Loverboy's Cousin
It was late afternoon and I was heading back to Muskegon. It was one of those mid-October days when the temperature soars into the mid 70s and the sun beams off the multi-hued leaves on the trees. I couldn't see much of that from the shoulder of I-96. Down near the freeway it was all blacktop and concrete, burned yellow scrub grass and litter. Once in a while there would be a stand of purple flochs or the carcasses of tires to break the monotony. Years before the Department of Transportation had deliberately introduced purple flochs to keep undesirable weeds down, and the species wound up being so invasive that it began choking out other desirable native species of plants.
The interstate highway system is one of America's premiere ongoing ecological catastrophes. Never mind the millions of cars leaking every industrial lubricant the automotive and petroleum industries can devise, if you simply consider the tons of salt dumped on the roads to melt ice in the winter it's easy to see how all surface water and most groundwater reserves have unacceptable levels of brine. Then there are road kills. Half decayed white tail deer corpses in the ditches and medians, without enough funding by the state to have them removed. Possums, rabbits and other small mammals strewn like furred confetti on the shoulder. And car parts. Tail pipes, mufflers, old batteries...
I was musing on these topics outside East Lansing when I was picked up by a really hyper skinny guy driving a Camero. I got in and he turned down the tape deck long enough to ask me where I was going.
"Muskegon" I yelled over the tape of some corporate rock anthem drivel.
"Cool, I can take you right there." he replied.
At 100 mph it was still the longest ride of my life to date.
"What are you playing?" I screamed over the ear-crushing off-key onslaught.
"This is Loverboy. Aren't they great? The lead singer is my second-cousin's sister's uncle."
He then proceeded to tell me the entire history of his near-association with the lead singer of Loverboy, without turning the tape down. I retreated into the pattern of simply smiling, gritting my teeth, and nodding while he yelled this or that inane fact as the veins on his neck stood out from the effort of shouting so loud. Eventually I couldn't hear him at all which was really a blessing. His radar detector was beeping, but we couldn't hear. I noticed that the light had switched to blinking red and pointed.
His beer, which had been lodged between his legs, went careening off onto the floor of the car as his foot came down on the brake and we went with an uncomfortable lack of grace from about 100 mph to 55. I saw him mouth the word "Fuck" but could not hear any sound other than the refrain "Turn me loose-Why don't you turn me loose" over and over at ear splitting volume.
The change in perspective was disorienting. 55 mph seems incredibly slow, especially after 100. We approached the next viaduct with painful sloth. He was saying something that I could not make out at all. I shrugged and he pointed to the right.
There, out of sight sat the state trooped, radar gun propped like some sort of warped TV camera on his car door. We cruised past, back up to 65 already. By the time we'd reached the top of the next hill, before we were even out of sight we were back up to 80 mph.
The rest of the trip was uneventful; he continued to yell what he thought were impressive facts about Loverboy, and I continued to nod, and the tape continued to loop, and play yet again.
When we finally got to Muskegon I was perfectly happy to get out at the first stop light, but he wouldn't hear of it. He insisted on driving me right to my door, in spite of some of my paranoid ideas about psychopathic stalkers knowing where I live. Then over my somewhat ineffectual objections, he invited himself in, whereupon he introduced himself to my mother and my brother Rick, and proceeded to regale them with tales of Loverboy. Had he not brought in the remainder of his case of beer and offered to share it I suspect he wouldn't have found a very willing audience. Once inside he was as tenacious as Jehovah's Witnesses or Amway salesmen; he went on, and on, till finally my cousin Bill showed up. Bill and Rick had plans to go out and do serious drinking, which usually meant someone (usually one of them) would end up in jail. Bill got out of his car, quart of Colt 45 in hand in sheer disdain for every drunk-driving law. He came in, already well on his way to getting tanked. He took an immediate dislike to the Cousin of Loverboy. Bill listened to about four minutes of my benefactor's diatribe and said "You look like some kind of blow-dried fuck."
There was sudden uncomfortable silence around the kitchen table. My mother stopped with her cigarette halfway to her lips, and Rick stifled a chuckle. Finally the Cousin of Loverboy laughed out loud as if he were sure Bill had been joking, and when he realized Bill hadn't been joking he gathered up his beer and made a hasty exit.
Rick finally lost it and started laughing.
"What the fuck are you laughing at?" glowered Bill.
The interstate highway system is one of America's premiere ongoing ecological catastrophes. Never mind the millions of cars leaking every industrial lubricant the automotive and petroleum industries can devise, if you simply consider the tons of salt dumped on the roads to melt ice in the winter it's easy to see how all surface water and most groundwater reserves have unacceptable levels of brine. Then there are road kills. Half decayed white tail deer corpses in the ditches and medians, without enough funding by the state to have them removed. Possums, rabbits and other small mammals strewn like furred confetti on the shoulder. And car parts. Tail pipes, mufflers, old batteries...
I was musing on these topics outside East Lansing when I was picked up by a really hyper skinny guy driving a Camero. I got in and he turned down the tape deck long enough to ask me where I was going.
"Muskegon" I yelled over the tape of some corporate rock anthem drivel.
"Cool, I can take you right there." he replied.
At 100 mph it was still the longest ride of my life to date.
"What are you playing?" I screamed over the ear-crushing off-key onslaught.
"This is Loverboy. Aren't they great? The lead singer is my second-cousin's sister's uncle."
He then proceeded to tell me the entire history of his near-association with the lead singer of Loverboy, without turning the tape down. I retreated into the pattern of simply smiling, gritting my teeth, and nodding while he yelled this or that inane fact as the veins on his neck stood out from the effort of shouting so loud. Eventually I couldn't hear him at all which was really a blessing. His radar detector was beeping, but we couldn't hear. I noticed that the light had switched to blinking red and pointed.
His beer, which had been lodged between his legs, went careening off onto the floor of the car as his foot came down on the brake and we went with an uncomfortable lack of grace from about 100 mph to 55. I saw him mouth the word "Fuck" but could not hear any sound other than the refrain "Turn me loose-Why don't you turn me loose" over and over at ear splitting volume.
The change in perspective was disorienting. 55 mph seems incredibly slow, especially after 100. We approached the next viaduct with painful sloth. He was saying something that I could not make out at all. I shrugged and he pointed to the right.
There, out of sight sat the state trooped, radar gun propped like some sort of warped TV camera on his car door. We cruised past, back up to 65 already. By the time we'd reached the top of the next hill, before we were even out of sight we were back up to 80 mph.
The rest of the trip was uneventful; he continued to yell what he thought were impressive facts about Loverboy, and I continued to nod, and the tape continued to loop, and play yet again.
When we finally got to Muskegon I was perfectly happy to get out at the first stop light, but he wouldn't hear of it. He insisted on driving me right to my door, in spite of some of my paranoid ideas about psychopathic stalkers knowing where I live. Then over my somewhat ineffectual objections, he invited himself in, whereupon he introduced himself to my mother and my brother Rick, and proceeded to regale them with tales of Loverboy. Had he not brought in the remainder of his case of beer and offered to share it I suspect he wouldn't have found a very willing audience. Once inside he was as tenacious as Jehovah's Witnesses or Amway salesmen; he went on, and on, till finally my cousin Bill showed up. Bill and Rick had plans to go out and do serious drinking, which usually meant someone (usually one of them) would end up in jail. Bill got out of his car, quart of Colt 45 in hand in sheer disdain for every drunk-driving law. He came in, already well on his way to getting tanked. He took an immediate dislike to the Cousin of Loverboy. Bill listened to about four minutes of my benefactor's diatribe and said "You look like some kind of blow-dried fuck."
There was sudden uncomfortable silence around the kitchen table. My mother stopped with her cigarette halfway to her lips, and Rick stifled a chuckle. Finally the Cousin of Loverboy laughed out loud as if he were sure Bill had been joking, and when he realized Bill hadn't been joking he gathered up his beer and made a hasty exit.
Rick finally lost it and started laughing.
"What the fuck are you laughing at?" glowered Bill.