A Nebraska Story (excerpt)
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The story will start like this:
“All roads lead to the Pink Palace eventually.”
We will get to that soon enough.
And it will end like this: Jack stayed quiet.
But first, there are a few things you should know about Nebraska.
Nebraska?
Nebraska. That is, after all, where our story is set.
Now listen.
1) The summers in Nebraska are occasionally so hot and humid that residents have been known to stick their heads in the freezer just to breathe. Perfect weather for, say, rattlesnakes, mosquitoes and tornadoes. Sometimes it snows.
2) Near the western border of the state stands a noted rock formation — “Elk Penis” to the Sioux who once lived there and named both objects and people based on their appearance. However, in a fit of misplaced gentility (given the forthcoming genocide of the native people), the pioneers renamed it “Chimney Rock.” It is neither tall and square, nor made of bricks. For years, Chimney Rock was a famous marker on the Oregon Trail. Also a popular place to die and hunt buffalo.
3) In McGrew, Nebraska, (pop. 99), about two miles east of Chimney Rock, in fact, a large, square hibiscus-pink building towers over its clapboard house neighbors. This, then, is The Pink Palace, a mecca for drinkers, pool players and fried-food epicures. For some reason, our modern and much less genteel locals call it “the big pink wang.” Really, it looks more like a chimney.
…
OK, then: “All roads lead to the Pink Palace … eventually.”
Actually, maybe starting with the letters is a better idea.
Chapter One
March 15, 2006
Dear Professor Kratzenstein,
Please accept our invitation to speak at the Buffalo Bill House in North Platte, Nebraska, on June 25, during our annual festival celebrating the Old West. We call it “Nebraskaland Days!” This year’s festival will focus on William “Buffalo Bill” Cody and his contribution to the Old West landscape since it’s also the 100th anniversary of his death.
Your services have been recommended to us by one Sarabeth Michaels, record-keeper at the Westward Ho! Museum of Oregon Rocks and Musical Instruments (Plus Wine Bar and Hotel). We have been looking for quite some time now for the perfect person to speak on Buffalo Bill. Miss Michaels assures us that you’re the person to do this. I understand that you’re an expert on both the Western migration of the 1800s AND Mr. Cody.
You should know that we have an extensive collection of Old West memorabilia and the largest document archive in the Midwest. You would have carte blanche to read and copy anything you might find there.
Now, our current financial situation renders us unable to pay you a respectable stipend. However, in lieu of any stipend at all, we would love to offer you a five-night stay at the Circle C South Comfort Motor Inn and provide you with all of your meals.
Your speech should last for 30 minutes. Afterward will be a short question-and-answer session with reporters and local history buffs. If you have copies of your Buffalo Bill articles on hand, we would love to have them to pass around.
The festival offers some good old-fashioned fun, or, you can elect to enjoy some time exploring our wonderful town, with its cobblestone streets and big city shopping, and nearby Lake Maloney.
Please accept the enclosed gifts of a hematite pendant, a red string and a small stick of palo santo regardless of your decision.
I will call you on Tuesday to confirm as I’m certain you’ll say yes.
Much love and bright blessings,
Sidran Moon
Buffalo Bill House
North Platte, Nebraska
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March 21, 2006
Dear Marie,
I feel comfortable calling you Marie now since we talked so well (although not very long!) on the phone yesterday. I’m so glad you said yes.
You should have received your ticket by now. It’s a one-way in case you decide you want to stay longer. And, yes, you see that correctly; you’re flying into Denver. Our driver will take you from the Denver airport to the hotel in North Platte. It’s about a 3-hour drive and I’ll have some nice muffins waiting for you at the front desk.
Your driver’s name is Jack Madison, which sounds like the main character in a romance novel. Which, come to think of it, he might have been. He’s not much of a talker, so don’t let that alarm you. Despite my instructions to the contrary, he refuses to pay for parking. So he’ll be looking for you at the exit underneath the United sign, and he’ll be in a blue Toyota truck with BBILL on the license plates.
About the gifts… They’re for safe travel. Yes, yes, it’s all superstition, I know. And you, being so educated and all, probably will just laugh it off. But, like I said, I’m old-fashioned, and I believe in helping luck along whenever we can.
The string is to wear on your wrist during travel, but not before; the mint leaves are to be put in your luggage, so it will end up at your destination with you, and the palo santo is to be burned in your hotel room for good sleep.
So there’s that.
Thanks again for saying yes.
Cordially yours,
Sidran Moon
Buffalo Bill House
North Platte, Nebraska
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Chapter Two
“All roads lead to The Pink Palace … eventually.”
Marie Kratzenstein watched the old man on the bar stool next to hers try to focus on not spilling his Hamm’s while he explained his drunk — or highly evolved — philosophy of the world to her in short bursts of something resembling English. Occasionally, he’d wipe his nose on the sleeve of his red-and-black checked flannel shirt to punctuate a point.
I can’t believe I said yes, Marie thought.
“Although,” he slurred, “most folks don’t even know it. Nope, sir. Siree. Nope. They’re blind fools. They cain’t see what’s right in fronta them. The Pink Palace. Like I said.”
He, Marie and an assortment of other patrons were presumably also waiting for the snowstorm raging outside to let up enough that they all could be on their merry ways to North Platte, or home, or whatever other destination called.
To Marie’s left was an under-dressed (for the weather, not the venue) young woman, in cut-off Levi’s and a t-shirt, cutting her fingernails, shoes off, feet propped on an adjacent stool. Two men in seed caps and fur-lined denim jackets were playing cribbage farther down the bar. Behind Marie was a group of pool players. Other two- and three-somes were sitting in the booths, waiting for something fried to eat.
Jack sat by himself at a table, looking out the window.
He didn’t say one word for the first two hours of the drive.
Marie had thought to bring a book, so the lack of conversation didn’t bother her too much.
Not one word until “I think we probably oughta stop. I smell snow.”
Marie had laughed, thinking he was making an ill-timed joke, since it was sunny. And June.
By the time they arrived at the Pink Palace, the visibility was poor and there were about three inches on the ground with more coming down.
Chapter Three
Most people have a belief system that guides their lives, that gives them a path to follow, a raison d’etre. Some belief systems can be simple — Mom, apple pie, straight teeth, don’t be a dick, pants that fit and dirty sex every once in a while. Others are slightly more complex. These are often called “religions.” Throughout time immemorial, there have been religions. They evolve, change form, are re-invented every thousand years or so. Usually they start when some smart person says something profound and everybody takes it out of context and starts making shit up. The rules are many and occasionally hard to follow. Luckily, most religions allow for a certain variable morality: For example, killing is bad (zygotes) unless it’s good (heathen infidels). The followers of a specific current religion drive minivans and SUVs. Their vehicles sport bumper stickers that blare out nifty platitudes such as: “Love the sinner; hate the sin” and “I’m not perfect, just forgiven.” Believers are promised eternal bliss with lots of music and chocolate eclairs — sometimes virgins — after Earth life is ended. For others, sex with virgins sounds like hell.
On the other end of the spectrum are those who believe in a vast nothing. Hedonists or atheists or nihilists, they spend their days trying to prove the religions wrong, running marathons, having more dirty sex than the simple belief system folks, and generally skimping on the Brussels sprouts in favor of butter and cream filled pastas. They write stuff. They eat well. They drive Volvos or Camaros or ride their bikes with bumper stickers that say: “Love the idiots; hate the idiocy” and “My other car is, well, a car.”
Somewhere in between is the catchall “other” category. The rules are much less strict and the bumper-stickers are more varied. “Science is my god,” “Goddess Bless,” “My other car is a broom,” “Vegans rock,” “Nothing is something” and others.
Then there are the rest. Those who want but don’t have. Those who see the validity in a creed but haven’t found or created one that feels reasonable.
Like our assumed heroine Marie.
The thing is, Marie theorized, each philosophy, or belief system, gives its adherents something to fight against. Which, of course, is the problem. Her fascination with America’s pioneers stems from this line of thinking. They, she wrote, in the paper that caught the eye of the Buffalo Bill people, had something to fight FOR. Their very lives. Well, that and some food, a little bit of entertainment and peaceful sleep. No more. Technology has made simplicity more complex and the fight more vague.
Really? This claptrap is what the Buffalo Bill people wanted to hear? Probably not. The Buffalo Bill House organization never did more than skim Marie’s work. You see, they weren’t the most popular kids on the block. Picked last for grants and other funding, they were pretty much just desperate. So, when the boss asked Sidran to find somebody, anybody with something published preferably, to speak at the festival on behalf of the Buffalo Bill house, the dutiful secretary concocted a story about her friend Sarabeth in Oregon and how Sarabeth found Marie, a C-lister, to be sure, but fairly well known in the small but ambitious subculture of Western migration fanatics.
And that’s really how it all began.
