Chow Run… And Other Stuff…
It all began with a birthday party and a very nice send-off at my daughter’s place…
My daughter and her crew threw a mini-surprise birthday party for this aging biker gypsy. Now I'm not bragging here, but my dear daughter is about the best daughter a not-so-worthy father could ever hope to have! Not only that, but she is extremely thoughtful and insightful... That's obvious, for example, from the candles on that cake. Only two for me to blow out and not the actual number for all my years!
In keeping with the usual routine of a solitary gypsy, I made the bittersweet farewell and waved one more time as I rode away from her house and towards Tennessee for... the Veterans Day Ride (VDR), but also for whatever adventure happened to come along, as well. I arrived a couple of days later before the gathering was to begin, so I dropped by Big Wolf's hacienda for a visit there... Then the ten miles or so to Ground Zero...
Lots of hanging out with friends and all the good things we all look forward to at these gatherings. A couple of Bama riders I've known for some time happened to be there again, and they were planning on watching Bama football instead of doing any of the group rides on that Saturday. Well, since I don't go to those events to ride either, I took them up on their generous offer to view the spectacle with them...
During one of the many commercial breaks, I commented on my major personal let-down at the closing of CF Penn Hamburgers in Decatur, AL. Ronnie then smiled broadly and informed this infrequent visitor that they’d reopened in another nearby location! Holy cow!!! That nostalgic link to my misspent youth had become something of an iconic basepoint for all the memory treasures of that period hoarded deep within my recollector muscle. Coping with its loss had been truly sad for this simple lad who grasped so disparately for connections between his own life and normalcy… Time is short… I must go there!
I proposed to Ronnie and Leon that we should meet at the new place for a celebration meal the following Tuesday… They indicated interest, willingness, and likely appearances… but who knows… I also invited many other of my friends to join us, but most had too much already on their plates for such. Jim (Slacker) however, well… I could tell he just might be persuadable… I began to work on him. I also began to build up the possibility of him accompanying me to his wife, Suzanne. She seemed amenable, as well! Like most veteran wives, it seems reasonable, I’m sure she could use the respite…
I had to select Tuesday because I’d already committed to drive Big Wolf to his next colonoscopy on Monday. Ron and Leon are both retired so that didn’t make much difference to them, although Ron did have plans with his grandson on Wednesday. Jim was on vacation that week with no plans other than vegging, so no interference of note there, either… Mitch is always a wild card in the deck, so who could guess how that might work out. Still the invitation was heartily extended, and no outright rejection was received… hmmm… Shoot, we had the makings of a genuine thing here! Then came Tuesday morning…
Slacker (Jim Babcock) and I met up near Lebanon, TN, then rode together to Decatur, AL, and CF Penn Hamburgers… MitchO (Mitch Ohemke) ‘Ninjaed us’ by appearing while we were dining… Mitch is famous for suddenly appearing from nowhere, unannounced and unexpected… Always good to see him, however!
baby girl names meaning light Our other two pals also showed up while we were there, so our motley crew became complete… Ron Keeton and Leon Strickland, both Bama boys, rode to join us for some fine dining at a very special place for this former Bama boy… Those extras made my delight even grander!
I hadn’t expected to devour my usual three burger gems that time, but I did anyway… They’re not for everyone, more of an acquired taste thing, I’d say, but for this devoted connoisseur, they occupy a prominent place among the top digestible favorites in my food chain! Ever since I enjoyed my very first one in June 1962, I’ve been a loyal fan visiting their big grease cookery whenever I was nearby…
Armed with my nap chair just in case, I felt confident as I led Jim away from Penn’s and toward the backroads we’d be riding to Tuscaloosa for the evening. Yes, he’d figured on returning home after dining, but he was calculatingly persuaded to ride a little longer… It really wasn’t that tough of a sale! We arrived in Tuscaloosa not long before dark, but all was good. Traffic was a little heavy, and my doing a dipsy-doodle by turning right from a left turn lane, I later learned, did give Jim some pause… I’d spotted the motel I was looking for, but it wasn’t where I’d thought I’d remembered it being…
Jim and his companion had much conversation that evening. We’d known each other for many years, yet we soon discovered we didn’t really know each other at all… Funny all the things the shared closeness of a road trip will bring out, and how that will create new bonds of friendship not anticipated. Jim turned out to be a very good traveling partner, and I’m mighty glad Suzanne had encouraged him to come along!
All that and we even had a ‘drop-by’ visit from an obviously inebriated gentleman… Not a derelict by any means, but a veteran, it turned out, and he was struggling to articulate the evasive source of inner conflict between his uncertainty and the pride he felt at the same time. None of us are quite sure how to place everything into perspective, or to explain to ourselves, let alone to non-vets, the jumble of contradictions between patriotism, loyalty, and duty on the one hand, and a desire for peace and to do no harm on the other.
The struggle between preserving freedom, safety, even America itself, while balancing that with the taking of life… the real nitty-gritty purpose of any military. We all find some line of thinking accommodation mechanism and lock onto it to afford us some peace, but the bottom line, that one common denominator seems to remain just beyond reach for some of us…
Taking back roads again all the way to Hattiesburg, MS, Jim and I headed away from Tuscaloosa and towards Mandeville, LA… Another opportunity and purpose for this trip had presented itself, so the original ride for burgers had been extended yet again. Jim was starting to grow suspicious… He only had a week of vacation this time, so when I brought up the idea he should be considering early retirement, he began to seriously wonder… Then, I had a boo-boo… I ran out of gas…
I didn’t tell Jim until later that I’d missed the turn I’d wanted to take, but I figured another route would be just fine. Well, no gas along a very long stretch and… We had passed a couple of abandoned former stations, but those relics of another time served no practical purpose for us…
When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade!
I did what I’ve done before: I found a place to pull off the roadway, took a big swig from my Gatorade bottle I keep between the risers, then poured the rest out and handed the jug to Jim… “Go fill ‘er up, please!” He returned before I could get a nap in, but oh well… I added the sparse fuel to the tank, then I looked for a place to discard that now empty jug. Jim suggested I not throw my ‘auxiliary gas tank’ away, so I uncharacteristically followed good advice…
A second boo-boo followed about halfway from the first to the next fuel spot… Who knew, right? Jim had to rescue me twice on the same stretch! That’s the second time this has happened to me, too, but mercifully both times I was riding with rescuers! Oh well, time for me to attempt to make it up to Jim, so we stopped at David’s Catfish House in the next town… Thomasville, AL.
Following a rather good meal, we returned to backroads and continued our journey. In Hattiesburg, we topped off, but due to the lengthening of shadows, we elected to jump on the super slab and complete our ride. We arrived in Mandeville, LA, checked into a nearby motel, then began making calls to those we would be seeing… Dinner at the Waffle House, more lengthy conversation, then turn-in time to get ready for the next big adventure…
DDT
