Poker Face

Greetings from Wyoming! I am officially in mountain country and my 250 mile drive featured one continuous breathtaking view of a corner of the world I never thought I would love so much. I have been very fortunate in this life to have seen some of the most magnificent natural sights the world has to offer, and this piece of land can hold its own against them all.

Because Cody, Wyoming is off the beaten path (read as: not directly on the interstate) I was able to catch a glimpse of what home on the range looks like for the residents of this state. Sheep and cattle farms are separated by the occasional corn field and I found myself envious of the view these folks have just from their front porch. It’s stunning. During my drive, I was momentarily transported back in time to when I played the Oregon Trail game on the only Apple computer that sat in the back of the room of my third grade class. I died many deaths as the result of dysentery on that game and I am amazed at the real life settlers who blazed the trail through this part of America.

Cody, Wyoming is a monumental stop on this journey because it officially marks the furthest point that I have ever been away from home by myself. A quick google search tells me that I am 1,338.7 miles from my hometown in rural Southern Illinois. I imagined what this moment would be like for me before I even left Flora. I wondered if I would feel homesick, scared, worn out, or maybe even bored. But aside from missing my family and cuddling with my baby nephew, I don’t actually feel any of those things. In fact, I feel just the opposite. I feel empowered and strong. I feel a sense of accomplishment.

As I approached the Wyoming state line, my audio book of The Handmaid’s Tale wrapped up its final lines and I switched over to my music playlist aptly named, “My Driving Tunes.” Tupelo Honey by Van Morrison filled my car and with the way the sun hit the snowcapped mountains just right, my mind drifted off to a memory I had forgotten about until now.

I was nineteen years old and it was, I believe, Christmas break of my sophomore year of college. I decided I was going to visit my friend Megan who was going to school in Charleston, South Carolina at the time. Not being brave enough to drive and being too broke to buy a plane ticket, I naively purchased myself a Greyhound bus ticket. My parents and younger brother dropped me off at a gas station in Effingham where I boarded the bus thinking of nothing but the sunny skies and warmer weather of South Carolina.

It didn’t take long for me to discover just how inefficient America’s bus system is. What was supposed to be a simple fifteen hour trip turned into almost 24 hours of travel time. At point I awoke to find the bus stranded on the side of the road, smoke rolling out from under the hood. All the passengers were unloaded and reloaded onto another bus and if memory serves me correctly, I had to wait several hours for a transfer in Columbia, SC. Bus stops are sketchy, and that’s being polite, and so when we finally made it to the bus station in Charleston, I was relieved to think the worst was behind me.

Spoiler alert: I was wrong.

While I remember enjoying my time in Charleston visiting with my friend, my bus ride home was plagued with even more troubles. I left Charleston mid afternoon and when I arrived in Atlanta for my transfer, the lobby was standing room only despite being around 8:00 at night. Due to reasons I can’t even remember, the buses were running hours behind. Passengers who were supposed to be on buses leaving much earlier in the evening were just now loading. I remember staring at the screen and seeing that my bus wouldn’t be arriving until well after midnight. Frustrated, I walked myself to the women’s restroom and dug through my suitcase for my toothbrush. The bus station was disgusting. Odors I can’t even describe loomed in the air and every inch of the floor and seats were covered in dirt and grime. For whatever reason, I felt it only appropriate to brush my teeth, like that would somehow make me feel cleaner. I hovered around the seating area and pounced on the first available chair. I opened my copy of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and when I got to the part of Cedric Diggory’s death I tried to hide my tears from the passengers around me so as not to cause a scene. When my bus finally arrived, I packed up my belongings and joined my fellow passengers in line. I climbed the steps of the bus but was stopped short by the bus driver. A few passengers were milling around in the aisle and making their way back to the front of the bus. The bus was full, and I was forced back into the station.

As I sat back down and reopened my book all I could think about was how dangerous this was. I was nineteen years old and stranded in the Atlanta bus station in the middle of the night. Yes, my name was on a bus ticket but other than that there was nothing tracking my whereabouts. Bus seats aren’t assigned and while I don’t know what it is like now, at the time there was no one around to scan my ticket. No one checked my name off a list and if I didn’t get on the bus, my seat would be filled by someone else. I could have gone missing and no one would have even known. I was starting to regret my decision to travel by bus even more so than I did on my trip down.

The sun started to rise as an empty bus heading my direction finally pulled into the station. I made it to Indianapolis for my next transfer and I had never been happier to be back in the Midwest. I found my bus and showed the driver my ticket. He told me this wasn’t the bus I needed, and he sent me up to the counter to talk to the attendant on duty. I stood in line and waited patiently and when it was my turn the attendant told me that I was in fact in line for the correct bus and she sent me back to the driver. When I approached the driver a second time, he assured me I was getting on the wrong bus and he sent me back to the counter. When I approached the attendant a second time, she told me she wasn’t sure what the confusion was about but that was the correct bus for me and as she pointed out the window to show me, the bus was pulling away from the station. If that was the bus I needed, it was leaving without me.

Cell phones were just sort of becoming a thing back then and I didn’t have one. So, with the pocket change I had left, I bought a calling card and used a pay phone to call my mom. Just the word, “hello,” was enough to send me into a fit of tears. I can only imagine what was going through her mind as I explained what happened through labored sobs. “I’ll come get you,” she said without hesitation, and a surge of relief filled my body. Three and half hours later my mom and my aunt Jane were there to rescue me from nightmare that is known as the American bus system.

Many years later I remember talking with my mom about this very unpleasant experience and I joked with her, “that was a terrible idea. Why did you let me do that?” She just laughed, “You were an adult! You were nineteen! You bought your own ticket and I couldn’t stop you from going. Even if I had told you not to go, you didn’t have to listen to me.”

It’s been seventeen years and she still doesn’t stop me from going places even though I’m sure there have been times she wishes she could have. She knows better than to do that. I’m not talking in a “if I try to stop her, she’ll resent me forever” type of knowing better but rather, “if I show her I’m worried she may not go and it’ll stop her from living her life,” type of way. I know this because a couple of years ago I jokingly and gently confronted her on her apparent lack of worry and concern whenever I made a big decision in my life like moving away to graduate school or the first time I flew to Florida with my friends. She always seemed so cool about these things. There were never any theatrics. No tears. No over the top proclamations of love. No standing at the edge of the driveway and waving goodbye until my car was out of sight. There were no Hallmark moments for this girl. We would always stand in the foyer of the house and hugging me a little tighter than normal she would just say, “Be careful and let me know when you get there.” When I finally asked her about how her ability to be so cool about these things she explained, “Of course I worry, but I would never want you to feel guilty about living your life. What if you saw me be sad about you leaving and it caused you not to go? I wouldn’t want that.”

She knows me well and she is right. She knows that if I were to ever see even an ounce of doubt, worry, or skepticism in her eyes it could be enough to stop me in my tracks. Thank God she has a good poker face.