You Can Go Home Again

Relatives put things in perspective.

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© 1995-2007 Carla King | All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

West Virginia soon gave way to Virginia. I was entering the South, where the land was a little more untidy, undeveloped, unindustried, and the people began to twang away with y'alls and honeys, and darlins. There were fewer tidy brand-name gas stations, and more messy independent ones. I, once a Southern gal, couldn't understand the attendant at one -- not a word he said. I don't know if it was his terrible lack of education or his mouthful of chew. He looked at me with delighted suspicion, handed me the pump, and babbled on. Behind the station's garbage pile of empty oil cans, rags, tires, and used blue paper towels rose a tall rock cliff and some tangles of blackberries. The sky was blue with a few dots of clouds. I rode on.

The Ural putted away, content with her new electrical system and engine fixes. As I rode, my eyes were drawn to a certain kind of sign. Antique-hounds see Garage Sale and Flea Market signs. Farmers see signs that say Tractors and Feed, and mechanics see Small Engine Repair. In any small town, I was oblivious to the charming gift shop if it happened to be beside an Everson's or a Napa. The quaint cafe was invisible next to a snowmobile shop where I might get spark plugs and fuel filters. In a town with a motorcycle shop, I didn't see anything else. I stopped just in case I didn't see another one in a while, to inspect hoses, plugs, filters, oil, gas additive, loose or lost nuts and bolts, light bulbs, and levers.

If I saw Small Engine Repair hand painted on plywood propped up by a mailbox, I looked down at my odometer. I'd remember that number until the next indication of mechanical ability or supplies came along, so I could calculate how far I'd have to walk or hitchhike if something went wrong.

But nothing went wrong. The Beast purred along steadily with a sound like one of those fancy, powerful sewing machines. The electrical weirdness was fixed, and the engine ran cool, without any worrying clanks or pings. Maybe she thought she was back in Siberia. But I wasn't quite past being suspicious.

IN SHENDANDOAH NATIONAL PARK I waited behind a camper and a trailer to pay my fee, then set out on a long, smooth stretch of road without houses or services.

Well into Shenandoah I stopped in the parking lot of an information center packed with cars and tourists. As soon as I took off my helmet and jacket, a hoard of Harley bikers rode up and parked around me. Their numbers were so intimidating that I had to keep myself from fleeing into a nearby bathroom. They dismounted at their different paces, pulling off helmets, jackets, kidney belts, gloves, goggles, and at the same time staring at me wondering what my trip was.

Among them were about a dozen women who had their own rides. I wanted to ask them questions: Were their husbands in the group, or were they there on their own? Did they do their own maintenance? When did they start riding? How did people react to them? Did they ever ride alone? But I wasn't the one doing the interviewing. I was barraged with questions about the Ural from all sides, but mostly from one man who seemed to be the leader. All of them were from Pennsylvania, he said. That seemed like a long trip to them. The group gathered around about three deep, the ones in the rear standing on tiptoe, all of them hanging on my every word.

"Can I take a picture?" asked the chrome king.

My affirmative response triggered a flurry of activity as twenty cameras popped from pockets and saddlebags. I stood against the seat of the Ural and tried to look cool as twenty flashbulbs went off in my eyes. Then, as a group, they all turned to leave. Relieved, I reached in the cooler in the sidecar and pulled out a carton of orange juice. As I tipped it up, I heard an excited voice from one of the bikers. "Look! She is from California. She's drinking orange juice!"

They all turned around to stare again. I had to get out of there. I put on my helmet and jacket and most of them came back. They wanted to hear the engine.

I could feel them all grinning as I kicked it over. It took two kicks to start it -- it always takes more than one when someone is watching. It's funny that we have forgotten about kickstarters in the '90s. We have forgotten that the little red button under the right thumb causes such activity. We have forgotten that there is a cam that turns in the crankcase that moves an arm that opens a valve to let in air and gas to be compressed, which is what I push against with my foot ten times a day. I knew exactly what was happening, because sometimes it kicked back. With only 37 horsepower, it didn't kick back very hard -- not as hard as one of those shiny Harley's would. Those things could break your leg.

Whenever bikers see this, they comment that they would like a kick starter too, in addition to the electric button. It's the battery problem. When the battery goes dead, kickstarting is preferable to finding a hill to bump start it. I don't know why bike manufacturers don't build in both. I don't know a biker who wouldn't appreciate it.

My group of bikers grinned and murmured to each other as I put it in reverse and backed out of the parking space. Some more flashes went off. I waved and rode off slowly and self-consciously. In my rear-view mirror, twenty hands shot up into the air.

FURTHER ON I STOPPED at a trailhead and walked to a waterfall in the woods. Eons of falling water had smoothed deep holes into giant stairsteps of solid gray rock, creating pools that shimmered with the reflections of trees and sky. I thought about the next day when I would be in North Carolina riding the Blue Ridge Parkway, where my grandparents had retired until they died in their late 80s.

It was a familiar drive. The parkway has a special scent that I remember from childhood. It is lined with rhododendrons that bloom spectacularly in spring. At this time of year their glossy thick leaves drop onto the grass with the pine needles, creating an acrid scent reminiscent of rot and skunk that mixes with the fresh mountain air.

Through the haze, the mountains rise in peaks so soft they could have been sculpted with a butter knife. I had to stop to avoid hitting a whitetail deer. It was a doe, taller than me, and the color of butterscotch. She stared, chewing grass until I beeped. Her muscles contracted and then relaxed. Looking away distainfully, she sauntered off the road on delicate pointed hoofs.

Large groundhogs sat up and stared, too. They are sleek brown-black with pointy noses and whiskers that wiggle with incessant nibbling. They stuff grass into their mouths with flat black leathery paws close together on their furry chests.

I remember going to visit my grandparents here in one or another of a series of campers and motor homes, pressing my face to the glass window, gazing at the motorcycles flying by. So free, I thought, floating along. As a child, that freedom seemed as far away as the day I might fly a spaceship or become president.

THE BLUE RIDGE PARKWAY is one of the most popular motorcycle routes in the world. I was riding it now, and I felt the reasons it was so popular, firsthand.

From the parkway, I cut over to the Glendale Springs Trading Post on the Pony Road I used to walk along as a child. It's a dirt road lined with snowy Queen Anne's Lace and purple-blue Bachelor's Buttons, but the chief feature is the pasture of ponies grazing beside it. They rarely came to the fence, and didn't this time, despite the grass I held out to them. Crickets buzzed by my face and bees gathered pollen. The ponies stood yards away, their heads down to the ground.

A mile farther I came to the Trading Post, its front porch cluttered with quilts and wicker on display for the tourists. Inside it was jammed with more quilts and wicker, dolls, whittled toys, jars of dark shimmering jellies. The ceiling was hung with great hunks of smoked country ham, and glass cases stuffed with cakes, pies, and blocks of homemade fudge. Helen Rose, who years ago owned the general store with her husband Delmer, was now working there. I was surprised to see her here. She used to give me a Double-Bubble for free at the store, where there was a wood-burning stove and two wrinkled old men rocking on the scarred wood floor, just passing the time.

When I told her who I was, she took both my hands in hers and didn't let go during our entire conversation.

"When Delmer passed away I gave up the store," she said in her soft Carolina drawl. Her hands were cold and smooth around mine. She leaned toward me, gazing into my eyes, and I wondered what she was thinking, if she really remembered me, the small blond girl who used to cling to her counter by the old mechanical cash register.

The Trading Post smelled good, like wood and jam and fudge, and the cotton bunting inside quilts. I remember going there as a child, a reward after working in the garden all day. When I was about 14 -- my sister a year younger and my twin brothers just toddlers -- we went there after a day of weeding and hoeing. We were all barefoot and wearing overalls, and dirty from the garden. My parents had put us and the dog in the back of the old rusty Jeep pickup my grandfather used around the property and he drove us there. As usual there were dozens of tourists in big slick cars or campers, and we had a hard time getting in to park. We cruised through the cars to the end, and my grandfather backed into a space beside a big trailer.

"Look! Mom! Dad! Real hillbillies!" a boy called out to his parents.

The parking lot came alive with camper doors and windows opening, cameras clicking, and video cameras whirring. I hadn't even thought about the way I was dressed until then. My parents were probably amused, my sister and brothers didn't care, but I was a painfully shy 14-year-old and still I remember it. I recall finding it very difficult to step gracefully from the back of the truck, helping my brothers out, while trying to control our big black Labrador retriever who was barking and stepping on the hoes, rakes, and shovels, rattling their handles against the truck bed.

IN THIS FALL DAY there were few tourists. I bought a country ham and jelly biscuit, some fudge and a handfull of horehound candy sticks and rode another mile down the parkway to visit my grandparents' old friend Kitty Scott. Kitty is a petite and energetic woman from New Jersey, and I'd always especially enjoyed her company. She's even come to visit us in California. "I can't believe your timing," she said when I arrived. "BRU is having our annual barbecue tonight."

"BRU" is the Blue Ridge University, a group of retirees led by a retired professor. Each "semester" they study something, and meet once a week to discuss it. They study a wide range of subjects -- wars, ancient and recent, poetry, literature, the Tsing Dynasty, anthropology. Each class member, being on the average 70 years old and well traveled, has some special personal experience to shed light upon the subject. I attended a few of these sessions when I visited my grandparents over the years. A first-hand account from someone who has actually been to China, experienced Shakespeare's theater in England, and lived in the midst of political events like World War I, brings the subject out from the history books and into reality.

Carla's grandmother on her honeymoon in 1927

At the party I remet all my grandparents' old friends, and ate a lot, though much less than was pressed on me. The hosts were Herb and Chris Johnston, dear friends of my grandparents. Near the end of the dinner, Herb took me aside and told me quietly that the evening's entertainment was to be a tape that he'd made of my grandparents telling the story of their 1927 honeymoon trip -- they'd scraped together $300 and driven a Model T from Boston to California and back. Would it be too sad for me, Herb asked, if they continued with their plan to play the tape? He assured me that the tape was really funny.

I told him I would be very happy to hear it, since I hadn't known the tape existed. Soon my grandparents' voices related their story from the tape player on the Johnston's living room mantle. There was silence in the room, except for laughter at their many young, innocent disasters. My grandfather's voice related the first disaster in a string of many:

We got up near Saranack, New York, and things were going swimmingly, and it was a beautiful day. We came into this town and there were these magnificent hotels on both sides, big piazzas and verandahs with people all dressed up sitting out there sipping on drinks. Well, we were busy gawking at them, and I didn't realize that there was a railroad crossing across this main street. Three tracks, and they were all angled, apparently because the road was on a slope, and I was going along merrily, and I hit this damn thing and a train whistle blew. I stomped on the accelerator and we flew over the last one, and when we got over the thing the engine fell out of the car.

I mean it fell out. There was steam and water all over the place, and these people roaring laughing on both sides, and I thought My god! My honeymoon is over with. I wonder if I can buy us tickets back home from here.

About that time a lad came up and he said, This isn't so much, it just looks bad. He said I've got a garage around the corner we'll get some people to push it around there, and then he said I'll have you on the road inside of three hours. I said, How much is it going to cost? and he said Oh, about 8 to 10 dollars. I said, Well, I'm your man.

That was the second day of their honeymoon.

In 1927 there were few paved roads going west past Chicago. Motels were rare, and their top speed was 30 mph downhill with a tailwind. In the following three months they had many more adventures.

Me? I'm traveling easy in the modern world.

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