welcome to texarkana, a lovely town located on the border between texas and arkansas.
this is our last evening in texas.
i am a little sad to leave. texas and i have shared a lot over these past few days…miles and miles of pavement, an early morning breakdown (a car breakdown, that is), my first night sleeping in a church, a picture perfect moment in a cotton field, a leisurely stroll on the boardwalk, my first time driving the tahoe while pulling the trailer, many naps and a few early mornings, hours spent staring at oil rigs and windmills, family visits, my first taste of a “pink lady” apple, meals of tex-mex and a couple of only peanut butter crackers, my first views of mesas, and many moments uttering “oh, LOOK at that!”.
the most memorable moment of our trip began early monday morning, lets say around 2 in the morning. i was passed out in the backseat of the tahoe while jeremiah drove and aaron kept watch in the passenger seat. i woke to the feeling of us stopping, more like the sound of jeremiah saying something about running out of gas as we pulled over to the side of the road. something was definitely amiss for when jeremiah turned the key the engine would not turn over so we called harvard, who was about an hour behind us, and asked them to bring us some gas. while waiting for their arrival, we slept…in the tahoe, in the middle of nowhere texas, on the side of the highway as semis flew by us. we actually slept while thinking we were safe because the doors were locked and trying not to think locked doors weren’t going to protect us from any rogue semis. soon, our heroes arrived with our much needed kryptonite, but it soon proved not to be what we needed at all. something was definitely amiss for once again the engine would not turn. after much deliberation, we went to plan B and called our backup hero, lupe, who came to our rescue in a truck of blinking lights and a pulley system. even in nowhere texas (that we soon came to discover was also called cotulla) men in tow trucks come to your aid. so as lupe slowly lifted our tahoe onto his own reliable vehicle, i stood at an exit ramp on some highway in the middle of nowhere texas with my 15 degree sleeping bag wrapped around me and looked up into the vast nothingness of the evening sky and saw a view i could never have seen when in somewhere texas. after standing in bewilderment for a few brief seconds, we (lupe, aaron, jeremiah and me) stuffed into the cab of the truck and took off for the big city of cotulla. as the sun rose, our evening worked toward coming to a close. we dropped off the tahoe at the shop, said goodbye to the harvard boys who chose to continue on toward austin, and we began an early morning walk with suitcase, pillow and blanket in tow down the streets of cotulla in search of a motel. i cannot even begin to express how cinematic a moment the experience of walking down an unfamiliar road in an unfamiliar town in an unfamiliar state in search of a bed was. after coming across one motel who refused to cut us a deal and allow us to sleep past the check out time of noon and not have to pay for another day (do remember we were checking in at 6 in the morning in nowhere texas and were obviously wearied travelers who weren’t joking around) we moved on to another motel. the woman we met at the next motel was more than helpful and told us we could stay the next night if we liked and would only have to pay for one night’s stay. so in the wee small hours of the morning, we three laid our weary heads to rest and slept well into the afternoon as our poor tahoe got itself a new fuel pump.
see how much time i’ve spent in the car getting fat while driving through texas at google maps.
pictures will arrive sooner than later.
