Clarkedale, AR

Memory lane for me right now is a two lane highway winding through the backwoods of eastern Arkansas. It passes through a little town named Clarkedale, population 62. It's so small it only takes up one side of the road. On the other side are the train tracks and cotton fields. Or corn fields, or soybeans, wheat, or what ever it is that happens to be growing at th' time. I remember them all, at one time or another.

Th' first thing I come to on this trip is a little red brick church, the Mt. Zion M&B. It used to be a small white wooden building, but was torn down by a tornado at some point. Somehow the few parishioners, mostly poor black folks, got together enough money to rebuild it in brick. Out back of the church, in between the yard and the field, is the graveyard, with about thirty or so tombstones in it. In eastern Arkansas everything is between something and the field. I always thought about the people who were buried in that graveyard as we drove past it.

I used to play this game where I'd look out the window and the rows of crops going past would look like a person with really long legs running fast. I'd pretend that person was me and I'd have to jump over all the obstacles, ya know, trees and ditches and houses and stuff like that. That graveyard was one of th' things I always jumped over. I'd always heard it was bad luck to step on someone else's grave and that made sense to me, so even when I was pretending I'd jump over the graveyard. It's disrespectful not to.

A few miles down memory lane, which for me right now is AR-77, you get to the town of Jericho, Arkansas, a much larger town with nearly a hundred and twenty people in it, but still not enough to take over two sides of the highway. There's a few trailer houses here but they're nice, well kept with American flags on poles and gardens and such. There's a pond tucked back in th' woods where me and Uncle Jimbo used to go fishin. There's a liquor store, which ain't much bigger than a closet, and just up th' road from there brings me to th' point of this little trip- the Jericho Grocery, which we all simply called Jericho, 'cause what else was there in this town.

Jericho Grocery was th' hub of activity around here. It had one gas pump out front, and inside to your right you had your old timey cash register with the cigarettes and chew behind it. Just to your left along th' wall was th' cooler full of coke. In Arkansas every pop is a coke. What kinda coke you want, someone would ask, and you'd say Coca-Cola, or Dr. Pepper, or Squirt, or grape soda, or whatever. Beyond th' coke cooler was th' beer cooler, and on around th' wall th' little grocery cooler with milk and sour cream and stuff like that in it. Then you had your freezer with th' pop-sicles and bags of ice and th' like. On th' far wall, straight across from th' door was th' deli counter. That's where you could get your cold cuts sliced to whatever thickness you liked. That's where you went to order one of their famous bar-b-que sandwiches with homemade cole-slaw on top. Th' man behind th' register'd walk over and put on a dirty white apron and make your sandwich and talk to you like he was your best friend, then he'd wrap up your sandwich, take off his apron and walk back over to th' register and ring it up. Right in th' middle of this forgotten grocery was th' one single shelf with th' chips and canned goods on one side and th' motor oil and diapers and toys on the other. On th' side facing th' register, first thing you saw when you walked in, were th' Twinkies and donuts and Snowballs and all that. My favorite thing to get from here were th' chili flavored Beanie Weenies, nowhere else seemed to have 'em. My brother always went for th' Vienna sausages or potted meat. I still can't believe people ate that stuff, and I imagine some people still do.

A few more miles down this road and there's an old white house that we lived in for a while, and for now that's where memory lane stops. My dad would find duck nests while ploughing the fields, usually too late to save them, but every time he'd get down off th' tractor and see if there were any ducklings still alive. When there were, which was often, he'd bring 'em home and raise 'em up till they were big enough to fly. We kept them in a pen so th' coons couldn't get 'em, and they had a little plastic pool in there that we'd put grass and bugs in so they could practice swimming and hunting and whatnot. Often times we'd get in th' pool with them, it was hot down there in summer. When they got big enough they simply flew away. We never saw them again.

So if ya'll wonder why I'm so strange just remember that I grew up in places like this. There was nothing to do and all th' time in th' world to do it. And sure I got bored at times, but for th' most part I absolutely loved it. I learned how to drive on this road, and a few others. Pa-Paw would sit me on his lap and let me turn the steering wheel, since I was still too small to reach the pedals. He had this little blue Ford Ranger for most of my life. When I was ten or eleven I was finally big enough to reach the pedals myself and he moved on over and sat in th' passenger seat. I learned how to tell time by th' sun. How to stay out all day long with no water and only a pocketful of snacks and make it back in time for supper. I learned that quiet could either drive a man crazy or be his best friend, depending on who that man was. I learned that John Deere tractors and Ford trucks were th' best, no two ways about it. I learned early on that I didn't need a babysitter and that I could pretty much do what ever I wanted, as long as I set my mind to it. I learned that you could have a dad living in one state and a mom in another and still have a good life. I learned that a gun is to be both feared and respected, that it could save a life or take a life. I learned that Me-Maw could wash anything out of my clothes. I learned that you could sell a snapping turtle you caught in a sewer for five dollars. And I learned that you don't have to agree on much to be friends with people, you mostly just had to be nice to them.

I'd like to say that you can still go there and see it for yourself, order one of them pulled pork and slaw sandwiches, and taste what kept us all coming back, but most of it's gone now, save for th' church and a few houses. It saddens me a bit to think that no kid will ever again walk into Jericho and get himself a can of chili Beanie Weenies, or one of those wooden paddles with th' rubber ball attached to it by a rubber band that could drive a kid bonkers. But I am glad that right after I got married I was able to take my wife down there and show it to her, introduce her to th' people and places America forgot, even though the accent down there was so thick she couldn't understand a word anyone said. I'm glad that I got to be a part of something so real, so real that I can't believe it's gone now. I keep thinking that one day I'll go back and there it'll all be, well, just as I remember it, like stepping into a time machine. But I know that's not true. It exists mostly in my imagination, and a little bit in my memory as well, but we all know how reliable that is. But still, I'd like to think that Miss Lossie is still out there somewhere, maybe older and greyer, but that one day I'll walk through th' kitchen door and she'll be sittin there at th' table shellin peas with one hand and foldin laundry with the other, and she'll smile real big at me and say boy you look hungry, why don't you get yourself a coke and sit on down here a while and help me shell these peas for supper, and I'll make you a nice ham sandwich. And of course that's exactly what I'll do.