Not Even Close to Almost Heaven

We used to go to Pennsylvania using I-95 and then Rt-119 to Connelsville. As I was driving along I got busy talking to my wife and missed my exit. Okay, I’ll drive to the next exit and turn back. I never get completely lost. I can always find my way to where I made my error or so my wife though my wife thought. But I figured that I’d have to run into 119 if I headed that way. To my relief the ramp said I-119. It must be where I-95 cut through. I was sure of that. I figured out I needed to go to my right to get to Connelsville. That seemed reasonable at the time.

The mountains were lush and beautiful. The valleys looked like the Depression hadn’t left.The people did too. They may have thought they were making a fashion statement and maybe they were. As we drove along we came to an intersection. The vehicle on the right had the right of way. After clearing the intersection I kept heading North. I was curious about the car that went through the intersection. After a minute or so I asked her, “Did you notice anything odd at that intersection?”

“If you mean that car with a hot water tank on the hood, then yes.”

That was a relief. I wasn’t seeing things after all. I wondered why he had in on the hood. Maybe they don’t have delivery here. Haven’t seen any FedEx trucks here.We drove along seeing things that weren’t normal, things we weren’t used to seeing. We noticed a house with three washers, two dryers and a hot water tank on the porch. I knew it was a different water tank but I wouldn’t have bet money on it. That was something we had never seen.

“I wonder what that’s all about? Odd place to have a laundromat. It’s junk. Why don’t they haul it away? The place would look better.” I didn’t believe that but I had to say something or look the fool.

My wife said, “Maybe they can’t afford a truck to haul it away. They ought to get a hold of the guy with the tank on his hood. Maybe he can strap it to the trunk.” That seemed reasonable to her. I thought that was nutty until I remembered where I was and what I’d seen. Yea, maybe.

Up next was a house with a toilet on the front porch. I didn’t say anything. My wife did. “I wonder if it works sitting there.” I was going to laugh until I realized it didn’t really look that much out of out of place considering where we were. I thought that if you got to go, you got to go. I couldn’t imagine where the crap went but it couldn’t be too far from the smell that hit us.

The next one almost caused me to wreck. A lot of trailers in this area. A guy would lever some ground, dig a cesspool and use a spring and be all warm and cozy. That seemed to be the right idea. Not this guy. He put his trailer not up against the mountain. Instead, he put it straight on stilts. He was a couple of hundred feet up and was using braces to hold the trailer in place. I could see the waste pipe coming straight down. It was stopped about halfway down. I also thought it must stink pretty bad. In the summer. It would have to be a bitch. Then again, maybe they got used to it. I wanted to pull over and take a picture of it. My wife advised against it, “You don’t actually know what this place is or how they react to it.”

I thought I’d was on a Hollywood set. It couldn’t get worse than that. Yes, it could. My wife said she thought we should stop at a store and ask for directions. What! Men, real men, never do that. That was plain silly. She won out by asking me if I wanted to stay lost where we were? No, I didn’t. Any minute I expected some one would see my out-of-state plates and shoot at me. Some of these folks are still pissed off about losing the war.They didn't know they weren't from the Confederate states.

I then heard a siren. I looked back to see a cop car and I pulled over to let him get by.He pulled in behind me. Oh, crap. He got out and adjusted his hat,adjusted his sunglasses and then his gun-belt. I got my license and registration ready. When he got to my door I had rolled the window down.Then he did it again.

“Morning officer. Did I do something wrong?”

“I didn’t pull you over to welcome you. Do I look like the Welcome Wagon to you? Give those to me,” pointing to my license and registration. He looked at them for a long time.

“Did I do something wrong?”

“I ask the questions and you give the answers. Are we clear on that?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Okay. everything seems to be in order.”

“Why did you pull me over?”

“What did I tell you about asking questions. Are you feeble?”

After he pulled away, my wife said I should stop and ask for directions. What! Men, real men, don’t ask for directions. She then asked if I really wanted to be lost here? She asked me to pull into a convenience store. When we got out, my wife told me to let her do the talking. She said not to so much as say hello. She explained it with one word-“accent". I'm from the South, remember?” Yea, that seemed the best way to handle this.

As we walked to the door I saw a guy sitting in a rusted pickup complete with a gun rack with a rifle in it. He had a beagle and a scowl on his face. I just wanted to get away from there. We went into the store. There was a woman behind the register and two guys talking to her. I didn’t see any guns but that didn’t mean they didn’t have any. My wife told the clerk we were lost and needed to get to Connelsville. One of the men said,“Where to?”

My wife told him Pennsylvania. The guy then said, “Pennsylvania? Never heard of it.”

His friend rolled his eyes and said, “Dummy, that’s where we go hunting every year.”

The woman told us to forget them. “One’s stupid and the other is trying to get smart enough to be stupid. Go that way and turn on the second road. Then to the right. That’ll put you on the big road.”

Big road? Did she mean off this two way barely driveable road?

When we got to the car, the guy was still sitting there. That wasn’t a good thing. Why was he sitting in the parking lot of a store? He would see the out-of state- plates and who knows what could happen. My imagination started running wild. When we started up the road, he’d see our out of state plates. I had no evidence it meant anything but didn’t have any evidence that it didn’t.

The Big Road was I-79. I damn near pulled over and kissed the road.