How I Got to Iowa

I’ve had August 14th circled on my calendar for a long time. It long loomed as a line of demarcation between my initial RV foray into Texas and the long, meandering, months-long trip that will carry me through the balance of the year.

I had no idea, of course, that I would enter this stretch in my fourth travel trailer or that I’d lose weeks on the road to the Stupidest RV Event Ever. Nonetheless, the calendar did calendar things and eventually served up a Friday in mid-August.

Let’s take it day by day. Highlights only. OK, that’s a lie. Inexplicable memories, too, and stumbles into history. If I’d had a Chevy, I’d have driven it to the levee and cried. That’s called foreshadowing.

Route: Laurel, Montana, to Glendive, Montana

Miles: 236

In retrospect, I cannot remember why I booked a campground that lies such a short distance from home on Day 1 of a three-day, 1,000-plus-mile trip (the stay was bought and paid for months ago). But I did, so Glendive, near the eastern edge of Montana, was my waiting room for a night.

After nearly 20 years as a resident and with a long life filled with regular visits, I like to think I know Montana fairly well. But for me, Glendive has always been a pass-through place. I often joke that it has a highly self-aware second syllable. (That’s snotty, and I really don’t mean it. I have no problem with Glendive, although the museum that depicts dinosaurs and humans as coexisting is flat-out bonkers.)

I spent the night in a nondescript RV park called Riverview, and I’d stay there again if it came to that. Some online reviews complain about the racket from the adjacent train tracks, but that clamor retreated into ambient noise for me. Plus, everybody loves the sound of a train in the distance. You gonna argue with Paul Simon?

As I was driving out of town the next morning, I looked to my right at a stoplight and ignited a memory straight out of 1995. I spotted the Glendive Inn, which has apparently seen better days. One of those was during February, 31 years ago, as I stayed there under previous ownership (Best Western, I think, but don’t hold me to that) while making the drive from Dayton, Ohio, to Bellingham, Washington, bound for a ferry ride to Alaska.

I can access the memories of that trip as if they happened yesterday, and I can see myself as that ambitious young man headed for a new frontier. But they didn’t, and I’m not. Those days unfurled more than half my lifetime ago. Nineteen ninety-five has as much proximity to now as 1939 does to the year I was born. In other words, very little.

Damn, it’s tough to get old. Better than the alternative, I guess.

Route: Glendive to Fargo, North Dakota

Miles: 391

Proud admission: I’m a fan of North Dakota. I mean, I’m not going to buy it flowers. I’m not going to live there (although I almost did; more on that soon). But I see beauty in it, stark as it often is, and I’m always happy to revisit it.

That said, nearly 400 miles of driving across it west to east will get to anyone. It certainly got to me.

By the time I checked into the campground at Lindenwood Park—a true gem in the heart of Fargo and a fresh entry on the list of reasons I’ve always been fond of that city—I was a hurting unit.

I was greeted by this.

That, my friends, is a sardine can. I’m a confident backer-upper of a trailer, a skill I’ve worked hard to develop, and I was mightily challenged by the layout here. It wasn’t so much that I couldn’t do it as that I struggled to watch my front end and keep it from clipping somebody’s truck while simultaneously watching my back end to ensure I was lined up with my space. (Thank God for backup cameras. Verily. Amen.) The various vehicles all parked akimbo didn’t help.

In stepped my neighbor—an Ember owner!—who helped me navigate the narrow spaces and get my rig centered in its space. I didn’t catch a name, just the “Smith” stenciled on his campground signage, which doesn’t exactly narrow it down. On the off-chance you’re reading, sir, I thank you again, and I promise I haven’t forgotten the name of the town you asked me to remember. Maybe we’ll meet again someday.

Later, I drove through downtown Fargo and remembered a near-miss from my past. Nearly 20 years ago, I interviewed for and was offered the job of sports editor at The Forum. I accepted the job, told my boss at the Billings Gazette, then had second thoughts. At least three times in my journalism career, I took jobs and backed out. I’m not proud of it. In each case, though, I can say I ultimately did the right thing for me at the right time. I’ve always wondered how things would have turned out in Fargo. Given the overall direction of the industry, I suspect I’d be doing something else now. But what about Fargo itself? I love that town. I saw nothing in my brief interlude a few days ago that would diminish that feeling.

Plus, you can never overvalue being in the land of Culver’s.

Route: Fargo to Boone, Iowa

Miles: 465 (including eight extra miles that were well worth the time)

The drive. The setup. The fitful sleep. The takedown. The drive. Lather, rinse, repeat. That’s a multiday RV trip. There’s a reason my preferred travel plan is to get somewhere and stick around awhile.

Finally, I made it to such a place. And what a ride.

Upon breaching Iowa for the first time in my life, I soon had a thought: I wonder how far from Buddy Holly’s crash site I am.

As if to answer, a subsequent mileage sign told me Clear Lake was a little more than 20 miles away.

I punched the actual crash site—a cornfield, still—into Google Maps. It was even closer. I recast my itinerary and headed for it.

I don’t recommend pulling a trailer there. Much of the route follows gravel roads. I took it incredibly slow, no problem for anyone else. I was all alone.

If you look beyond the monument festooned with glasses and notes from fans who’ve made the pilgrimage to the site, it doesn’t take much imagination to picture what the scene must have looked like in February 1959. It’s still a working farm. There’s no ostentatious commercialism. It’s a somber place, and I wept, thinking of The Day the Music Died and the relentless velocity of time. Buddy Holly barely made it past 22. Ritchie Valens was 17. J.P. Richardson, the Big Bopper, was the senior citizen of the group, all of 28. Even the pilot of the doomed plane, Roger Peterson, was barely into his 20s.

Neither time nor circumstance cared. Those young men of such promise were here, then they were gone. Buddy Holly would be turning 90 later this year, had he lived. Time and circumstance didn’t let him.

(Interesting coincidence: Holly, Valens, and Richardson were trying to get to Fargo that night. Nearly 25,000 days later, I stood near the spot where they died, having come from Fargo.)

These are the kinds of things I think about when I feel the urgency to do what I’m doing right now rather than making a better plan or waiting for more resources. Wait? Seriously? And just assume time will let me do it later?

No. I don’t trust future time.

A few miles more brought me to Clear Lake, where I stood outside the Surf Ballroom, the site of the young rock ’n’ rollers’ final show. I was a gawker, for sure. Yet people were kind and friendly. Clear Lake didn’t ask for its notoriety, although I suppose one could take the cynical view that it has capitalized on its role in such a well-known story. I choose not to be cynical, just this once. Welcoming those who make the trek, who feel some kinship with three fated young men, is simply the right thing to do. Kudos to the people of Clear Lake for doing it.

So now I’m in Boone, hunkered down for a week of work before I head to my next destination. I’ll make time for play, for learning more about the dot on the map where I’m staying, for meeting people and making friends. My campground host, Joel, is a hoot and runs a good venue. I’ve chatted with neighbors. I’ve made plans to visit museums and a bookstore. I’m open to serendipitous moments.

Those are the best kind, after all.