Carsick: John Waters Hitchhikes Across America

by John Waters

  Before I can answer, I get a ride. The back door opens and I see a pretty middle-aged woman on the floor on a mat with a three-legged little white poodle in her lap. Her husband, a nice-looking man, is in the front seat behind the wheel. They’re going all the way to Denver and they tell me they’ll take me! Thank you, God! He’s Mike, a circuit-court judge in a “very rural” town in Southern Illinois, and he’s a fan of Barbra Streisand and Liza Minnelli (the only straight guy in the world with that taste?). And she’s Laura, a Democratic Party chair and an animal rescuer (!) who so reminds me of Linda Grippi, my friend and fellow strong supporter of the parole of Leslie Van Houten. I feel so guilty remembering the horrifying animal rescuer I imagined in a “bad ride” chapter of this book. Here, next to me, is a rarity (from what I’ve seen)—a woman who militantly loves animals but also loves people. Even the three-legged poodle is well behaved after initially freaking me out by jumping in my lap and kissing me on the lips the moment I got in the car. I guess he is grateful he’s on an adventure, too!

  They are headed to some Colorado state park for a vacation and admit passing me by once standing on the ramp in Junction City, Kansas (where they had stayed the night in the same hotel, but slept later), and debating if it was me for eight miles before turning back to come see. And yes, it was me. I try to be a good rider and tell them stories about meeting Liz Taylor and Kathleen Turner, and they in turn fill me in on their lives and how the animal-rescue deal works. The judge and I even talk about our shared opinion that mandatory life sentences without parole for minors are wrong.

  I text The Corvette Kid, “Oh my God, I just got a ride to Colorado.” He answers, “You headed to Denver?” I respond, “Yep. Will let you know when I land.” We drive for hours. Kansas is an amazing state—both beautiful in its minimalist geography and horrifying in its brutal weather extremes. We see lots of little dust tornadoes on each side of the highway. Kansas is so-o-o-o-o-o long. So boring. Yet so awe-inspiring in its horizontal, hypnotic dullness and threatening lack of population.

  After more hours of traveling together and bonding, Laura admits she wouldn’t have recognized me or have known who I was if it weren’t for her gay son, who has been a fan of mine forever. “Let’s call him,” I offer, and she dials his number and I hear her ask him about me without revealing anything. He starts telling his mom how he’s been reading online that I am hitchhiking across the country. Unbelievable! He already knows! “Guess who we picked up?” she says with, yes, glee. “John Waters.” And she hands me the phone and her son is speechless as first. No wonder. What are the chances of this happening? He’s a great guy and even starts quoting lines from Female Trouble, but in a cool way, not like that other scary fan I imagined earlier in this book.

  We pull off in Bunker Hill, Kansas, to get gas and I offer to fill it up, but they won’t hear of it. Instead I buy the snacks, but only because I grab the bill before they can pay. While Mike is using the men’s room, I take Laura out back of this big rest-area convenience store to look for cardboard. After all, my 70 WEST THROUGH KANSAS sign will be obsolete when they drop me off in Denver. We actually Dumpster-dive together to get the right-size box and take it around front, back to the car, where Laura thinks Mike has a pocketknife to break down the box. But as we walk through the giant gas-station parking lot, the ever-present howling wind blows open the box, and thousands of Styrofoam “peanuts” pour out and accidentally scatter all across the rest area and into the Kansas plains themselves. Oh well. Not much us litterbuggers can do. Except step on it! Mike does. See ya later, Bunker Hill.

  The Corvette Kid has texted back, “Sounds good. I’m in Kansas right now.” You gotta be kidding me! That means he has been driving for forty-eight hours straight at eighty miles an hour with no sleep, not stopping to help tornado victims in Joplin, Missouri, where his parents think he is going. He’s actually coming to get me?! “Don’t get arrested for speeding!” I text. “Hey,” he writes back, “I’m on Mission Impossible here. LOL. There’s no stopping The Corvette Kid, my friend.” “Evel Knievel,” I answer. “If you leave Denver I may have to smack you by the way. LOL,” he adds. I’m starting to really get impressed by this guy. If he’s telling the truth. Suppose he’s still in his bedroom in Maryland playing a game? Well, I’ll see soon enough.

  An incredibly ferocious rainstorm is approaching as we plow our way across Kansas past signs promising ahead RATTLESNAKES, PRAIRIE DOGS AND A SIX LEGGED CAT. I guess this is show business here in Kansas. I offer to get in the back on the floor with the dog but Laura wants to stay there, she promises she’s comfortable. The black clouds are getting ominous. Naturally we talk about Dorothy, then discuss storm cellars, but never mention there’s nowhere for us to go now if there is a tornado. Torrential rain hits. It’s actually scary, but Mike is a great driver and we make it through without flying off to some freaky local Oz. I see a junkyard that is exactly like the one I imagined in the “good ride” rave chapter. So perfect. So isolated. Right smack-dab in the middle of nowhere with a trailer on the edge of the property where the owner must live. Wonder if he’s cute.

  Suddenly the sun is out but it’s still raining. Surely there must be a rainbow in these weather conditions, the three of us agree, but after searching the horizon on both sides of the interstate, we come up visually empty-handed. Maybe Kansas is fed up with all this Wizard of Oz bullshit. Maybe the state lawmakers have outlawed rainbows. I text The Corvette Kid back that I will wait for him in Denver and “will call from the hotel. If you haven’t stopped to sleep, do so.” I know he couldn’t still be in his Corvette because that was his mother’s car, so I add, “I will wait for The Corvette Kid no matter what you are driving,” “Will do,” he answers, “Kansas is scary long.” Good God, he’s gaining on us! I tell Mike and Laura about The Corvette Kid, how he picked me up and how now he is coming back, and I see they are too polite to ask, “What the hell’s going on here?” I don’t know the answer myself. All I know is I’m glad he’s coming. It’s not cheating—he’s still a stranger giving me a ride, he’s just picking me up for the second time.

  I feel so comfortable with Laura and Mike, even the dog. We pull off at Colby, Kansas, and have lunch at Montana Mike’s. God, what a town. The wind is still howling. What could life possibly be like here in the dead of winter? We sit in a booth and Mike and I order a big, fattening meal while Laura is more health conscious in her choice. I use the men’s room (no graffiti, dammit) and pass an empty video-game room. Such a Nan Goldin “art” shot. So sad, so lonely, so empty of fun. I try to imagine the bored, angry teens of this town in this pitiful room and shudder at the potential hormonal violence this clubhouse from hell might provoke. I insist on paying for lunch.

  We keep going. God, this is such a great ride! My new family, Laura and Mike. They decide they’ll stay in a motel in Denver, too, rather than keep going to their state park, where they actually aren’t sure where they’ll be camping. Since The Corvette Kid is picking me up, it doesn’t matter to me about exit or entrance ramps, so we all can stay at the same place.

  We cross into Colorado. Yay! Mountain time! I’ve made it to the West. It doesn’t look much different from Kansas for a while, though, still sparse. Scary little towns I’d probably get stuck in if I didn’t already have a ride. We even pull off and scope out the motels on the outskirts in Limon, Colorado, but they seem spookily uninviting. We don’t check in.

  Nearer Denver it starts to look just like every other city does—same chain shops and motels—but we don’t care, we just need a room at the inn. We pull off and pick a place, the La Quinta Inn, 4460 Peoria Street, which is in the city limits but near the airport. We unload and Laura hides the dog in one of her bags to sneak him in. I know this is Mike and Laura’s vacation, so I tell them, “Farewell, my new friends. I’m going to let you have a romantic dinner alone.” We ask a stranger to snap our group photo on our respective cell phones and he does happily. I know my undercover travel adventure is still safe when he whispers to
Laura, “Is that guy homeless?” Laura laughs and then, as we go inside, asks me, “Were we the most boring people to pick you up?” I honestly answer, “Are you kidding? You were perfect!” And they are. Absolutely, undeniably marvelous people who give me faith in the kindness of strangers and the gifted new Saint Christopher medal on my key ring. They rescued a dog and me.

  REAL RIDE NUMBER EIGHTEEN

  CORVETTE KID AGAIN

  I check into my room and text The Corvette Kid the exact address of the hotel. He texts back that his own car has a GPS so he can easily find the location and he’ll probably sleep before he continues driving. I answer back like a stern dad, “You should.” I’ve got time on my hands: maybe I’ll do laundry, wash those dingy underpants I haven’t thrown away. I go down to the desk and ask if there’s a Laundromat in the hotel. “Yes,” the girl behind the counter says, surprising me; I didn’t know these kinds of places had washers and dryers available. I go up to where she instructed me and see it’s just one room with nothing in it but a washer and a dryer. No change machine. No soap. I race back down and she gives me both and I stomp back up, throw in my underpants and a few T-shirts, sprinkle on the soap, and put in quarters, but the machine jams. Now what? All my pitiful homeless clothes are covered with detergent. I go all the way back down and tell her, and she accompanies me back up with a paper clip. She attempts to jam the stack of quarters through but is unsuccessful, goes back downstairs while I wait, and finally returns with a credit card, which she uses like a professional lock picker, and presto, the coins drop and the machine starts working. I thank her and figure it’s safe to leave my clothes in the wash cycle even though I had already fantasized stealing somebody else’s laundry in one of the “good ride” chapters in the book. Reality is never as exciting as fiction.

  Back in my room, which is okay, better lighting than Holiday Inn but not as good as Days Inn, I try to kill time but get bored and plod back up to the laundry room. This is the exact opposite of glamour. Naturally, the clothes are still sloshing around, so I just wait until they’re done. Alone. I don’t use dryers because my T-shirts will shrink, but they’ll never dry hanging in my bathroom overnight, so I toss them in with my clean underpants and hope for the best.

  I wonder if The Corvette Kid pulled over to sleep. Do I pay for a separate room for him or does he just take the other bed in my room? I have no idea what he expects. If I don’t offer to pay for the room, does it look as if I’m coming on to him? Or just an innocent sleepover? Who knows, I think, as I gather my still slightly wet T-shirts and boxers and head back to my room.

  It’s Saturday night in Denver! I’m going out. I go online and find out where The Dictator is playing. It just opened today all over America and I purposely didn’t read the reviews because I want to see this Sacha Baron Cohen movie first and make up my own mind. The girl at the desk tells me which theater is nearest. At first I think maybe I’ll hitchhike there, too, but then internally yell at myself, come on! You’re off work tonight! This isn’t part of your trip, take a cab! I do. It’s not far. I feel so alien in the backseat of a taxi. Am I now just a bourgeois passenger from the middle class, too dim-witted to hustle a free ride?

  The theater is located in some giant outdoor shopping center filled with young people. I am shocked how many fat teenagers I see. Really fat! Four hundred pounds fat. All with giant plates of alarmingly unhealthy food piled in front of them in outdoor cafés. I’m early, as always, so I search around for a more model-friendly type of eating establishment. I settle on the Euro Café and have a Mediterranean veggie roll and a bottled water. It is screamingly average, and although I am one of the few diners, the service is abysmal. Maybe they don’t like thin people.

  I go into the movie theater and am happy to see it is crowded. I take a seat on the aisle, and three presumably gay gentlemen pass me taking their seats and recognize me and I say hi back. I like the movie. It’s so odd to be doing anything besides standing beside the highway, though, so I’m a bit uneasy throughout. As I file out afterward, I run into the gay guys again and one asks me why I’m in Denver, and I tell him I’m hitchhiking my way across the country. He says, “Well, do you want a ride back to your hotel, then?” and I say, “Yes,” with great enthusiasm because technically I’m hitchhiking again, aren’t I?

  I tell the guys that I am staying at La Quinta Inn nearby, and the driver says he knows where that is. On the way I discover one of my hosts owns a drive-in movie theater in Kansas. We talk about the isolation living in those tiny towns, and he fills me in on how tornadoes, some recently, had devastated many of the same places I had just driven through today.

  As he pulls up to La Quinta Inn to drop me off, I am momentarily confused. This doesn’t look familiar, but what do I know? I’m in a different motel every night and they all blend together. “I hope this is the right one,” I joke as I get out, unsure. “Well, if it’s not, you can always hitchhike,” the drive-in owner wisecracks innocently. I get out. Fuck! It is the wrong one! I check my hotel-key-folder address, and sure enough, they dropped me off at a different La Quinta Inn. I go inside in complete alarm and the desk clerk calms me down. The one I’m staying in isn’t that far away, and he’ll get the guy that drives the airport-hotel courtesy van to give me a ride back. I am greatly relieved and, of course, give the nice driver a tip for his kindness.

  Imagine my surprise when I play my phone messages and hear The Corvette Kid’s already here! He couldn’t possibly have slept! I’m amazed he caught up to me this quickly. “Come up to my room,” I text. “Damn! I already got a room,” he replies. Well, that settles that. He texts he’s “going to take a shower first.”

  I e-mail Susan that The Corvette Kid “is here!” “A new chapter—so bizarre,” she responds, “there’s definitely something strange about his race across the country. He may be one of those Log Cabin Republicans. The adventure continues,” Susan signs off.

  “Okay, now I feel better,” The Corvette Kid texts again, freshly showered. “I could drive another 2000 miles.” “Ah, youth,” I text back. “Did you eat yet?” he asks. “Yes, but I’ll go with you if you’re hungry,” I reply. “I’ll be right down,” he answers. Suddenly I think, “Suppose he’s not here at all? Suppose all these texts have been a scam? Suppose no one comes down? No one knocks on the door? He could be laughing at me all the way from Maryland!”

  But no, The Corvette Kid delivers. He’s here, dressed as wholesome as ever in his khaki shorts, T-shirt, and running shoes, but I can tell he’s unsure if his “look” is cool enough for the road. It is, even if he is now driving a red Kia Sorento. I am happy to see him. We go out to look for something to eat but everything is closed this late. We drive around as if we were casing fast-food joints to rob until we finally settle for an open 7-Eleven and he buys the most unappetizing prewrapped sandwich I’ve ever seen. I can see he’s excited to be beginning the next leg of our crazy trip and so am I, but I tell him he must be exhausted. He agrees, and I add that he should sleep as late as he can tomorrow morning. Back at the hotel we split up to go to our separate rooms and I tell him, “You could have slept in the other bed without paying for your room. I’m not going to attack you—I’m too tired.” He laughs out loud and goes up toward his new accommodations.

  I’m actually glad we have separate rooms. When was the last time I shared a motel room and wasn’t sleeping with the person? Almost never. I decide that I’m going to just go as far as Reno with him, then get out for other rides and give him the keys to my apartment in San Francisco and tell him to drive there and wait for me. He’s safe. I can tell.

  Even though we are supposed to be sleeping late, I wake up at 5:30 a.m. I’m so relieved I don’t have to go outside and beg a ride. I see online on the Deadline Hollywood website news alert that Donna Summer has died. It’s hard to care about celebrity news from a motel that doesn’t even carry USA Today. I feel lazy just lolling around the motel room, waiting for The Corvette Kid to wake up. I take a bath and then panic when
I realize I am out of La Mer cream! If ever I needed this pricey moisturizer, it’s now. I look in the mirror and see I have “hitchhiker face.” Almost none of these motels ever offer complimentary body lotions. This one does, thank God, and I pocket it. Reduced to swiping cheap toiletries, all in the name of literature.

  It’s 10:00 a.m. and The Corvette Kid is ready to go. He’s freshly scrubbed, looks rested, and seems even more willing to take on his new role as my on-the-road sidekick. I fill up the tank and we’re off. As soon as we get out of Denver, the landscape changes. The Rockies are suddenly so scary and beautiful. The Corvette Kid laughs and admits he thought the Rockies were just one mountain we’d go over. We go through ski resorts with amazing vistas, and as excited as I am to see this kind of scenery again after forty years, it is even more fun to see it through The Corvette Kid’s eyes—especially when he’s missing in action from his parents’ home.

  We stop at a rest area and ask other tourists to take our picture. I get recognized and sign autographs. If I had been hitching, I bet it would have been easier to get picked up in Colorado than elsewhere. I like this state. We keep going, laughing, comparing stories about his life in a small town and mine as a filth elder. I immediately feel guilty for imagining anything gay about The Corvette Kid. He’s just a curious guy and somehow we’re suddenly in a book together. Could life be any better than this?

  We pull off in Grand Junction, Colorado, and make the mistake of having lunch in Applebee’s. It’s Sunday at one-thirty in the afternoon and the eatery is packed with families and elderly people after church. The food is horrible and I tell The Kid that this gets the prize as the worst chain restaurant I’ve eaten in on the trip so far. I visit the men’s room and am shocked to see it’s filthy. Middle America never looked so unappealing. We drive off and pass a middle-aged male hitchhiker, the first one I’ve seen this trip. We don’t pick him up. I know, I know.