A short story based on actual events.
About four hours from my next overnight stop, something on the dash caught my eye. I looked down - the temperature gauge had jumped to 'very hot'. Smokin' hot. This was one of my worst nightmares - car trouble while on a rural highway. I typically kept a car for 6-10 years. That is an invitation for something in the many complex systems in a car to break down. Now, it was happening. And on an interstate highway that sliced between thousands of acres of farmland. A nightmare for sure, but I was with my dog Brooklyn, and had the determination to make it through this ordeal.
I looked up from the dash - in time to see a sign for an exit ramp. I eased over to the ramp, unsure of what was going on, but I didn't want to be on the Interstate with an overheated car. I slowed onto a dirt road coming up to the service road from the south. It was a beautiful day. The sky was bright blue, there were only a few wispy white clouds, and one could see for miles over dry farmland. The land was dusty due to the drought. I stopped admiring the scenery and walked to the front of the car and popped open the hood. There was a bit of steam, so I let the engine cool. Meanwhile, I called the Dodge Roadside Assistance number that was stored conveniently in my phone. It was Sunday and I was in, well, not real sure where I was. Somewhere in the Texas Panhandle. I had left Amarillo about an hour earlier and was not yet to the Oklahoma border. I didn't know what the middle of nowhere looks like, nor had I been to the boondocks, but I now knew what the plains of the Texas Panhandle look like. Flat fields of some khaki-colored crop.
The national Dodge service operator provided no help since she couldn't find my location on a map and couldn't find a Dodge dealer open on Sunday. About then, coming up the dirt road, in leading a plume of road dust, was a pickup truck, the Official National Vehicle of these here parts. The driver stopped at my car. He really had very little choice since I was standing in the middle of the road blocking his path. He was just what you would imagine a seasoned Texas plains farmer to look like. Yep, just like that. He was an absolute Google of information. He knew exactly where they were, what towns were nearby, where the closest Dodge dealer was, hotels. You search for it - he knew. I now had the name, Fenton Motors, of the best repair option. But it was 30 miles away. Due north, up Texas Highway 71. By this time, the car engine had cooled off and it started right up. We agreed that I might be able to drive on for 30 minutes or so, stop, let the engine cool, and move another 30 miles. Since I couldn't reach anyone by phone on a Sunday afternoon in the middle of nowhere, that seemed like my best option.
They each started their vehicle and drove off. The farmer continued up the hot dusty road. I drove along the service road to the next entrance ramp. But, just as he was about to enter I-40, the temp needle jumped to Centerfold again. He stopped right there. This plan wasn't going to work. There was now a scary grinding sound coming from somewhere in front of me. He looked back to see if the farmer was still close by, but the dust trail confirmed that he was on his way and, soon, would be out of sight. Alone, just me, my dog, and a busted automobile. I found enough calm to call Fenton Motors in Pampa. The recording on the far end of the telephone line stated that if you needed a tow, to call Delaney Brothers. Brilliant move for a car dealer out here - have a special Sunday and evening recording that guides people in need. I called the number that the voice had recited, but, it was Sunday. It rang a couple of times, and then, a human voice. Not a recording, a person. It was Harley. He took note of my location and said he'd be there in about 30 minutes. What a relief. A tow truck out here on a Sunday.
30 minutes is not long, even on the plains of west Texas. I had just spent two full days driving from Los Angeles. In the background of a country song, a guitar track, or one of the voices in the chorus could be mine; a studio musician in Nashville. I liked what I did, but I wanted more. I wanted to perform my own songs. Two weeks earlier, during a lull in my schedule, I responded to a job notice that my good friend had told me about. It was a respected talent agency that could help me along my career path, at least, the next step. But it was in Los Angeles. It was too late to prepare, shoot, and mail a video submission. I got an appointment about 4 days later. I took my guitar and my dog, which meant having to drive rather than fly. But that's okay, I like road trips and this one would take me over parts of old Route 66 on into Albuquerque in time to see the sky filled with hot-air balloons.
I drove across the mountains and stayed with Megan, a friend in Los Angeles, an actor who had been in a few films and several Geico commercials. The audition went well, I was told I was good, my songs were fresh and original, just what they were looking for. Two of the people sitting at a large desk made some 'suggestions' - work out, lose a bit of weight, and get a styled haircut and some different clothes. I thanked them and we agreed to talk again in a few days. Megan and I went to Venice Beach so we and Brooklyn could walk along the ocean boardwalk. I shared my concerns about remaking my image. Megan had gone through a similar makeover after she arrived and auditioned for "young professional woman with a husband, a 10 year old, and a toddler." I wasn't so sure about their trying to fit me into a 'type'. I didn't want to be so manufactured and 'fake' that I was uncomfortable with myself. It was like a country boy putting on a tuxedo and being told to look natural. I was concerned it would hinder my songwriting, which was often folksy, earthy, and real. Nothing was determined during our walk. I felt the drive back across mountains, deserts, and forests would provide a welcome opportunity and time to be alone with my thoughts.
The trip home from LA was more Route 66 exploration and an evening at the Grand Canyon. Then on to Tucumcari, New Mexico for dinner at Denny's and a night's sleep at the Pony Soldier motel (they had a liberal pet policy). The Pony Soldier was a 50s/60s era motel, one of the first motels an eastbound traveler on Route 66 would encounter. In the Route 66 heyday, that allowed the motel to charge a little bit more. Now that traffic was on I-40, the rates were very reasonable. I realized that the next day he would be traveling next to the Santa Fe Railroad tracks and right through what was once the epicenter of the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. The next morning was sunny and I was filled with anticipation to get home that evening.
But, the trip would not be over quite so soon. I was now walking with Brooklyn back up a rural entrance ramp. A young couple with a small child in a white pickup came partway down the ramp. The driver asked if I needed help. I told them of the coming tow truck, thanked them, and made a mental note of the kindness of these strangers who went out of their way to make sure I and Brooklyn were okay. The truck turned around in the grass between the ramp and the freeway, went back up the shoulder of the ramp, waved goodbye, and disappeared on the dusty side road.
I opened up the back of the Dodge SUV, and let Brooklyn out so she could walk around a bit. She was being very patient and accommodating; she may have sensed the tension in my voice. We sat in the open rear of the car to escape the heat and dusty wind. To our relief, Harley arrived and efficiently winched the Dodge up onto the ramp bed of his rather large tow truck. I hoisted Brooklyn up into the back seat of the truck and then climbed up to the front seat. Harley said it would be about 30 miles to Fenton Motors, the repair shop. It felt like much longer - they shared little, Harley and I. While I loved to travel to other cultures and parts of the country and the world, Harley had probably never left this part of Texas. But, he was a good guy. He mentioned that he normally didn't work on Sundays, but happened to be in the office to pick up some paperwork when the phone rang. If he hadn't taken my call, I wasn't sure what my plan would have been. Hitchhike (with a dog) back to Amarillo? And then what? But, he did take the call. And I was very glad to be riding up in the cab of that truck, with an air conditioner, looking out over the fields of the panhandle. I did learn about new hay baling techniques.
I asked Harley where they were headed. Pampa, replied Harley. Pampa Texas? I thought to myself. I had read that Woody Guthrie had spent a few years in Pampa, but I knew only that Pampa was somewhere in Texas. I was more familiar with Guthrie's time in California (the Dust Bowl Ballads) and New York City (This Land is Your Land). And now I was going to Pampa. The trip with Harley was no longer boring. It was exciting. I would get to see where Woody played his guitar and wrote several songs. Since it was a Sunday, I figured I'd have most of Monday to explore downtown Pampa.
There was only one motel in Pampa that accepted pets. Harley called his girlfriend and asked her to call and make a reservation for us for the night. She was certainly kind and considerate and willing to help. Later, during our conversation, Harley did allude to some tension at home which may have helped explain why Harley was willing to be away from home on a Sunday. He met Pam in college. The country boy and the city girl. She moved out west with Harley so that he would be close to his family, where he grew up, and still had some friends from his days as the high school football star.
Harley took us to Fenton Motors, opened the locked gate to the storage lot (tow truck drivers had such access), unloaded and parked my car towards the front of the lot, by the service bays. I retrieved my guitar and suitcase from the car and left the key under the mat, as Harley had instructed. Harley then drove us to the motel and waited patiently while I wrestled Brooklyn and my luggage down from the back seat. Harley refused a tip. Profuse thanks to Harley and Pam. I checked in to a very nice new motel, settled into the room, and took Brooklyn for a walk. I was a bit anxious - how serious would the car repair be? How long would it take? What if they had to order parts from another dealer, in another city? I made some contingency plans. I could just stay at the motel for another night and drive back when the car was ready. Or he could rent a car, drive home, and return later.
We walked a couple of blocks to a drug store for dog food and a few snacks. Back in the cool comfort of the motel room, I researched more about Woody's time in Pampa. While in college at Texas Tech in Lubbock, I would hang out at a folk club where I first heard of Guthrie. Buddy Holly's hometown, Lubbock, was the music center for much of West Texas. I had learned to play the guitar and became quite good at it. Sitting on the front porches of the farmhouses in the Panhandle, I would strum, sing, and write music of the prairies. I had heard some of the old timers talk of Guthrie and that he once lived in the area. Woody Guthrie was a my inspiration and unseen mentor. But I never imagined that I would one day be in Pampa with time to kill. I might not have had that opportunity if my car hadn't broken down.
My thoughts were more focused on what might happen the next day - I tried to get some sleep. I wasn't too successful. Nightmares of car repair, the warning light on the dash, and realizing I was alone on the prairie. I woke up early and got a small styrofoam cup of coffee and a bagel from the motel's breakfast buffet. The service department at Fenton Motors opened at 8:00 am. I waited until 8:10 before calling. Marilyn, the service rep, was very nice and had already taken my car from the fenced lot to the shop for diagnosis. She said she'd call me as soon as they figured out what was wrong with the car. I didn't mind the trip delay as much - I now had a Guthrie mission. And was glad for having the time to do it.
Brooklyn and I headed off to downtown Pampa. It wasn't very far from the motel, so we walked. On the edge of downtown, we stopped for breakfast at Finley's Fountain Cafe. Brooklyn waited outside next to a wooden church pew with two crusty farmers that were wheat deep into solving the world's problems and griping about the weather. The younger man immediately took to Brooklyn, petting and cuddling her head in his lap. Inside, I was enjoying the decor of antiques, some from the oil boom days, some from railroads, some from Route 66. They reminded me of what Guthrie might have seen. I paid the tab at Finleys with some crinkled bills I stashed in my pocket as we left the motel room.
"Thanks for comin in!"
I turned and waved,
"Have a good day."
Stepping outside to the clean morning air, I encouraged Brooklyn to take a drink of water. I returned the water bowl to its spot next to the bench I told the men why we were in town. One of the men mentioned that his father had played with Woody. With two other musicians, Woody began his musical career by forming the Corn Cob Trio and later the Pampa Junior Chamber of Commerce Band. The Trio played outside of the Harris Drug Store, starting in the summer of 1929. Eager to see the old drug store, I said goodbye to the two guys.
Woodrow Wilson Guthrie was named after the soon to be elected President. Woody's free spirit and his dreams just couldn't be contained in his hometown. Okemah, Oklahoma, had crashed a bit once the oil fields played out. His dad had moved to Pampa a few years earlier for work. Pampa had become a vibrant working town due to agriculture, the railroad, and oil fields discovered in 1916. Woody's mother had recently died, school bored him, and he had dreams. He itched to go west and join his dad in Texas. Woody was only 17, but he had traveled by rail before. He and his friends in Okemah would go to the railyard, find an empty box car, and climb up in. They would huddle in a corner to be the least visible in case a railroad watchman was making the rounds checking for vagabonds and hobos. Woody arrived in Pampa in a vacant box car. The same Santa Fe Railroad that brought pioneers to this prairie water stop, starting in 1888. Named Glasgow by early Scottish pioneers, the name was later changed to Pampa. The prairie grass reminded early town leaders of the pampas grasslands of South America.
Woody stayed with his dad, sometimes missing the familiarity of Okemah, where his dad taught Woody some of the basics of the guitar. They would often play together in the evening on the back porch. Woody would always be an Okie. But Woody was excited about the new adventures and opportunities in Texas. Woody was in Pampa for his final year of high school, but he rarely went. He found a job working the counter inside the Harris Drug Store, making fizzes, malteds, and sody waters, and selling small bottles of Jake, an in-house drink of moonshine and ginger. It was Prohibition and there was a provision that one could get a pint of alcohol every ten days with a prescription from a doctor. This gave Harris and other small drugstores a legal way to sell liquor.
Woody found a beat-up old guitar in the back of the store that a customer had left, probably in exchange for a drink. When he wasn't making drinks, Woody sat on a bench outside the drug store to sing, and play his 'new' guitar. Jeff, a well-known fiddler in town, would mentor Woody, who tried to figure out how to play the old songs he remembered his mother singing. The shoe shine man from next door would come over and play some blues. Woody called him Spider Fingers because "his fingers walked up and down the guitar neck like a tarantula".
Woody started writing songs; 'hobo songs' he called them. The many tales Woody heard at the counter found their way into his lyrics. If the weather was bad, or he needed a table to write on, he would go to the relatively new Pampa Library on the second floor of the City Hall. While the book selection was a bit slim, Woody spent much time reading stories and biographies, influencing his growth as a songwriter, poet, and balladeer.
April 14, 1935 was Black Sunday. Massive clouds of dust caused by poor soil practices and years of drought rolled into the Panhandle. Pampa was completely engulfed. Already weakened by the Great Depression, farms failed and shops closed. Like many others, Woody planned to hit the highway, Route 66, to go further west to look for work. Thousands of migrants from the Midwest, Oklahoma, and Texas were refugees in their own country. Woody eventually made it to California by riding the freight trains, hitchhiking, and even walking; taking whatever small jobs he could scrounge. He wanted to support his Pampa family - wife Mary and their three children. During his few years in California, Woody busked for road folk and sang at refugee work camps. The separation of miles was too big a hurdle; Woody and Mary divorced. The next dream itch was to enhance his music and writing by hanging out in Greenwich Village, New York City. Woody Guthrie drove cross country, back on Route 66.He stopped to visit his father, who had just moved back to Oklahoma from Pampa.
Brooklyn and I headed south, past Pampa's main commercial center of older buildings. Many of the buildings were the same as in Woody's time, but now in worse shape and vacant. As we crossed the railroad tracks, I paused to gaze up and down the tracks. I was imagining Woody jumping down from a boxcar, possibly right near where we were standing. The same point in space but decades of progress apart. In the next block of shops, still on the same street as Finley's, was the Harris Drug Store. I froze in a time warp of history. The brick building was the same. The letters painted by Woody Guthrie over the door, on the brick, had been touched up, but there they were. There were chairs out front, right where Woody sang and strummed. I was transported to another chapter. One that excited me. I felt such a clear inspiration, almost as if Woody was speaking directly to me from the chair.
The Harris Drug Store was now the Woody Guthrie Folk Music Center; there was a State of Texas Historical Marker in front. It was closed on Mondays, but I wasn't too disappointed. I could find most of the info online. I relished being right where Woody played his guitar and sang for the people passing through and the people of Pampa. Brooklyn and I sat and looked out over the street and the neighborhood. Seeing the same buildings that Woody saw.
On our way back to the motel, I stepped into a touristy gift shop. Ignoreing the Texas shaped coffee mugs, the postcards of armadillos and rabbits, and the bumper stickers, I stepped up to the counter with a Dr Pepper, a bag of chips, and a bottle of water for Brooklyn. As I was about to pay, Woody's image caught my eye. I included a paperback book about Woody Guthrie and a CD of his music for the trip back to Nashville. We walked to where the old City Hall and Library stood. We each lay on the grass to enjoy our snacks. Brooklyn napped and I flipped through my new book. We were at the site where Woody spent time in the library reading, writing, and forming his future career.
Woody made common music for the common man, and I felt a connection to him now that I had experienced a segment of Woody's journey. From the appreciation of Woody and his very real, folk truths, it was clear that Los Angeles wasn't for me at this time, or maybe ever. Monday afternoon, I called the agency to thank them for a great experience and to turn down their invitation for a second audition. They told me they were disappointed, they thought I was a winner - a talented singer and writer. I was buoyed by their compliments. But the unplanned pilgrimage to Pampa was a significant step. I was now working from my own dreams and my own convictions. I wanted to continue to write and perform in Nashville; staying true to my new direction. My pocket vibrated. I thought maybe it was LA calling back.
"Hello, this is Marilyn from Fenton Motors, is this Jim?"
"Yep, that's me." I replied with some concern about the hassle of repairs.
"We looked over the car. The water pump is busted, but we have one in stock. The car should be ready by early afternoon."
"Fantastic. Thank you very much."
We checked out, and walked to the repair shop. We will soon be on our way home. Another Dust Bowl refugee on the highway. From Pampa, it was a twelve hour drive to Nashville. But, with a new appreciation and thirst, I would stop in Okemah in eastern Oklahoma (about four hours from Pampa) to see Woody's childhood home. Brooklyn and I listened to the CD Dust Bowl Ballads along the way. The song I repeated most often was written just before Woody Guthrie left Pampa:
It's a hot old dusty highway
For a dust bowl refugee.
Here today and on our way
Down that mountain, 'cross the desert,
It's a never-ending highway
For a dust bowl refugee.
And I wonder, will I always
Be a dust bowl refugee?
Dust Bowl Refugee
Songwriter: Woody Guthrie
Lyrics © T.R.O. Inc., Universal Music Publishing Group
© James Robert Watson Email Text
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