Warm beer and sweat dust back roads of desolation
And I will never be set free/
As long as I'm, a ghost you can't see.
“If You Could Read My Mind, ”
Gordon Lightfoot
Bill
Allen
“Boy, Nebraska sure is boring,” she
said, sitting on the side of the dirt road.
“It is?” I said, looking off across the
plains, where the buffalo used to roam
before Buffalo Bill killed them all in a
fit of territorial jealousy.
Our tire was flat. We didn’t know
why. We were just 20 miles from Lincoln,
but taking back roads through desola
tion.
Her name was Coco and I met her
four weeks ago beside a small dust
storm in California. We were traveling
for free with my new good buddy Melvin
Lloyd Peterson, called "Pete,” and
eryoying each other’s company with a
few all-American beers, my favorite
brand, warm.
We had no spare.
Pete wiped his forehead and shook
the sticky sweat onto the trunk of the
car. He stood and watched it dry.
“Damn,” he said, “Damn, damn,
damn. How could any car not have a
spare?”
He hadn’t thought about it when
he’d bought the car, a 1972 Ford Galaxy
500, for $250 back in Great Falls, S.D. I
guess he just assumed that every car
had a spare in the trunk, waiting on the
bench for the final minutes of the big
game.
“Com,” Coco said. Then she stopped,
her thought completed and just as well.
On both sides of the road, as far as
we could see, was com — row after row
of brown, drying com, burning under
the hundred-plus temperature of the
Nebraska summer.
Pete moved his 270-pound 5-foot-lO
frame around to the front of the car and
lifted the hood. Then he walked around
to the back door and scrounged around
in the back seat until he came up with
a piece of white cloth, which he tied to
the antenna. It stayed there, having
nowhere else to go.
He stepped back and viewed his
desperation. His shirt, usually stretched
tight across his enormous belly, popped
apart and then hung limp on both
sides. Pete crawled into the front seat,
leaned back, and perspired.
The car’s air conditioner didn’t work.
Neither did the radio. As far as you
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could see on both sides of the road was
com.
We sat in the ditch, under a sign,
because it blocked some of the sun
from our faces and bodies. "NEBRASKA,
THE GOOD LIFE,” it said.
It was 2 p.m. and we had eaten a
little over an hour before in Grand
Island. Nonetheless, Pete peeled him
self from the vinyl seat cover, leaned
over, and opened the glove compart
ment. He pulled out two Snickers
candy bars. He peeled the wrapper away
from one of the melting sweets and put
half of it into his mouth. He licked his
fingers, smearing his face with chocol
ate in the process.
It was funny, in a nauseating way,
but I didn’t laugh. A ride was a ride,
spare tire or no.
The sun was high, the sky cloudless,
and no one came by for nearly an hour.
“I used to live here,” I said, mostly to
the sign.
“I’m sorry,” Coco said. “You don’t
have to talk about it if you don’t want
to.”
“It’s not that bad,” I said, ‘it’s not
all like this.”
"No?” she said, with sarcasm.
“I went to college in Lincoln. Weil
be there in an hour,” I said. "I went to
football games, and parties, and well
My words trailed off into a nostalgic
past, wrestling with eternity.
"It’s not all like this,” I said.
Pete wheezed from the front seat.
"I’m sorry,” Coco said. "I’m just hot.
It makes me irritable. I’m sure it was
very nice.”
I reached over and touched her
hand.
"Someone’s coming,” I said, loud
enough to arouse Pete.
It was true. Puffs of dust rose over
the corn In the direction we came from.
Several cars were coming.
Pete pried himself out of the car and
stood waving his arms toward the^
approaching caravan.
"Pete, stop it,” I yelled, softly.
"Why?” he said.
"It’s a Aineral.”
A hearse went past, followed by a
slow procession of immediate grief.
People looked at us. W<. looked back. A
pickup truck pulled over.
"I can take you into town,” he said,
“but it’ll have to be after...”
"That’s fine,” I said.
We brought up the rear of the dusty
line, feeling sad for a dead man who
never knew us.
"Is Nebraska dull?” the preacher
asked, in a boominu voire that rarried
across graves to where we waited.
"It sure wasn’t for Lester," he said,
and he smiled.
"It sure is for me," Pete said.
"Shhh,” I said.
"No," the preacher said, "Lester was
too busy running a farm and raising
kids and cows to be bored."
Someone sniffed loudly, sucking back
a sob before it could leave.
"And he didn’t sit around asking for
something to do,” the preacher said.
"Lester lived life full from sunrise to
sundown, and judging from the size of
his fine family here today, he lived a
little after sundown, too."
People smiled, gently. I did, too. I’d
never heard anything like that at a
funeral before.
"So we shouldn’t grieve for Lester,"
the preacher said. "He’s all right. He
spent his whole life working for this
reward. He’s up there right now, re
united with his wife Wilma, and with
the Lord. He’s fine. I want you to know
that not three Sundays ago he came up
to me and said 'Reverend, I’m not
scared to die.’ He said i've spent a lot
of years wondering what dying would
be like, but right now it seems like a
small matter compared to the things 1
know for sure.' "
Kvcntually, we got to town, got the
tire fixed, and got a ride back. I put the
tire ni, i he t ,ti Pet* sat in the back and
!to DULL on 59
