"toenail, get up off that floor"

get away from the interstate and another america reveals itself.

gone are the landscapes dominated by walmarts, mcdonalds, and arbys

gone are the motorists rushing away...

rushing anywhere but here.

hope begins to seep in

hope that there lies another america quietly minding its own business...

quietly tending its flower beds...

quietly discussing the weather in mom and pop breakfast joints.

we'll leave the lumbering behemoths to cannibalize each other out on those ribbons.

but those towns are dying...

the walmarts and the homedepots are slowing choking them to death.

stand in a parking lot for a walmart and you feel like an insect.

tiny,

minuscule,

insignificant.

is it any wonder we have taken to driving monstrously huge trucks?

is it any wonder we have taken to gorging ourselves beyond epic proportions of lard?

america has become dominated by giants and we're just trying to keep up.

"toenail, get up off that floor"

she said as she pumped dollar bills into the soda machine, her obese son rolling around on the walmart floor...

indiana was the bleakest state i had been through...

indiana brought it all back home again...
and i was a hundred miles from gary...