Sunday, April 4, 2021

An Easter Road Trip

On this Easter Sunday, I planned a road trip.  I would have preferred a leisurely journey through hilly farmlands with quaint homesteads, old barns, placid livestock, gurgling brooks and parcels of forest.  Unfortunately, that would not be the case.

Instead, I was due to speed eastward on the concrete ribbon of Interstate 70, crossing the bleak landscape of the High Plains.  Relatively featureless, the semiarid Plains are disrupted only by dry stream beds, tree- shrouded farm houses, the massive turbines of wind farms, occasional juniper-pine snow-breaks and small towns clustered around grain silos.

Worse yet, strong south winds pushed afternoon highs near 90 degrees F and, stepping from the car, one faced a blast furnace; while billboards warned that I might be heading for hell, it seemed that I was already there.  Then there were the maskless locals and truckers at rest stops and convenience stores, prowling about as if to intimidate liberals that were passing through Trump Country.  Yes, it was an Easter road trip to remember!