Day 28

Starting Point: Casper, WY

Destination: Madison, WI

Miles Driven: 944

Toward the end of my stay in Casper I had a decision to make. My journey was coming to an end, I could feel it. I could have stayed longer but the voice within told me it was time to come home. The only question was whether I take the 15 and a half-hour straight shot back to Madison or try to break up the drive, crash somewhere in Nebraska or Western Iowa to play it safe. After my exhausting 14.5-hour ordeal between Omaha and Albuquerque I had promised myself no more marathon drives, especially across so empty a part of the country.

Yet as my Casper check-out date drew near, I increasingly began to favor the Marathon. Obviously it would get me home faster and let’s face it: any stay in small-town Nebraska or Iowa would be nothing more than a pit stop. The coolest shit of this Tour was already behind me. But that wasn’t the biggest factor in my decision. What really pushed me toward the Marathon was that it was simply a better story.

One of the odd things about doing a travel blog (at least for me) is that the task of writing it changes the experience that I have. While I absolutely love and treasure traveling for its own sake, the task of also entertaining an audience (however small) gives me a subtle push to experience more things than I otherwise might, to press for a more immersive encounter with each city, to reflect more deeply on my own experiences as I strive to build narratives out of them.

In a way it all harkens back to my L.A. friend Alex’s question about honesty in blogging. I fundamentally reject the impulse to exaggerate my experience on paper (or screen, you get the point) so my only option is to exaggerate them in real life.

With that in mind I set out at 4:30 A.M., threw on some clothes and dropped off my motel key. I smoked the last of my vacation cigarettes; the “lucky” one, the one you turn upside down, which in some weird way I hoped would ensure good fortune. I ate a light breakfast of granola and dried sausage but I was careful not to ingest any coffee until at least three hours into the drive.

The first few hours were the roughest. I was driving East, directly into the rising sun, across a lonesome stretch of Wyoming’s Highway 18 which had been roughed up by some interminable construction. For an hour or two I had to turn up my car stereo to drown out the guttural roar made by my tires against that bumpy asphalt, all the while squinting past the solar glare to make sure I was actually on the right sight of the road.

As I reached Nebraska, the sun lifted above my eyeline and the road quality improved. The landscape flattened out and became less visually compelling. From here on out it was a mental game.  Try not to look at the clock. Try to hold in my pee until we hit the next town. Merriman is only 27 miles away. Oh, what’s that? Merriman only has a population of 119 and that gas station is closed? Oh well, on we go…

In the town of Gordon, Nebraska I got pulled over and ticketed for speeding. When the cop saw my Wisconsin license plate he remarked, “You got a long drive ahead of ya.”

No shit, I wanted to say, why do you think I was going so fast?

The reality is I don’t usually go too fast when I’m on the highway, but those sleepy little towns with their tiny speed limits can sneak up on you. From that point on I made sure to slow myself to a crawl at every little Nebraska town, even the ones that were obviously too small to have a police department.

The speeding ticket was annoying but I got over it. What worried me more was that this was the first actually bad thing that had happened to me on this Tour. My lucky cigarette hadn’t worked. Had my spell been broken? Did this mark the opening of a Pandora’s box of troubles to come? I nervously prayed that this wasn’t the case.

The vast majority of my route went along Highway 20, which passes through Northern Nebraska and Iowa, through absolutely nothing at all. More rotted-out motels and service stations, more windmills, more cattle, more Trump signs. Here and there I’d see a mildly amusing sight that might merit a photograph, but I was determined not to stop. Nothing would impede my singular mission to get the hell home.

And not to toot my own horn, but I pretty much crushed it. I kept the stops to a minimum, I relied mostly on my pre-packed food, and after that one brush with authority I kept my nose clean.

It wasn’t until I hit the town of Webster City, Iowa that I forced myself to stop for a significant amount of time. This was as much for my car’s sake as my own; I’m not an expert but it just can’t be good to keep an auto engine running for 12 hours nonstop. I parked outside the first available restaurant – a Pizza Hut – and ordered dinner.

I tried to take a moment to notice how I was feeling. I was edgy, strung out, similar to the feeling I have when put a few too many shots of espresso into my latte. My body itself seemed to vibrate and it was awkward to stand or sit still. Nonetheless I dined on a fine meal of pizza, breadsticks, and Pepsi and 25 minutes later I was back on the road.

At this point I only had about four hours to go and I was feeling pretty good. I had little doubt I’d made the right choice and would arrive home on time, but I still told myself not to count my chickens, anything could happen.

Sure enough as I neared Dubuque, Iowa I noticed storm clouds ahead of me. This brought to mind the dramatic and nerve-wracking conclusion of my 2018 tour, when I encountered floodwaters in the jagged, dicey terrain of Southwestern Wisconsin. But these rains were far more mild, and for some stretches the clouds were broken up to reveal an absolutely angelic pink-hued sunset sky (again, part of me really wishes I could have taken a picture).

An hour and a half later it was over. 28 days, 13 states, 8 motels/hotels/hostels, over 5,000 miles. Each time I come back after some of these trips I find myself asking the same questions: did it change me? Did I learn anything? Is anything really different?

I’d like to say yes. I’d like to say I feel rejuvenated, awakened, proud. That I feel more inspired and creative. That I’ve rediscovered parts of myself, strengthened old bonds and warmed the embers of my heart. Because all of that is true, or at least it feels true right now.

But I also know that in this world nothing lasts indefinitely, that reality as we know it can get torn asunder at any given moment. Even highways themselves don’t last forever (just ask Winslow and all the other dying old Route 66 towns). Positive or negative, no feeling is final. Therefore as this chapter of Ghost on the Highway comes to a conclusion, there’s only one thing I can say for sure… I’ll be back.