There are no vegetables in Wyoming, although we can hope that Dick Cheney will soon achieve such a state. In the west (to the east from the Pacific coast), the old joke goes "way out west, where the women are scarce, men are men and the sheep are scared." Barbecued meat, big bellies, and huge pickup trucks appear to be the Real Man western style.
One can hardly imagine a more dreary drive than across Idaho, Utah and Wyoming. Approaching Ogden Utah, there are frequent "drowsy driver" warning signs, and rightly so. On local radio, we hear Mormons discussing Jews — what is with this somewhat intense interest, I wonder — and at highway rest stops one sees the nice, clean-cut Mormon families and their nice, clean-cut children. And on billboards, one sees Mormon business hustles everywhere. The Romney business ethic at work.
Driving east from Portland, I think of Woody Guthrie's song, "Roll on Columbia." In his day, the thing was "progress." The hydroelectric dams on the great river were a miracle of progress. Could Lewis and Clark have imagined it? Could Woody have envisioned how quickly and to what extent "progress" would progress? And I'm wondering how many salmon can find the "ladders" some thoughtful soul installed in the mighty structures. The green Columbia Gorge becomes bleak desert almost instantly at one point, and I can't helping thinking, Okay, we are now beyond the influence of the ocean. It always occurs to me that this is where the interior, the midwest begins, even if we're still in Oregon or California or Washington. Culturally, it's hardly different from Utah or Arizona.
There is, in Idaho approaching the Utah border, an exit with a sign saying "Last Gas in Idaho." We pulled off there only to find the place closed, with a sign in the window: Welcome to the Middle of Nowhere. A sheep and a llama were penned up near the front door. These were the only signs of life besides the other fools who kept arriving, and finding places to relieve themselves around the side of the building or behind two large tanks just off the parking lot.
Not far down the road in Snowville, we were surprised by Mollie's Cafe, an old-fashioned diner with a good breakfast and friendly waitresses. It is, I'd guess, about the best Idaho has to offer, while Twin Falls may be the worst, with its traffic, endless malls and condos, creepy, overbearing Mormon-ness, and memories of Evel Knievel's failed rocket stunt over the Snake River Canyon.
Crossing into Wyoming on I-80, I should have been prepared for the endless dreariness, but it was worse than I remembered. There is evil stuff along this road, including a big chemical complex called Tronox, as well other quasi-industrial-toxic-seeming operations of one sort or another. At least they're situated away from any towns.
American highway monoculture is provided at truck stops, the only trace of civilization one can find in the bleak territories. My old friend who was a cross-continent truck driver recommended Petro as the best of them, although I don't see much difference. The difference I do see in truck stops lately is lots of black and brown faces that wouldn't have been welcome in places like Wyoming 25 years ago. The tide has turned, America, already ahead of schedule.
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