Here
the big trucks roared, wham, and inside two minutes one of them cranked to a
stop for me. I ran for it with my soul whoopeeing. And what a driver-a great
big tough truckdriver with popping eyes and a hoarse raspy voice who just
slammed and kicked at everything and got his rig under way and paid hardly any
attention to me. So I could rest my tired soul a little, for one of the biggest
troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel
that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all
of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to
sleep in hotels. The guy just yelled above the roar, and all I had to do was
yell back, and we relaxed. And he balled that thing clear to Iowa City and
yelled me the funniest stories about how he got around the law in every town
that had an unfair speed limit, saying over and over again, "Them goddam
cops can't put no flies on my ass!" Just as we rolled into Iowa Qty he saw
another truck coming behind us, and because he had to turn off at Iowa City he
blinked his tail lights at the other guy and slowed down for me to jump out,
which I did with my bag, and the other truck, acknowledging this exchange,
stopped for me, and once again, in the twink of nothing, I was in another big
high cab, all set to go hundreds of miles across the night, and was I happy!
And the new truck driver was as crazy as the other and yelled just as much, and
all I had to do was lean back and roll on. Now I could see Denver looming ahead
of me like the Promised Land, way out there beneath the stars, across the
prairie of Iowa and the plains of Nebraska, and I could see the greater vision
of San Francisco beyond, like jewels in the night. He balled the jack and told
stories for a couple of hours, then, at a town in Iowa where years later Dean
and I were stopped on suspicion in what looked like a stolen Cadillac, he slept
a few hours in the seat. I slept too, and took one little walk along the lonely
brick walls illuminated by one lamp, with the prairie brooding at the end of
each little street and the smell of the corn like dew in the night.
