Balmy Daze

Monday, 8th April 2013
 
Map: Simpsonville, South Carolina to Tarboro, North Carolina---310 miles

We sat at the kitchen table for a couple of hours that morning, drinking coffee and visiting with the in-laws.  I've become quite proficient with their family stories after fifteen years---enough to occasionally comment or remark when some variation thereof comes up. I enjoy listening to them because they resonate with me more than my own era, and unlike my own family the perspective is male.

That morning the brothers we naming off all the neighbors but forgot their mother's Bendix bursting a frothy load of wash out onto the floor.  Instead they went down into the basement to discuss the change from shoveling coal into furnace to installing an oil burner and where they were allowed to play down there and what section was off limits to them: their father's workshop.

Once my husband expressed surprise that I had no real interest in inheriting my birth home.  Unlike most Americans, it's still in the family after fifty years.  It's not so much the memories housed in it---memories that when given consideration are generally unpleasant, but by the mere fact that a circa 1960 tract home is a boring rectangle of many rooms squeezed into a modest square footage.  There were four floor plans in the tract I grew up in and twice as many expressions worn on their facade.  Ours was vaguely Southern, with some brick oozing mortar and three wrought iron filigree pillars that the kids quickly bent out of shape by climbing.  The neighbor's house was more assuredly Japanese, complete with courtyard entry.  It is my favorite floor plan, and it was also available as an improbable but thankfully vague Colonial.  Tonga and Bavarian Ranch were the other two major themes.  Their entertainment value fell far shorter on the inside.  I recall being most fascinated by the multicolor splatter on white asphalt tile under the avocado green shag carpet in the bathroom.  The colors were aqua, coral, pea soup green and black.

I studied Google maps thoroughly that morning and made some notes, so we had no problem leaving Simpsonville on the secondary highways.  By the time we reached Spartanburg we were traveling on old US 29, which we followed right into Charlotte.  Between Cowpens and Gaffney US 29 is called the Old Georgia Highway, and it's very similar to the Old Cornelia Highway we drove on the proceeding Saturday.  Up past Blacksburg, Crowders Mountain started peeking up over the horizon, an unexpected and beautifully rugged peak poking through the forest canopy.  In the towns the Chinese magnolias were in fragrant bloom, the daffodils were laying down to rest and Confederate violets dotted the lawns.

The radio station of the day was WOLI-AM Spartanburg---for at least as far as 3600 watts can carry in hill country.  Very recently reformatted as an 'adult standards' station, it is actually a descendant of the first radio station in South Carolina, WSPA, which began broadcasting in 1930.

Charlotte, North Carolina (Google Images)

We drove into downtown Charlotte at noon---another surprisingly easy surface street drive, although in all I didn't find the street scape as interesting as Memphis.  An exception was the 1947 Dairy Queen on Wilkinson Boulevard (US 29), complete with a giant Eskimo couple on top enjoying their cones with the curl on top.  These were a variation on the postwar Eskimo girl trademark Dairy Queen used into the late 1950s, before they switched to the saccharine cartoon Dutch boy and girl. We did not stop and partake, having shared a Subway breakfast flat bread sandwich in Cowpens.

By the time we were traveling east on North Carolina Highway 49 we had all the windows down, enjoying the balmy day that would occasionally turn stale and muggy, depending on a dip in the highway or sunblasted road cut.  At Asheboro 49 joins again with our old friend, US 64---although I can't recommend this section because one has to deal with the chafing outskirts of Raleigh.  I wish I had tried North Carolina Highway 42 directly from Asheboro , but my original intention to visit a nursery outside of Raleigh had been dropped without readjusting our route.

The drive became enjoyable again once we reached Highway 42 in Clayton.  The landscape flattened out and became mostly farmland---fields turned under for the winter or left to cotton stubble.  Little old cemeteries, so common in the Carolinas, dotted the roadside or sat squarely in the middle of a stubblefield.

Patsy was once again mute in helping us find a Roadfood recommendation in Wilson, so I had to park at McDonald's and dredge up a WiFi connection on my laptop.  It turned out Parker's was on the south side of town at an old highway crossroads, a long low building built for crowds.  Since we were a bit early and it was Monday night hardly anyone was there, so we found the waiters standing at attention.  It seemed waiters were the tradition and preferred since they also bussed and were expected to carry heavy loads.  They were of all descents: Latin, African American and Caucasian---pretty much matching the clientele.

Parker's menu was short and simple and cheap.  I got the small barbecue plate, my husband ordered the small combination plate---both at under five dollars each.  Each came with hush puppies, corn sticks and slaw for the table---plus a choice of two sides for the plate.  I chose green beans and french fries.  The green beans were cooked far longer than modern standards dictate, but still retained a green color, good texture and a savory, sour flavor.  The slaw was a vivid yellow, with a pickled flavor so far off from Martha's in Corinth that it seemed to me more like sauerkraut.  The vinegar notes continued with the shredded pork itself---it was becoming a somewhat monotonous meal.  My husband was far luckier with his piece of fried chicken---it was excellent.  If we ever return to Parker's, we'd order the chicken and fish and shrimp---the latter two coming out of the kitchen looking just as delicious as the chicken.

We had the windows down again for the last 26 miles to Tarboro via Hwy 42.  The air, the light---everything was soft, warm and beautiful.  The day's sunlight rose again from the damp earth as a fragrant heat---green as grass, with an occasional whiff of Chinese magnolia.   Once at our motel room I opened the screenless window and ran the heat pump underneath it on fan only, blowing the outdoors in all night long.

"There's a Dairy Queen at the Shell station next door," my husband grinned.

I raised my eyebrows---normally he wouldn't eat something like that after the kind of dinner we had.  But he must have known he was in for a good time, for he came back with even a bigger grin.

"The Latin boys working there liked me," he said---handing me a large cup with a medium one inside of it.  "They kept asking me if I wanted more stuff, so they had to put it in a larger cup.  No extra charge."

My husband dipped his spoon in for another bite, evidently very pleased with himself.