Curing White-line Fever

Scissor-tailed Flycatcher at sunset. Something you won’t see from the Interstate.

There’s something great about driving the Interstate highways across America—I just don’t know what it is. Susan and I were hardly out of St. Louis a week ago when a serious case of white-line fever hit us.
We looked up all the antidotes and discovered there is only one that seems to really work—get off the road as soon as possible. It worked like a charm. Before we reached Kansas City we were kicking up dust; not worried about gravel tattooing the underside of our car. We bagged our first Scissor-tailed Flycatcher on the main street of a little town in east-central Kansas. We managed all of Kansas (except for a few miles on I-70) and most of eastern Colorado all the way into Boulder, on roads that kept us in touch with the real world.
There are many wonders to be seen in the backcountry. For me at least, the best of the best is the lack of litter on a stick, i.e. billboard advertising. But that’s a whole ‘nother rant I’ll save for the future.
Let me add my voice to those who recommend getting off the highway—and out of the car for that matter—to see what’s so great about America. Theme parks and DizzyWorld places are just fine—if you have no imagination, or want your kids to live someone else’s dream.
The real world is sitting on a swivel stool in Hoxie, Kansas, having a root beer float made by a lady who has been working in the store for longer than she cares to remember. The real world is about crawling around on your hands and knees, eyeball to eyeball with a collard lizard in the Tall Grass Prairie Preserve in Strong City, Kansas. You’re going to get hot and dirty, however, you are also going to build memories that will last a lot longer than a T-shirt.



A real soda fountain in Hoxie, Kansas.