For some, vacationing involves getting to stay in posh hotels with luxurious sheets, fancy soaps and beautiful views. For us, at least twice a year it involves getting to discover a new temporary residence in the middle of that most popular of destinations, central Nebraska. We are spending most of our Christmas Eve here this year.
At one time, this region was rather romantic for us. One of our first times together was spent in Ogallala, NE. I nearly wrote that this was along the shores of Lake McConaughy, but though it should have been and we expected it to, it did not. It occurred along the edge of a sand dune that used to be underwater. Thanks to drought, the reservoir had shrunk such that the edge of the lake was now over a quarter of a mile distant from the lake-edge campsites.
Jack drove from Missouri and I drove from Wyoming. It was Memorial Day weekend and we only had enough time to meet in the middle: Ogallala. It was a lovely weekend during which he cooked breakfast outside on the campfire for me one day and I made him pancakes with homemade applesauce inside the next day while raindrops plopped on the camper. It was perhaps the great moist towelette incident that bonded us forever, but that is a story for another day.
I offer this simply for the context that central Nebraska is, for us, covered with the haze of romantic nostalgia. Or was.
I killed it this Spring.
Today, we’ve risen in North Platte and departed to continue our journey. It is where we begin to get excited about life in the city where we’re headed. For example, there is a Starbucks here. Gingerbread Latte! WOOT!
But last trip, I got up on my 'support local businesses' high horse and used my fancy new Droid to find a nearby non-chain hotel for us to stay the night. I don’t recall the name, but suspect it was something like Fort So-and-So Inn. Sounded good. The directions gave it street cred, sending us past the bloodsucking highway-adjacent concrete cookie cutter hotels and restaurants. We left those lights behind, passed the grain elevator and a then began passing more and more bars before crossing several railroad tracks. No lights now, just shuttered old buildings with aging architecture. No downtown revival here.
Eventually, we arrived. It seemed stripped down but acceptable from the outside, which was fine with us. We are cotton folk, not silk or satin. But as soon as we walked in I knew we should have stuck close to the familiar chains. They might be bloodsuckers, but at least I knew we’d get back on our way with some quality rest-eye behind us.
This place might have been used as a set on CSI. Seedy isn’t the word. Visions of getting caught up in a sting operation and ending up in jail flooded my head. I didn’t answer the surly Indian man who came from behind the bright flowery curtain to inquire what the heck we were doing there.
He seemed astonished we sought a room. He could barely find the various office implements he needed to check us in. While he searched, I looked around. The walls and floors were stained and damaged. The windows looking on to the pool had a kind of permanent scum clouding them. Hand-written signs warned around every corner of things not working as they should. A circa-1983 television with rabbit ears and –I’m not even kidding, aluminum foil- sat on a TV stand. Next to it was a large golden statue of one of the Hindu goddesses. Bright fabric was tacked on the walls, hanging like sheets across the windows in a meth house. Jack got the logistics handled and shuffled me out.
The room was pretty dingy, but we aren’t the type to walk away and go somewhere else. We made do. The main feature was a sagging bed. There was a television, but despite posted signs the only channels were piped in from India. Jack tossed the remote, groaned and got ready for bed. I explored the bathroom. At one time – one I tried to focus on – it would have been charming. I visualized it as sparkly and new, an exciting destination for a family venturing from the farm in their shiny Ford Fairlane.
Those days were long gone. Tiles were missing, rings stained the sink and tub. My showering could wait. I swallowed a few extra sleeping pills and tried to get some sleep.
We got out of there before dawn.
Ever since, we have driven no more than a couple of hundred yards from the highway for our sleeping quarters. Nebraska lost some luster that night. Now, we just hand our money over to the grumbling teenager at the desk of the concrete cookie cutter hotel and dive into our predictable rooms. And drive thru Starbucks in the morning.
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