Pressing Matters. . .and Flowers

From Pittsburgh, I made the last leg of my journey through Kansas, which was only six miles, and made the other leg of twenty four miles through Missouri to meet Tim. The wind was doing its own thing in Missouri compared to a constant head wind in Kansas. I couldn't figure out where it wanted me to go but was thankful for those small bouts of encouragement when it was at my back. Added to that was the desire to reach Golden City, my last stop heading east and then it was all south from there.
On my way, I hit a couple of rainstorms that weren't torrential but were a torment when it came to my comfort on the road and the leisure I took to get where I needed to go. I took a small refuge in a small church to await the passing of the side-winding rain. As I made my way closer, I passed a few cyclists wearing the same jerseys and we did the usual wave-hi-how-are-you. A mile down, I passed more cyclists wearing the same jerseys as the group before. We waved. A mile or two further on down, I passed another group adorned with the same jerseys. At this point, I started to get the idea that all of these people were together and tried to ask who they were but they took my hollering and asking to my hollering hello as though I were hard of hearing and I needed to yell my "hellos" to everyone at the top of my lungs as though a train were passing. . .as though as though. One of the earlier guys I waved to yelled back at me "Kookie's Kitchen has excellent pies!" and he was gone. That made me think about the idea of passing cyclists while on tour across the country. Aside from the status quo of passing them and just waving and saying "Have a good ride", what would you yell if you wanted to tell them one quick, important thing about one of the town's they were coming up on that you'd already experienced and might be able to give a good tip about? And I guess telling a fellow cyclist about where to find good pie would fall in that category and I must say that he was right.
I made it to Golden City and found Kookie's Kitchen where I had told Tim and his wife to meet me seeing that the Kitchen had good pie. I entered into the diner and looked around, calling Tim and trying to figure out if he made it before me or not. It was hard to tell because the place was such a hustle of bustling people in such a narrow space that I really couldn’t find my bearings. All of a sudden, a young man who looked like he just stepped out a desert, showered, and put on a smile approached me and stuck his hand out. It was him. . .Tim.
After telling me I looked a bit crazed and that the road hadn’t done me well(always a good friend), we started in on talking about my trip thus far and what we were expecting on the road ahead. We had a few good laughs and went out to his car to retrieve his bicycle and baggage from the car. He was half-bit prepared without sunscreen and no helmet. I laid my face in my hands, trying to understand his reasoning behind no helmet and other small detail-ish things and settled on him not remembering which was reasonable enough knowing who I was dealing with. He bid his love a lovely day and we started off toward Arkansas, going the wrong way for about ten feet and then turning around to get our heads on straight in order to straighten out our route.
We had a heavy head wind going south and were exhausted by the time we made it around fifteen miles or so. We made our first pit stop in a cemetery, ready and willing to let anyone who found me to just bury me right there and then. We continued on and being that I had started collecting local floral from Kansas, I figured it reasonable to keep on gathering ye’ flowers in Missouri, so I was always on the lookout for something new. Passing some purple something at one point here and there, I finally pulled over and rummaged for my journal where I was keeping these samples. While I was digging through my bags, digging because I could never remember where I put anything in eighty pounds worth of luggage, two motorcyclists were riding by and slowed to see if we needed any help. Say what you will about how most of those bikers look, some almost as worse as we looked, but they are some of the friendliest blokes on the road. There’s not a particular common bond found between cyclists and bikers, but there is a comradery between us in that we’re both traveling on two wheels? Either way, I thanked them for the offer but we were alright. And as they rode off, I thought of what we were doing, and turned to yell back as they drove off, “We’re just pressing flowers!” I yelled to the point where I knew they wouldn’t hear me so as not to embarrass Tim; but it was a funny thought and I took advantage in being vocal about it. It was his turn to lay his face in his hands. At this point, I knew I had the right person on the road with me. We were a pair and three’s company.
We made it to Reed and found where our flat roads met an end and started on our first uphill battle. It wasn’t big, but it was my first one on the journey and would be a precursor to what was to come. We trudged up, the whole time me huffing, puffing, and cussing Tim for dragging me into this mess(even though I was the one who convinced him to meet me; it was just nice to find someone else to blame for what I was putting myself through rather than myself). I introduced him to the world of asking strangers on the side of the road about the surrounding towns and where a good place to stay would be. We found Sarcoxie per a Reed-ian and discovered Casey’s Grocery and fell in love with the most convenience I had found and both of us would find on the trip until we would hit Russellville, AR. They had subs, coffee, fruit, and so much more. We purchased what seemed to be a rag-tag dinner and sat, well, more slid, against the wall of the building and began to eat when one of the ladies who worked inside asked if we wanted to sit inside in the back. We agreed and she grabbed two milk crates and went on to explain that she did this for her kids all the time and set the crates in the back of the store(not in a separate room, but in the store itself) and we had dinner in the middle of the small convenient store and laughed at the thought that we looked homely enough for a woman’s motherly instincts to kick in and offer us comfort.
After we finished, we set up tent behind a church across the street and just around the corner from our next route change. It was nice to have someone to talk to and aid in the speed of my setting up camp. We talked until the fireflies signaled the getting late of the evening and we retired in southern Missouri to the pressing matters of an exciting venture that awaited us for the next four days.

Of Getting Back to Reality

I stayed a Schmidt for one more night for no other reason than they asked, I said "Sure", and it's fun being a Schmidt. I worked at the pool the next day selling concessions to better pay my dues to such hospitality. I played shoot 'em up video games with Chuck, who kicked my butt at every corner due to the fact that I'm completely in the dark when it comes to anything that has to do with a console; especially if it doesn't have a N64 or Original Nintendo stamped on the face. While playing, Chuck asked me if I would be staying another night. I thought to myself, If only I could. . .but I knew if I did, I definitely would never want to leave. I told him my legs were getting restless and I had to be on my way, quoting Good Will Hunting, "I've got to see about a girl." We had a good laugh and I retired to bed.
The next day, I did my bidding of farewells to the family, making one last trip to the pool so I could see off the rest of the worker-bee family. I rode off into another scorching day with a clean jersey stained with miles and a couple of dryer sheets in my bags to keep the upcoming days smelling fresh enough to fool myself.
From here, I had plans on meeting up with an old college mate of mine in Golden City, Missouri. Tim Walton is a married man who convinced his wife that he was stupid enough to join me on a trek from Missouri back to Russellville, Arkansas; and he is. I rode from Eureka through a few more small ghost towns hosting nothing but one road and a few condemned buildings supported by walls that could only talk of the good ole' days when they were able to support conversations about the future that would never be. One town had a neighborhood watch that I could only fathom that the only thing they had to watch was the wind; but, who am I to say they didn't have troubles in such a small town. . .such as wolves stealing babies as such.
I made it to Chanute, KS and found that there wasn't a whole lot going on and I just found the closest(only) camping ground and pitched tent. I showered in the public bathroom as I had been in most of the parks and camp sites on my trip and read the usual graffiti splayed on the walls of the shower and made me really nervous about showering in a place where men felt sure enough to sketch their sketchy thoughts about such things I'd rather not draw out in detail so as to believe that these thoughts were jokes and not a reality hoping to be played out on some out-of-state traveler who had no other choice but to use their facilities. . .After a restful night. . .I bolted from the town and made pretty good timing to Pittsburgh, a town of over 10,000. Just outside of the town, I took a pit-stop in front of a chicken farm on a rural road and got the biggest kick out of chasing chickens in my cleats, trying to capture them on camera to document the countless number of chickens, ducks, and roosters clucking around the grounds. If it weren't so far away, I would like to have taken a picture of this one creature that I can only explain as having the body of a chicken, the neck of a goose, and the face of a sunflower. I had a good laugh, not at its expense, but to myself in feeling bad for such a creature caged with a bunch of normal looking animals.
I found the local park in Pittsburgh which was big enough to have a permanent little amusement park for kids that had a train that ran through the entirety of the park, including past me pitching my tent in my spandex where I imagined if the conductor, hunched up in a ball in the engine car that was as big as a three wheeler you had when you were a child, were pointing out all the spots in the park, he would say, "And there's a man in tights setting up a tent in the middle of our city park. Just wave and maybe he'll go away," to which they all would wave with blank stares on their face and I would just smile and keep on trucking with my cooking and camping as though I were in the middle of the woods in the middle of nowhere. It was a fun little thought and I couldn't wait to get through the night so I would be able to ride out in the morning and meet with Tim so I could have another person with me to talk to besides me and the cows.