Yeah, it was raining. So?
No flash floods? Check.
No falling trees? Check.
I'm not made of sugar? Double check.
Why am I feeling such anxiety about rain on the drive from Montgomery back to the campground? Maybe this rain might bring cooler temperatures? (I'm not sure why I kept trying to associate rain with cooler temperatures...in the South...in the Summer. We're not in Idaho anymore, Henry.)
When I arrived back to Stevie, my anxiety went full tilt. There were all my textiles dripping wet from the clotheslines. S.O.B.! I had completely forgotten about my laundry. As a reminder to you reader, the majority of my clothing and bedding was out there. I had no dry skivvies and only long sleeved/legged clothing to wear, torturous in that heat.
Well, the rain had stopped and the wind was up, so I again left all where it was on the clotheslines, to dry overnight. Why at this time didn't I take my wet items over to the nice laundry facility and use the dryer you ask? It never crossed my mind. Gah!
I took a quick shower and attired myself with the last clean pieces of my pajama wardrobe and went to bed.
We woke to angry rain and wind. Thunder. Pickiowwwww! Rumble, rumble, rumble. Here we go again. The trailer was rocking and Henry was shaking.
S.O.B.! My laundry!
I launched myself out of the trailer, ripped all the items from the clothesline, stuffing absolutely soaking clothes and sheets and towels and blankets and rugs into garbage bags, while the rain and wind hosed me. Drenched, I flooded the floor of the trailer as I peeled my wet jam jams from my skin. I dried myself with paper towels and redressed in long sleeved/legged clothes. Gawd it was hot.
I checked the weather forecast on my phone. Hurricane Claudette was headed this way.
Ok, Henry. It's time to bail buddy. We gotta try to outrun this hurricane.
Shove this here. Stuff that there. Retract the pop out. Retract the awning. Shove Henry in the vehicle with windows down, because it's 150 degrees (yeah, despite the blasting rain). Up go the stabilizer jacks. Extend the front jack. Back up the vehicle. Couple. Lift. Install sway bars. Drop. Attach chains and brake line and electricity cable. Remove the chocks. Quick inspection around the RV and we're...
An Emergency Alert buzzed on my phone.
National Weather Service: TORNADO WARNING in this area until 10:15 AM CDT. Take shelter now in a basement or an interior room on the lowest floor of a sturdy building. If you are outdoors, in a mobile home, or in a vehicle, move to the closest substantial shelter and protect yourself from flying debris.
S.O.B.!
I pulled the trailer over next to the laundry facility building, a nice sturdy-looking structure that felt like it could withstand a hurricane (as if I know). Henry and I hung out in the vehicle with the air conditioning on full speed, while we waited for the world to go to hell around us. Having just experienced a tornado a few days ago, I kept my eyes peeled for the signs of shit getting real.
Winds gusting, not a steady blast. Trees remained in the ground. Tree limbs stayed attached. So far, so good.
At 10:30 AM, after the tornado warning had expired (ha!), I left the safety of the laundry facility building and drove a few feet over to the dump station - had to dump the trailer. You might ask, did you really need to dump the trailer in the middle of a hurricane? I'll just say that I don't have a satisfactory answer for you.
Although the immediate tornado threat was past, I was still in hurricane-style rain and winds, mind you, hooking up the shitter hose and tank flush hose in a torrential downpour. My long sleeved/legged clothes, shoes, socks, hat, hair, glasses were completely saturated and dripping rain water and sweat within 3 minutes of exposure. The winds blowing through the trees above was loud and frightening. It was all very chaotic. Some sense finally decided to show its face in my brain, and I realized I needed to gtfo, now. I called it a wrap, went back into the trailer to change my clothes again. I put on the only remaining wearable clothes left - the pj bottoms I'd worn the night before and a t-shirt I'd bought as a gift for a friend that says "Asshole, with feelings." (You f*ckers will just have to arm wrestle over it.)
We hit the road jack. Off toward Tennessee, due north, as fast as we could go. Hurricane Claudette was moving north with us, right on our ass. It rainED the entire way. Traffic was thick. Sections of the highway were flooded. I was afraid we were going to hydroplane ourselves into a RV jackknife rollover situation. I admit that I am sometimes a little dramatic and hyperbolic, but this was really scary. In fact, I later learned that several people, including 10 children!, died in a car accident on the same highway just south of my position and at the same time I was fleeing, when their vehicle hydroplaned into a travesty.
Folks of the Bible Belt! Check yourself into a mental health institution, because it is very likely you are either entirely co-dependent or you have Stockholm Syndrome. God is abusing the shit out of you and yet you stay! Is it just a coincidence that the Bible Belt is also the Natural Disaster Belt? It can't be, since God controls the weather (refer to my post "Fried Pie.") The best advice I know is, "You're in a cult. Call your dad." - My Favorite Murder Podcast
"North" bound and down, loaded up and truckin'
A-we gonna do what they say can't be done
We've got a long way to go, and a short time to get there
I'm "north" bound, just watch ol' "Bandit" run
-Jerry Reed
After several hours, we made it safely to northern Alabama, to an RV park, flags galore, with a lively rooster farm in the two acres behind the RV park. Cockadoodledoo. Henry and I took a leg-stretcher around the place and struck up a conversation with a fellow RVer from Florida out walking his dog who noticed my Idaho plates. We chatted about his travels to Idaho and other extraordinary beautiful landscapes we'd both experienced in the West.
Florida guy says, "All those layers upon layers of rocks and stuff in Utah in all those different colors. It's just incredible. Mind boggling. Like, as I'm looking at it, and I'm thinking 'This can't be real. Aliens MUST have created this.'"
I had just escaped a hurricane. I was not in the mood.
"Aliens did not create the Colorado Plateau," I responded in a serious tone and then launched into an explanation of the geomorphic forces responsible for such formations.
He interrupted me, holding up his hands, "I know that aliens didn't actually create the landscape. I was just trying to make the point that it all seems so unreal."
I looked him in the eyeballs to see if I believed what he was saying. He seemed on the fence.
"Well, then. Sorry about my reaction. People nowadays believe some crazy shit, so when I hear someone say 'aliens did it,' I don't take for granted that they are kidding around. It's as though people in this country today are purposely trying extreme stupidity on for size, like a craze. First we had X-sports, X-games, X-factor. Now I guess we're doing X-idiot. Do you know, within the past month or so, I had some kid tell me that God controls the weather and as a result, his family became farmers in order to get paychecks from God? And, I had another guy tell me that Fauci (pronounced Fossi) and Bill Gates invented COVID to control "the population," but they just lost control of the virus. This is what I'm talking about! People in this country have lost their gawd damned minds. Crazy ass shit. This country is doomed."
Florida guy looked at me. I could tell he was holding something back. If he was on the fence about the aliens, the look on his face said that his beliefs were probably more in line with God-boy and the conspiracy nutter.
But, Florida. What did I expect?
The following day, we made it to our next major destination just southeast of Nashville, TN at another Army Corps of Engineers campground, right on a gator-less river. My campsite sloped down toward the river, was off camber and narrow. Backing Stevie into that spot and getting her level was real fun.
The guy over in the adjacent campsite came over to see if I could use a hand. He was shirtless, pierced nipples, which he was fiddling with, smoking a joint. I looked over at his campsite and I shit you not, he had living room furnishings (from a house!), including matching lazy-boy recliners, arranged under a large tent that also straddled the large concrete picnic table included as part of the campsite amenities, and the picnic table was covered in a fully stocked bar. In front of the living room was a large cargo trailer, presumably the trailer used to haul the furniture to the campsite, and mounted on the side of the trailer was a 50-inch flatscreen television, and atop the trailer was a some sort of cable/satellite television contraption. A very large motorhome sat over to the side, as an afterthought but a requisite camping fixture.
The guy was super nice. Helped me unhitch the vehicle from the trailer, which was difficult given a handful of variables, and invited me over to his campsite for a drink or a joint or to watch some tv or any combination of the three: the choice was mine. Not wanting to be rude, I stepped over to chat with him and his guests, a couple who had just returned from jet skiing on the river, three sheets to the wind. We sat around the "bar" and chatted.
"So, are you folks from Tennessee?" I asked. Pierced-nipple guy said, "Oh, yeah. I only live about 5 miles from here. During the summer, my wife and I like to come out here to camp, just to get away. You know, for a little peace and quiet. She's at work right now, works as a bartender. She should be getting off work here pretty soon. She'll swing by our house to pick up the dogs and then she'll be here. If you want to come over tonight to watch tv with us, just come on over."
I thanked him for the offer and told him I had to head back to the trailer to get some work done (which was true).
Sure enough, about an hour later, his old lady arrived, and the two of them kicked back in their recliners and watched Judge Judy, while their ski boat, lightly tethered to the dock down from their campsite, drifted on the river.
Henry and I did lots of hiking around the thick wooded area surrounding the campground, even though we were still in very uncomfortable sauna-like weather conditions. We drove into Nashville to have lunch with Noah, a consultant I work with in Los Angeles (or in cyberspace, really). After, we did a little Honky Tonkin on Broadway and visited the Johnny Cash Museum. Nashville is a pretty town. It's on my recommendation list.
After a few days of camping near Nashville, we headed east. My next major destination was Raleigh, NC, and I'd been inching my way there from the time we escaped Hurricane Claudette, where I planned to visit Rhoda Jane and her husband Waverly. Rhoda was my brother's girlfriend (or my brother was her boyfriend) about 25 years ago and at the moment in his life when he rode his mountain bike over a 150-foot cliff in the South Bay Area of California, landing himself in a coma at Standford University Hospital for several weeks and about a two-month stay overall. My brother and Rhoda were living with my mom and stepdad at the time in Fremont, CA, and I took a leave of absence from college and work in Los Angeles to sit with Rhoda and my family at the hospital, waiting for my brother to wake up.
All of this is a very long story, filled with a lot of crying, heartache and stress, but a bunch of hilarity too, which I might tell you about some day, but the main point of what I'm saying here is that Rhoda and I became friends, despite me being bitchy and her, a terrible driver (snort!), and despite that Rhoda and my brother did not live happily ever after together. I loved Rhoda from the moment I met her and ever since and always will. We are kindred.
Our next stop on our way to Rhoda was in Crossville, TN.
A few years ago, Henry and I were at our local dog park, when I encountered a new dog-park person, a man with a cute little scruffy dog. The man was named Mark, and the dog was Cocoa. Turns out Mark was from Crossville, TN and was in Boise getting his MFA in creative writing. He likes to write books, and I like to read books. He likes to hike and kayak and camp, and so do I. Our dogs liked each other. We became friends.
We met regularly at the dog park, where we would walk and talk about stories of our childhoods and our families and friends, and we talked about the book he is writing, which is inspired by his childhood and growing up in Crossville, TN. So, I had to visit this place.
Coincidentally, I ended up camping at a place where Mark and his family had reunions every summer. The campground is very lovely, lush with trees and vegetation, a visitor center, restaurant, and a large lake for kayaking, paddle boarding, and fishing. While there, I could imagine all the fun a kid could have with a large extended family, cousins playing together, running through the forest, swimming in the lake, campfires, and staying up late, with little to no involvement in the behind the scenes work needed to set up, maintain, and breakdown camp, which was left to the adults.
Henry and I took long hikes through the forest, where I would let him off leash, so he could burn off some cobwebs. He's a terrier and needs to run full bore or he'll die. All-time on-leash does not work for Henry. He needs freedom and discovery. I totally get it.
Our time in Crossville, TN was peaceful and relaxing.
Crossville, TN is still quite a distance to Raleigh, NC, and I was trying to find campsites in the Smokies and or Asheville, NC, some intermediary location to visit and breakup the long drive to Raleigh, although the further east I got, the more excited I was to see Rhoda.
Every campsite between Crossville, TN and Raleigh, NC was booked, given that it was high camping season in an area where the residents love their outdoors. Rhoda and Waverly tried to find me places to stay along the way as well, but nothing was working out. To me, this was a sign that I needed to just get myself to Raleigh straightaway.
(On my adventure, if there is a place I think I'd like to visit, and I try this way and it doesn't work, and then I try that way and it doesn't work, I just move on. The US is enormous with so much to see and experience, I won't waste my time trying overcome crazy obstacles. I can always come back.)
As if the impossibility of finding a campsite in a very busy area before I reached Raleigh wasn't enough of a sign that it was time for me to just get my ass to Raleigh already, as I was packing up the trailer and getting her hitched up, a man who looked like Uncle Jesse from the Dukes of Hazzard came a strolling through my little circle of campground, wearing for-real overalls and carrying a giant bible.
I figured I'd better gtfo, before he asked me to pray with him.
Stay tuned for "And the winner is... (Part 3)."
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