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Going to Graceland

I’m going to Graceland, in Memphis Tennessee, I’m going to Graceland
For reasons I cannot explain, some part of me wants to see Graceland

— Willie Nelson

The first time I drove into Memphis was in February 2019 during a thunderstorm. It was cold and dark and the rain was coming down so hard my windshield wipers couldn’t keep up. I had a death grip on the steering wheel as 16-wheelers flashed by, blasting my car with a wall of water.

I pulled off the freeway once and parked on a side street just to calm my nerves, but I had two choices: Sleep in the car on some side street or get back the freeway and try to find my hotel. I chose the latter, and Siri guided me turn-by-turn through the downtown spaghetti junction to my hotel on the other side of the city.

I had planned to go to Graceland the next day, but I had had enough of Memphis and decided to head south instead, stopping in Tupelo, Mississippi to see Elvis’s birthplace. A lot better, if you really loved Elvis, than Graceland.

Four months later, on my Road Trip with Annie, I drove into Memphis on an overcast afternoon, exited the freeway six miles from downtown, and made my way down Winchester Road to The Guesthouse at Graceland on Elvis Presley Boulevard.

The Guest House at Graceland on Elvis Presley Boulevard

All Shook Up was playing when I parked the car and went inside to register. I mentally rolled my eyes as that song segued into Jailhouse Rock, but the thirteen-year-old inside me was swooning. And kept swooning as Elvis’s music resounded inside and outside the hotel, day and night. Continue reading “Going to Graceland”

Eureka!

While monitoring our subject sleeping in Theodora’s room [Room 419], several lamps turned themselves on and off. First it was a floor lamp in the couch/TV area. Then it was the nightstand lamp right beside the bed. While we were marveling over the bedside lamp switching on and off, the closet door in the room opened all by itself!

–– Rich Newman of Memphis Tennessee, Paranormal Inc founder on location at the Crescent Hotel for a Japanese television show

I put Eureka Springs on my itinerary because I had vague but pleasant memories of the town from a trip with my first husband when I was nineteen. Little Switzerland, I think it was called then.

I don’t remember where we stayed, but it wasn’t the Crescent Hotel. I’m not sure it was in operation at that time, but if it was, it would have been completely out of our newlywed budget.

On this trip in June 2019 I booked the hotel because of its reputation as “America’s Most Haunted Hotel.” Jeri and Darci had stayed there in 2017, and Jeri told me about her experience in Michael’s Room: Continue reading “Eureka!”

Livin’ on Tulsa Time, Part 1

I had no business leavin’ and nobody would be grievin’
If I went on back to Tulsa time

— Daniel Flowers

Tuesday, June 4: I drove in to Tulsa from Kansas on US-412, a four-lane highway that becomes Sand Springs Expressway west of the city.

When Tulsa skyline came into view, I started looking for an exit to avoid the freeway interchange that lay ahead. I saw an exit for Riverside Drive and took it.

Tulsa, Oklahoma – Population (Metro Area) 978,000 – Elevation 722′

Tulsa was the Big City when I was growing up in Bristow, which is about 40 miles away.

After my best friend Joyce moved to Tulsa in the ninth grade, I spent a lot of weekends and summers with her, and it was where I moved after graduating from high school. College was not in my mindset then — going to work and getting an apartment in Tulsa was my small-town goal.

So Tulsa holds a lot of memories. One of my objectives on this trip was to reconsider living there.

Riverside Drive follows the Arkansas River through downtown near my old neighborhood and flows past Marlon and Jeri’s neighborhood in South Tulsa.

I arrived at their gate just in time for happy hour. Continue reading “Livin’ on Tulsa Time, Part 1”

Beto Who?

If there should prove to be one real, living Free State Democrat in Kansas, I suggest that it might be well to catch him and stuff and preserve his skin as an interesting specimen of that soon-to-be-extinct variety of the genus Democrat.

— Abraham Lincoln

Sometimes, when I visit my family in Kansas, that’s what I feel like — a soon-to-be-extinct Democrat. The state — and my family — are Trump supporters. But I love ’em, and the first stop on my June 2019 road trip is Ulysses, in the southwest corner of Western Kansas, where sister Shirley and brother Gary live.

Kansas — at least Western Kansas — is flat, flat, flat and nary a tree in sight.

Occasional visual relief . . . Tall white granaries that signal a small town ahead . . . Irrigation systems that resemble giant insects from an alien planet . . . Wind turbines that harness the fierce winds that blow across the plains. Sometimes, when the wind blows in the wrong direction, I get a whiff of a feedlot. Makes me rethink that bacon cheeseburger I planned to have tonight.

Ulysses, Kansas, Population 6,000, Elevation 3,051 feet.

As I neared Ulysses, my sister texted me there was a thunderstorm in progress. I could see the black sky up ahead so I stopped in Holly, Colorado, 20 miles from the Kansas state line, and looked for an alternate route.

Continue reading “Beto Who?”

San Diego Redux

“I suddenly realized I was in California. Warm, palmy air – the air you can kiss – and palms.”
-– Jack Kerouac

I feel it every time I start that long smooth glide past the little mountain town of Alpine down Interstate 8 into San Diego: The air grows warmer, more kissable maybe; palm trees appear; and I can almost smell the ocean a few miles ahead.

Then, just past El Cajon, my romantic illusions fade in the frenzy of freeway rush hour. But after experiencing a harrowing drive into Memphis a few weeks ago, I know what to do. I exit the freeway on Texas Street and wind my way down University through Hillcrest to Balboa Park where I take Annie for a walk. Continue reading “San Diego Redux”