Editor’s Note: Marlow’s Road Trip, 22 years ago, resumes this morning with the experience of meeting America and it’s roads up close and personal!

– Vic

May 2001

Detour Version 1.0

Day 1

I hoped to slip out of Alexandria to pick up Steve in suburban Fairfax county to avoid any more public displays. Out the door well before 7 AM doing my final rig checks wasn’t enough for an undetected getaway.

As this farewell unfolded, I recalled a midwestern summer’s morning in the very early 1960s. The occasion was my eighth-grade graduation from Immaculate Conception Elementary School. My mother directed me during that sweaty Midwestern afternoon to pose in front of every conceivable backdrop on our well-manicured front yard for my father’s decades old Bell & Howell 8 mm movie camera with color film. I could hear the key wind-up, spring-driven, gears grinding as I stood still with salty perspiration stinging my eyes in front of his prized Red Emperor cannas flower bed.

I heard over and over our neighbors drop by to congratulate me for graduating and to compliment Mom for the shiny new suit in which she had encased me that day. For months, she had shopped, no, hunted for it. I remembered her triumphant moment when with me in tow, for what had to be the sixth shopping trip, she found the perfect electric-blue colored model on the deep discount rack at the downtown Union Department Store in Columbus.

To commemorate her success on that multi-day hunting safari, she had one of the clerks take a photo with my Kodak Brownie camera — a big game “trophy shot” with me on one leg kneeling at her feet, the suit draped over the rack behind her, and her cradling between her palms her still smoking store credit card. Sadly, those pictures never saw the light of day — something must have happened to cause that whole film roll to be overexposed.

Despite the relatively cooler AM conditions four decades later, it was a welcomed déjà vumoment as many of the same encouragements, admonishments and best wishes came my way again. As a bonus, this time I was dressed in the clothes of my choosing — black leathers that would be used many times over the decades that followed. During a brief driveway moment I tried to figure out what I was graduating from or matriculating into.

After a brief twenty-mile westward jaunt to Steve’s place, we went through another photo op with his wife Janet before being cleared for departure.

Departure photo — Steve and Marlow

Before we left, Steve started removing the cold weather gear from his saddle bags to leave behind. I asked him to consider taking it, if room permitted as we’d be doing some early morning mountain riding out west. This was not me being prescient — just blind rookie road trip luck as you’ll see later.

Just an hour into our journey, we whizzed past a hand painted roadside sandwich board sign that proclaimed:

“Antiques Made Daily
Inquire Within”

We took its sheepish sentiments as a good omen, as we were embarking upon a path where we might be crafting personal memories that our heirs could consider as olden days, grandpa once-upon-a-time tales. Antiques, if you like.

We stopped in Beckley, West Virginia, for lunch at Fosters. It was a small-town pub serving a decent lunch as the man on the sidewalk contended in response to my query about where to eat. A women in her mid-30s with her two petite, well mannered, towheaded kids scampering about the place, ran the tavern.

Upon learning of our journey, she sounded envious and related her desire to ride the country as well. This was to become one of this trip’s themes, if not refrains, which repeated itself in numerous variations about attempting to do deferred things from one’s secret “to-do” lists. It was sometimes masked by a hidden unwillingness to risk personal failure or injury.

With others, in particular, the fifty plus year old crowd of our new road friends, it was predominantly tinged with regret for not having tried. Our tavern operator understandably seemed restrained by her two darlings and her lack of a partner. As we did with all the others on this and future trips, we encouraged her to hold onto her dream, keep a list and attempt it when she was able and ready.

While waiting for our sandwich order, I went outside to retrieve and apply sunscreen. As a card carrying pink eyed, pale skinned, northern European extraction rider, I come in one of three colors — red, white, and blue. For a long life, two of these should be avoided. As I was applying the screen to my face using my bike’s mirror, I was approached by a kid who couldn’t have been older than eleven. Keep in mind the picture here of a small-town child talking to an utter stranger outside a local tavern, a biker who was two plus feet taller than him and clad in all black and wearing yellow-tinted bug-eye prescription riding goggles.

Here’s the first part of our conversation:

Josh:
(looking at my mildly dirty bike) “Can you wash a bike like that at a car wash?”

Marlow
“Nope. Need to wash it by hand.”

Josh
“Well, how much would that cost?” (not missing a beat) “In these parts, it’d be at least $5-6.” (Note: Local Harley Davidson dealers charge more than $50 to detail a Big Twin; a little less for a Sportster.)

Marlow
“Sounds about right.”

Josh
(while handing me his business card) “Well, I only charge $2.50.”

Marlow
“Well, that seems fair . . . for a good job.”

Josh’s business card

I was astonished at how quickly this kid established a rapport, got to the point, and tried to close the deal. We continued for a short while talking about his and his brother’s odd jobs business, his prices, his savings and the like. As we parted, I for lunch, he for more marketing encounters, I wished him a good day. Hopping aboard his home-made skateboard, he replied over his shoulder: “I will, Mister. I most certainly will.”

As I got back to the table, our sandwiches were delivered as I slid into the booth. Steve was amazed at my tale of an unchaperoned kid coming upon and engaging a total stranger. We both made a promise to stop by Beckley sometime in the future, call Josh for a wash and wax appointment and meet his amazing, supportive family. He’ll get a nice tip.

We spent the rest of the day power riding the interstate road system to put us back on our time and distance schedule and goal of riding the legendary roads of the west. We did take some nice two-laners in the Shenandoahs but cut them short, since today was a 600+ mile butt-buster.

Arriving in Louisville at twilight, the plan was to enter the city and then circle back out along an old US route to the now bypassed areas of locally owned motels, diners, drive-throughs, and dives.

We entered neighborhoods not so much bypassed by I-64 but rather by time, progress, and the DotCom fortunes of the late 1990s. Many were old and dilapidated, the remains of a well distant in time middle class flight. Some areas had resisted with their new inhabitants proudly keeping them shipshape.

Sadly, most were not.

We putted our bikes by a broken-down Howard Johnson restaurant and shuttered HoJo Motel to find an open-air drug market in full swing. We cracked our throttles as we had started to gain unwanted eyeball attention. You could almost hear our observers’ eyelids sounding like motorized press cameras going click-click-click as they fixed us with their best Who the f*#k are you stink eye stares.

Failing to find in town accommodations during our 20-mile city searching sojourn, we retraced our path via I-64 out east to an old motel area, secured a Red Carpet Inn room, called home, and dined at a local greasy spoon after logging 680 miles.

We had one Alpha Sierra moment. Steve’s recently dealer-installed throttle lock fell off on one of West Virginia’s twisty mountain roads. It had come loose back in Virginia but he didn’t ask to stop and tighten it. Lesson learned.

Day 1 miscellany and counts (updated and edited whenever)

Windshield Bug Smash Bingo Game winner: Yellow.

Query count:
Where’re you going? – 2
What’s that? (Steve’s Valkyrie) – 1
Damsels in Distress – 1

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