hands.
Follow your heart wherever it leads.
Meditate.
Remember: you can find a way to do anything you want to do.
Don't worry too much about your body.
Find and develop your style.
Be aware of why you react to things the way that you do.
If you don't like something about yourself, change it.
Don't worry about what others think of you, your opinion matters more than theirs.
Say "yes" to things more than "no".
Stay positive, life is too short to waste time being negative.
Do things that make you uncomfortable.
Get your heart good and broken, then learn from it and move on.
See music played live whenever you can, especially international music.
Talk to people, and decide what kind of company you want to keep.
Always be interested in the other side of an argument.
Change your mind.
and above all, enjoy your individuality.
Listen to the news.
Get out of the country as soon as you can.
Feel deeply the joys and heartaches of your life.
Don't worry.
Support your opinions with fact.
Read.
Learn to do something useful with your hands.
Follow your heart wherever it leads.
Meditate.
Remember: you can find a way to do anything you want to do.
Don't worry too much about your body.
Find and develop your style.
Be aware of why you react to things the way that you do.
If you don't like something about yourself, change it.
Don't worry about what others think of you, your opinion matters more than theirs.
Say "yes" to things more than "no".
Stay positive, life is too short to waste time being negative.
Do things that make you uncomfortable.
Get your heart good and broken, then learn from it and move on.
See music played live whenever you can, especially international music.
Talk to people, and decide what kind of company you want to keep.
Always be interested in the other side of an argument.
Change your mind.
and above all, enjoy your individuality.
Portraits
Man 1
Come see my room
full of elk
By the way
I have a job for you
And
why dont you stay
for dinner
Woman 1
Well here's a latte and a crepe for lunch
use my bathroom if you need a shower
You need to stop smoking
I remember when I was young
my parents smoked all the time
they rolled their own cigarettes
I think it's a disgusting habit
Well there's a long story behind why I started to smoke.
It's just disgusting and you shouldn't do it
Man 2
There're just gettin t' be too many laws
When I was young
you use t' get days off school for hunin
excused days
for hunin
and you use 't be able t' go way back in the hills
wherever you wanted
now they've got fences up
now I don't go to church
but when I go up in them hills there
that's my church
Man 3
Oh i'm alright
The cows are gettin through the fence
down there
an' I gotta go get em back
Come on Skeet!
Good boy!
Come see my room
full of elk
By the way
I have a job for you
And
why dont you stay
for dinner
Woman 1
Well here's a latte and a crepe for lunch
use my bathroom if you need a shower
You need to stop smoking
I remember when I was young
my parents smoked all the time
they rolled their own cigarettes
I think it's a disgusting habit
Well there's a long story behind why I started to smoke.
It's just disgusting and you shouldn't do it
Man 2
There're just gettin t' be too many laws
When I was young
you use t' get days off school for hunin
excused days
for hunin
and you use 't be able t' go way back in the hills
wherever you wanted
now they've got fences up
now I don't go to church
but when I go up in them hills there
that's my church
Man 3
Oh i'm alright
The cows are gettin through the fence
down there
an' I gotta go get em back
Come on Skeet!
Good boy!
Sep 29, 2009
"Alex"dote: 80's Rock
Never in my life have I heard as much non-essential 80's rock, as I have in Montana.
Sep 28, 2009
Pies, Guns n' Fun
Last night we had dinner with Kay, the lady Candice is working for. She cooked us Cajun chicken and bought chocolate pie for desert. It was all very tasty and we had a good night. When we got back to 'DA SLUM', we were chilling outside when something dawned on me:
This woman was the first person I had met since being in Montana that didn't own a rack of guns or kill and eat their own food.
Now, I'm all for people having guns.
Sorry, I mean I'm all for people with some kind of a brain, and/or a reasonable level of training, having guns to shoot things for a reason.
When we stopped at our first campsite in Oregon, we met the lovely old couple. Like so many aged American couples, they toured around their home state in an unnecessarily large RV, stopping at a campground and sitting there for a week, socializing with all the other old couples who are doing exactly the same thing. Every one of them I've come across have travelled around America, seen everything, etc, etc. In the middle of a conversation with this particular old guy about how excited I was about traveling and camping around the country, he informs me that dispersed campsites are dangerous places where everyone wants to rob you and he would never dream of staying at one [Note: this might have something to do with the fact that his giant fucking RV wouldn't fit there]. He always carries a shotgun with him when he drives because the beautiful country he was just raving about, is only filled with evil people who want to take everything from two old people pulling an RV. He continued to back this up with some kind of story where some time, some place someone of some color ALMOST robbed him when they looked at him in a funny way and he ALMOST had to pull out his gun, blah, blah, blah. He also said that even if he's in a state where his license isn't valid, he still carries his gun, for 'protection'.
There's no need to have a gun "to protect yourself". You don't need to protect yourself from evil criminals who don't live anywhere near you and aren't planning on stopping by to rob you, rape you or kill you. And do you really think having a gun hidden somewhere in a lock box will help you if they do come knocking? Oh please.
You are idiots. You should probably just dirty a bullet with your own simple brains.
I have a problem with all the older Republicans waving their .44's and screaming about their 'right to bear arms'. Really?! Have you actually read it?
Amendment #4: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed"
Meaning, in my mind, weapons for the armed forces, and the right for people to KEEP and bear their arms. This in a time when men needed to form militias to protect land, or were traveling in wagons (not RV's) and people out there were really trying to kill them.
I don't see you picking up your gun, joining the army and running off to find bin Laden, who you've also conveniently forgotten that you haven't found in your stupid "War on Terror".
How the living fuck to you have a war against a noun?
All the people I've met in York are Republican, own guns, shoot guns, and kill animals; which they subsequently eat. Game tastes damn good. However most people here kill their animals with a bow and arrow. They just sit in a tree, make a few sounds, wait for it to come along, then shoot it in the lungs.
I've met people here who are amazed there is so little gun crime in England, and that cops don't carry guns. I explain that if you don't let people have guns, less people have guns, therefore police don't need to protect themselves, and the public, with guns.
Like I say, I'm not against guns. Guns are fun.
This woman was the first person I had met since being in Montana that didn't own a rack of guns or kill and eat their own food.
Now, I'm all for people having guns.
Sorry, I mean I'm all for people with some kind of a brain, and/or a reasonable level of training, having guns to shoot things for a reason.
When we stopped at our first campsite in Oregon, we met the lovely old couple. Like so many aged American couples, they toured around their home state in an unnecessarily large RV, stopping at a campground and sitting there for a week, socializing with all the other old couples who are doing exactly the same thing. Every one of them I've come across have travelled around America, seen everything, etc, etc. In the middle of a conversation with this particular old guy about how excited I was about traveling and camping around the country, he informs me that dispersed campsites are dangerous places where everyone wants to rob you and he would never dream of staying at one [Note: this might have something to do with the fact that his giant fucking RV wouldn't fit there]. He always carries a shotgun with him when he drives because the beautiful country he was just raving about, is only filled with evil people who want to take everything from two old people pulling an RV. He continued to back this up with some kind of story where some time, some place someone of some color ALMOST robbed him when they looked at him in a funny way and he ALMOST had to pull out his gun, blah, blah, blah. He also said that even if he's in a state where his license isn't valid, he still carries his gun, for 'protection'.
There's no need to have a gun "to protect yourself". You don't need to protect yourself from evil criminals who don't live anywhere near you and aren't planning on stopping by to rob you, rape you or kill you. And do you really think having a gun hidden somewhere in a lock box will help you if they do come knocking? Oh please.
You are idiots. You should probably just dirty a bullet with your own simple brains.
I have a problem with all the older Republicans waving their .44's and screaming about their 'right to bear arms'. Really?! Have you actually read it?
Amendment #4: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed"
Meaning, in my mind, weapons for the armed forces, and the right for people to KEEP and bear their arms. This in a time when men needed to form militias to protect land, or were traveling in wagons (not RV's) and people out there were really trying to kill them.
I don't see you picking up your gun, joining the army and running off to find bin Laden, who you've also conveniently forgotten that you haven't found in your stupid "War on Terror".
How the living fuck to you have a war against a noun?
All the people I've met in York are Republican, own guns, shoot guns, and kill animals; which they subsequently eat. Game tastes damn good. However most people here kill their animals with a bow and arrow. They just sit in a tree, make a few sounds, wait for it to come along, then shoot it in the lungs.
I've met people here who are amazed there is so little gun crime in England, and that cops don't carry guns. I explain that if you don't let people have guns, less people have guns, therefore police don't need to protect themselves, and the public, with guns.
Like I say, I'm not against guns. Guns are fun.
Sep 27, 2009
Second Week In York
So, on Monday Bill informs me that Steve (the Elk man) wants to get in contact with us. As cell phone reception is non-existent in York, Steve leaves a message at the bar, they pass it on to Bill, who in turn is giving it to us. Steve needed us to stop over in the morning to split some wood for him, he said he'd treat us right if we could help him out.
So there we are at 8:30 in the morning, staring at a HUGE pile of tree (Steve cuts down the trees himself and splits them up to sell as fire wood). Thankfully he has a motorized splitter, thus removing the need for an axe, and a lot of the effort/work!
"Just work your way through towards the back," Steve says pointing at the pile of tree after showing us how to operate the splitter, "I've gotta go see a dog walking client, and then I've got another one this evening, so I like to eat around 4:30pm, I'll cook you dinner."
We wave goodbye to Steve and start to split up the wood. What looked like it would take a couple of hours, in fact took 7 (with breaks), but there was a mother fucking shit load of wood. Steve had said if we had any problems to go and talk to the neighbors, a nice old couple.
But, within an hour, the old guy had popped out to make sure we were OK, and the woman had brought us fresh baked muffins.
Fucking tasty fresh baked muffins.
Like I say though, we did manage to do nearly all of it before Steve returned. He told us to take a quick shower whilst he finished getting dinner ready. Dinner tonight was a kind of roast, but made with deer. It was fucking awesome!
White tail deer is my new favorite thing you can kill and eat.
Got to spend the rest of the week working on the cabin with Bill. This is really good work as it gives me a better idea of building a place when me and Candice get round to settling somewhere (see Candy blog: )
I've been insulating, paneling and trimming. I already know how to do these, but they're all good things to know how to do, and to see how people do differently. The cabin is coming along nicely, with only the kitchen and bathroom, plus a few smaller places, left to go. Then it's on to staining and varnishing. Should be completed by the end of next weekend.
Then, the weather starts to change for the worse, so who knows where the next story will come from...
So there we are at 8:30 in the morning, staring at a HUGE pile of tree (Steve cuts down the trees himself and splits them up to sell as fire wood). Thankfully he has a motorized splitter, thus removing the need for an axe, and a lot of the effort/work!
"Just work your way through towards the back," Steve says pointing at the pile of tree after showing us how to operate the splitter, "I've gotta go see a dog walking client, and then I've got another one this evening, so I like to eat around 4:30pm, I'll cook you dinner."
We wave goodbye to Steve and start to split up the wood. What looked like it would take a couple of hours, in fact took 7 (with breaks), but there was a mother fucking shit load of wood. Steve had said if we had any problems to go and talk to the neighbors, a nice old couple.
But, within an hour, the old guy had popped out to make sure we were OK, and the woman had brought us fresh baked muffins.
Fucking tasty fresh baked muffins.
Like I say though, we did manage to do nearly all of it before Steve returned. He told us to take a quick shower whilst he finished getting dinner ready. Dinner tonight was a kind of roast, but made with deer. It was fucking awesome!
White tail deer is my new favorite thing you can kill and eat.
Got to spend the rest of the week working on the cabin with Bill. This is really good work as it gives me a better idea of building a place when me and Candice get round to settling somewhere (see Candy blog: )
I've been insulating, paneling and trimming. I already know how to do these, but they're all good things to know how to do, and to see how people do differently. The cabin is coming along nicely, with only the kitchen and bathroom, plus a few smaller places, left to go. Then it's on to staining and varnishing. Should be completed by the end of next weekend.
Then, the weather starts to change for the worse, so who knows where the next story will come from...
Sep 26, 2009
Montana Values
Montana, in my mind, was a place filled with hardcore, God-fearing Republicans, with a gun and a ranch.
Funnily enough, I'm not that far off. People ARE religious, but their church is the wide open spaces of the state. If a man here needs some reflection time etc, he just fucks off into the forest with his bow and hides out with his own thoughts, maybe killing something he will subsequently eat, but not always. I appreciate this concept.
I've met a couple of guys here who have been 'taken to the cleaners' by their ex-wives, but they just go "Oh well," and then rebuild.
When I got divorced, my ex took 'everything', but I came to the understanding that it was only stuff. I'm not going to fight over a car, microwave, set of salad spoons, etc, etc.
What's the point?
They are NOT the important things that need to be worked out in a divorce; your own and your kids mental/physical well-beings are.
I expected people living as families even if it didn't work, cos that's the way it is, but instead I've met a large number of people in Montana who have been divorced, some of them three or four times. Although their relationships didn't work out, all the people I've talked to made sure their children were OK. Their kids meant the world to them, and so they should.
This, I totally appreciate.
Despite being completely jaded by my marriage experience, and never wanting to experience it again (at the moment), I do respect those who are married and make it work. It's certainly not easy, and you ALWAYS have to want it. I know how hard this can be and how it's much easier to believe it will just work, and then before you know it, you end up stuck in a rut.
I realize you have to make sure everyday, that you spend time remembering all the things you love and like about your partner. Talk to them, tell them HOW YOU FEEL, and don't focus on the negative stuff. Let them grow, grow yourself, and grow together.
It's not easy, but why should a great thing be easy to keep?!
Funnily enough, I'm not that far off. People ARE religious, but their church is the wide open spaces of the state. If a man here needs some reflection time etc, he just fucks off into the forest with his bow and hides out with his own thoughts, maybe killing something he will subsequently eat, but not always. I appreciate this concept.
I've met a couple of guys here who have been 'taken to the cleaners' by their ex-wives, but they just go "Oh well," and then rebuild.
When I got divorced, my ex took 'everything', but I came to the understanding that it was only stuff. I'm not going to fight over a car, microwave, set of salad spoons, etc, etc.
What's the point?
They are NOT the important things that need to be worked out in a divorce; your own and your kids mental/physical well-beings are.
I expected people living as families even if it didn't work, cos that's the way it is, but instead I've met a large number of people in Montana who have been divorced, some of them three or four times. Although their relationships didn't work out, all the people I've talked to made sure their children were OK. Their kids meant the world to them, and so they should.
This, I totally appreciate.
Despite being completely jaded by my marriage experience, and never wanting to experience it again (at the moment), I do respect those who are married and make it work. It's certainly not easy, and you ALWAYS have to want it. I know how hard this can be and how it's much easier to believe it will just work, and then before you know it, you end up stuck in a rut.
I realize you have to make sure everyday, that you spend time remembering all the things you love and like about your partner. Talk to them, tell them HOW YOU FEEL, and don't focus on the negative stuff. Let them grow, grow yourself, and grow together.
It's not easy, but why should a great thing be easy to keep?!
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