Tales from the Trail #21: The mercy of life’s next Michael …
I was a bit bummed out about losing my hat, without question, and the day was already getting to be another true scorcher, and so I limped resolutely to the next major intersection of the roadway (a traffic light located where Highway 31 crossed State Road 252) and tried to hitch a ride there (knowing full well that I had another 10+ miles of “nothingness” between me and the next town; 10 more miles that would have to be somehow traversed through the glaring heat – and on my breaking feet – in order to reach any kind of solace therefrom). And it was at this point that I once again realized – with greatly enhanced clarity – that I was in truth stranded; at least temporarily fully at the mercy of the kindness of passing motorists and my attempts to catch a ride with one of them; at least until the Sun later set and I could proceed further in the traffic-less cool of the deep evening …
And so I stood there for a time – quite a long time, actually. And yet when it became clear that a ride was indeed not in the offing, I set out once more to somehow get as far as I could get, eventually becoming exhausted and overheated enough to lie down right by the roadway in the shade of a lone tree to hitch in the prone position. And yet even this new form of obvious resignation didn’t inspire anyone to assist me, so after a time I simply shrugged my shoulders, rose from roadside sanctuary of shade, and hobbled onward as best I could, until I finally reached a roadside company called Horizon Freight (some 8 miles short of the town of Franklin). And here it was that once more I officially “raised the white flag” and decided to simply lay down at that spot for the rest of the day (thinking that my feet might be able to heal enough to make it that final pre-town stretch during the upcoming night).
Well, it didn’t take long at all for an employee of that same company to come out and tell me in no uncertain terms that I was not allowed to lay down so near to their facilities and that I would have to move instead to a different shaded spot elsewhere. I immediately apologized for making her nervous and told her about my Walk and my predicament and said that moving to another spot was of course no problem whatsoever. She became immediately more sympathetic to me & my plight at that point, and shortly thereafter came back out two more times to bring me some non-vegan granola bars (the first of which was politely rejected – for she didn’t know I was vegan, and the second of which was graciously accepted and then later surreptitiously discarded – for she didn’t know that the 2nd bar wasn’t vegan either).
At this point I knew my legs (specifically my feet) were pretty done-in and I was pretty sure I was going to just sit there in the shade for the next several hours until the Sun completely set and the traffic mostly disappeared, before trying to continue along my Way. And yet to my bewondered surprise the same woman who had offered me the granola bars had soon thereafter also called the local police to come and provide a welfare check on me. And so it was that officer Mike Purtlebaugh of the Johnson County Sheriffs Office arrived on the scene. He was overly cautious and somewhat skeptical of me at first, and yet soon (to his credit) quickly warmed to me after hearing about my Walk’s basic hows & whys … And so it was that, after asking me if I “had bugs” (“No, my Brother. Peace Pilgrims don’t ted to get bedbugs – seeing as how we tend to sleep outside on the roadside, far away from where any sensible bedbug would ever be.”), he drove me the 8 miles to the near outskirts of Franklin and dropped me off at the local McDonald’s there – where the kindness of his gesture and the air-conditioning of the establishment both inspired in me great waves of heartfelt gratitude.
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