I am standing with one boot in Arkansas and the other in Indian Territory. Such a positioning back in the 1800s wouldn’t have been the safest of perches, especially for the traveler just passing through town. Fort Smith, Arkansas has long found its identity destined to its positioning in the world. This small settlement sets up on the Arkansas-Oklahoma border. It grew up as the area’s first frontier fort and served as a key point where Federal marshals rode out of the United States and into Indian Territory. The Wild West was just over the Arkansas River. Standing where I am in Fort Smith Continue Reading
Nine Reasons To Go Back to High School in Little Rock
Big yellow school buses perch outside of a high school in Little Rock. The fact that it is a Saturday morning makes them somewhat haunting in their emptiness. I never cared much for high school. Those that did usually didn’t have braces, bad hair and pants that were permanently high-waters. However I never thought of walking into the doors of my high school at 14 years old thinking of that walk was anything but a personal struggle, one that would pass in four years. For nine students in Little Rock, Arkansas that walk into school was the difference between right and wrong, a good society and a Continue Reading
The Meeting of Time, Travel and Money on Back Roads in Arkansas
The road on the map is a squiggly line that appears to connect with the Pig Trail Scenic Byway in the Boston Mountains of Arkansas. That darting line of indecision proves to be the rockiest of roads with no cushy marshmallows to break up the bumps. The car stops as the windows roll down. I listen to the chatter of the leaves in the wind. The sound is magically uninterrupted. Time suspends. Lately I have been struggling with travel, time and money. There never seems to be enough of these three. Travel and time collided for me on a whirlwind trip through Dusseldorf, Copenhagen, Vienna, Zurich Continue Reading
Little Rock, Arkansas Wishes You Were Here
I watch Little Rock from a streetcar window as the trolley chugs through the streets of downtown, a place that lives up to its title. Arkansas’ capital does not boast a dramatic skyline or even a size that overwhelms. It is truly little, but its heart is certainly large. The River Rail Electric Streetcars in Little Rock are easy to spot. They stun the eyes in their bright yellow coloring. The clickety-click of the tracks make for a rhythmic sound one could fall asleep to while cruising the streets of the downtown. For $1, I ride the Blue Line, a 3.4 mile loop with 15 stops in downtown and Continue Reading
An Oddball in Search of Oddities on the Road to New Orleans
Stevie Nicks belts out “Dreams” countless times on the radio during my long drive down to New Orleans. It is a song, like most I gather, about wronged love, dreams foiled and hope at the end of the storm. One line sticks with me most, “Like a heartbeat drives you mad in the stillness of remembering what you had and what you lost.” I don’t feel my heartstrings tugging over a wronged relationship, but rather my heart beats for the road. It drives me almost mad as I search for reasons to be on the road, the zaniest of roadside attractions. These roads come into my travels, I have them for a time Continue Reading
Northwest Arkansas Wishes You Were Here
It’s Saturday night and Alice Walton is calling the hogs. The traditional Arkansas Razorback football hog call is something outsiders like myself never completely understand. The “Woo, Pig, Sooie!” cannot be uttered at certain times and comes with an entire set of hand gestures akin to jazz hands, jazz hands. And yet, in this northwest corner of Arkansas and throughout the state for that matter, great care, great devotion is paid to the University of Arkansas Fayetteville’s football team. You come here to call the hogs, just as Alice Walton is tonight. Alice Walton, the heiress to the Continue Reading