ST. LOUIS TO CHICAGO:
"This Moment" (a poem)


Illinois Corn (pretty big picture)
Most of the 300 miles to Chicago looks more or less like this


  THIS MOMENT

 
This moment on the road
St. Louis to Chicago
on a sunny day,

AC breze in my face,
hat band a little tight on my head, brim
coming down into my field of vision,

pen in hand, small notebook
poised on the steering wheel,
specks of dirt on the windshield,

my body at perfect
rest on the cushioned seat

as the soothing green
corn and trees slide by
on both sides of the highway,

120 miles from St. Louis,180 to Chi,
2250 since I left California,

58 years, 4 1/2 months
since the day of my birth
& who knows, till my death,

this moment in time,

many joys and horrors
vanished beyond
the horizon of the past,
their titrations residing as memories

this moment
I am competely happy

                      
June 29, 2006


      Below: I had one other heart-warming little experience on my drive to Chicago.
This is Herman, in front of Herman's Garage in the tiny village of Divernon, Illinois, near Springfield. A billboard had gotten me off 55 in search of a restaurant that turned out to have closed. Somehow I'd lost my way back to the freeway. I passed the garage, went in and asked directions, and then also asked about the tiny problems with the Nissan that had me carrying a small cloud of worry. Herman helped me open the hood, which I hadn't been able to do for 2000 miles. He also consoled me that the check engine soon light, that had come back on, was nothing to worry about.

herman, in front of his garage in Illinois

     At a little after noon, just as I was phoning Barbara to say good hello, after a perfect morning of driving and listening to NPR and Paul Theroux, I spotted the Sears Tower rising in the distance.


CHICAGO: A GREAT DAY IN A GREAT CITY

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