invasion of america - i think i'm allergic to oklahoma

Kansas City - Lubbock

750 miles.

Wind in my face -- because that's what it does...

It's amazing. I am beginning to think that the wind is actually being controlled by something supernatural. I have been on this trip for 5 weeks. Every day that I have had to travel somewhere, no matter what direction it's in, the wind has been in my face. It's eerie.

Head winds as I leave Kansas City - 20 miles an hour. That drops my gas mileage to a measly 45 MPG. That sucks.

I am headed south to see my sister and my stepmom in their new digs around Carthage, Missouri. I haven't seen them in years and I am well past overdue for a visit. They recently moved to Carthage, Missouri but as it turns out, my visit is actually going to be in Joplin a few miles away at their new "shop". It's only 100 miles from KC, but the wind is again, B-R-U-T-A-L and it took an extra hour to get there.

The highway was filled with bikers heading the other direction and not one of them waved or gave me the "hand signal". I was a little pissed about it, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that it wasn't a big thing. Or, it just wasn't there thing. Not everyone has to do it, it's just a thing you do if you want to. I still do it even though others may not. For every bike nazi that feels above a wave, there are ten bikers that will and they make it worth it. (the rest of the day, not one person waved back... God damn hillbilly bikers!!!)

I finally arrived in Joplin and the lot of us went out to eat and catch up. The conversation was much like the conversations in KC and it was nice to actually get some old lost memories back in to my mind. My stepmom is my birth father's second wife and the only real wife he ever had. His first wife, my mother, was a marriage of pregnancies, and his last marriage was a marriage of money (her's, not his) so that makes his second wife the only, "married ya cause your cute!" entry. I have known her since I was two years old and our relationship is actually stronger than most of the relationships I have with blood relatives. Oddly, I think I might have been more widely accepted by people I share no DNA with.

After lunch, we went back to their new homs and she brought out some of my father's old "stuff" and again I was thrust into the emotional whirlwind of my past. It's great to see that stuff and it's great to appreciate it again, but it was tinged with a tad built of guilt for having forgotten about it in the first place or for having neglected it when it was so much a part of my normal life so many years ago. All and all, it just felt great to see it again. The photos were hard, but any time you, "pull out the photo albums" you know it's going to be rough. Especially if there are photos of you in there that you would rather have never had to see again.

We visited longer than I thought we might and when I finally got back out on the road, it was too late in the day for me to reach my original goal in western Oklahoma. I rode off anyway feeling that if the only way I see Oklahoma is at night, all the better. I am not a big Oklahoma fan, I was just raised that way, and my touring career has taken me across it many times - it never gets better....

It also didn't help matters that I rode into Oklahoma with a rather sniffy nose and irritated puffy eyes. One of the things about the Midwest that I don't miss is my annual allergic reaction to it. I don't know what is in the air here, but I have always suffered during the weeks from mid September to the first frosts of October. I would like to think it's just Oklahoma in general that I am allergic to. As as Kansas/Missouri man, I was raised to hate this state. It contains nothing of importance, and what it does contain is just pure evil; Oral Roberts University, Oklahoma State and Oklahoma University, Garth Brooks, Reba.. You can see where it would be hard to like a place like this. Even the pretty red-orange dirt that is fun to play with, loses its luster pretty quickly.

AND! It cost me 10 bucks to use the highway. So if you are trying to escape Oklahoma quickly, say because of tornadoes or because you read a book and suddenly you were overwhelmed with intelligence, or because you wanted more in your cuisine than just Crisco encrusted everything, then it's going to cost you. Sadly, the rest of the world that needs to get somewhere, sometimes has to travel THROUGH Oklahoma in order to get there. It's like a test, or puberty, or what they call, "earning your stripes". Oklahoma is a test of will.

I spent the night in Oklahoma City and with the little bit of energy I had left in my wind-battered body, I went down to visit the Memorial for the Oklahoma City bombing. I had to. This trip has become more about the misery and death and visiting sites related to misery and death than it has been about life and the future.... What's wrong with me???? Anyway, It was a lovely memorial. If you do visit here, I don't know why you would, but if you do, then visit the memorial at night. I think that the lighting and the softness of the quiet sleeping city lends to the overall effectiveness of this site.

The Murrah building was torn down and a field of fresh grass was placed where it's foundation used to be. 187 lighted chairs are placed in order on the grass to indicate where their bodies were found that day. Each one has a name of a victim engraved and back lit for viewing. There are two large gates at either end of the park and each one reflects the time before, and directly after the explosion - 9:01 and 9:03. In the middle of the modest park is a reflecting pool with the water laying so softly that it creates a perfect mirror for reflecting the lighted chairs and the towers. It does a great job of capturing the essence of this moment. For me this is just another reminder that a location is not where a memory lives. The memory lives inside your mind. In my mind, I know this place for different reasons than the woman that was in the park crying for her nephew that was killed here. I doubt that my sentiments are the same as hers.

The next day, I continued on with my drive across the great Savannah of Oklahoma. The red dirt below the wild grasses is neat to see, but when you think of what you have to endure to see it.... The trees seem like they are scattered across the landscape like paint splatter on an artist's studio floor. There is no real rhyme or reason for their locations and they're not real pleasing to look at. These are not the fourth of July firework trees of upstate New York or the brilliant singing trees of Ohio or even the mighty trees of Missouri. No... These are the whitetrash of treedom. Very ugly. I think they might eat people.

Of course I say all of this and somewhere out there is someone for whom this place is their "Kansas City" and it means more to them than I will ever know. So much so that I would be ashamed if they heard what I just wrote about it. I must learn to be more respectful of the world. Even though I don't like it, somewhere there is someone that would give anything to see it again. Say, someone in Iraq or someone in a bad marriage in Florida, or someone in prison in Thailand. For every inch of ground there is someone in the world that thinks it's the holy land.

The winds - 30 miles per hour.

It was hooooooooooooo(stop to take a drink of water) oooooooooooooooot. I took off all I could to keep cool, so basically I just in a tee shirt, socks and a helmet. I am buring up and drying out fast. My eyes are puffy, I can't stop sneezing in my helmet. When I'm not sneezing, my nose is clogged up. It's agony.... It's Oklahoma! I'm so dry that by the time I pass into Texas near Vernon, I am dizzy, near dead and not making sound travel decisions. I think I actually stopped for lunch and ate a corn dog. I got lost for two hours in the stifflin' Texas back country. I was on dirt roads for two hours without any idea of how to get back to the highway. Images of men with chainsaws and masks made out of human flesh were flashing in my mind. It was fucking freaky.

Somehow I made it into Lubbock safely. My friends took me in, fed me, cleaned me up and then promptly shoved me on stage for the amusement of all their friends. Somehow I had a great, but very short, set AND.... I, Daniel Rock, was able to say, "would you suck a dick for Jesus" in front of a west Texas crowd and walk away without injury, and I got a laugh to boot. I can now retire from comedy as a legend. Thank you!

I arrived in good spirits knowing that the tour is winding down. I was informed that I lost my Colorado show so instead of crawling across the southwest, I am going to bee-line it to Salt Lake City and then home. I really have seen enough and don't feel I need to see any more... That and my tires are about to blow out...