Road to the WSOP, Part 6: Enjoy the Ride

Thursday began with the Truman Presidential Library and Museum. Though head and shoulders above the Lincoln one, it still wasn’t as good as some others we’ve visited, especially the Johnson and Eisenhower Museums. It was more broad historical information about the era than a unique perspective on the man who was president.

I did like, though, that the museum put an emphasis on presenting the difficult decisions Truman had to make, trying to show the issues from all sides and encouraging visitors to put themselves in the president’s shoes. I’ve always believed that while Roosevelt set the stage for modern domestic policy, Truman played that role in foreign policy. It was interesting to see significant actions such as the creation of NATO, intervention in Korea, and of course the use of nuclear weapons presented as legitimately tough decisions with compelling arguments and prominent advocates on both sides.

We picked up some groceries in Kansas City, then began the long, flat drive to Hays, Kansas. That took most of the day, but the next morning we stopped off to see the buffalo before leaving town. There’s actually a herd of buffalo maintained by the town parks department not too far off of I-70.

We had another long day of driving ahead of us and were already late leaving the hotel, so I was anxious to get going. We were set to camp that night, which meant that after we arrived we’d still have to set up camp and make dinner (not a quick task on a camp stove), so I didn’t want to get in too late.

Emily was really looking forward to seeing the buffalo, though, and I’m glad we did. There was a baby with them who was really funny because he was still fundamentally a thick, awkwardly shaped beast, but he was trying to frolic like any other baby animal and he just looked ridiculous.

I felt ridiculous myself for being in such a hurry to “get there” that I nearly missed such a cool little sight. Driving across the country is hardly the fastest or most efficient way of getting there, so you have to enjoy the little stuff along the way to make it worth your while.

Finally we settled in for a long, windy, empty drive across the prairie. Mostly there’s just flat fields of stubbly crops stretching off in all directions, train tracks running parallel to the road, and occasional windswept trees and towering grain elevators the only interruption to the 360 degree skyline.

Pat McGee on 1400 AM gave us the latest agricultural news, rattling off crop prices in the Chicago and Kansas City markets and updating us on the major ag bills before Congress. Hot topics of the moment seemed to be tying crop insurance to compliance with conservation requirements and lifting adjusted gross income caps on insurance qualification.

We crossed into Colorado and approached the long-promised cities of Lamar and La Junta. Everything was dilapidated: windows boarded up, porches crumbling, gates hanging off hinges, cars cannibalized for parts, their skeletons left gaping on abandoned lots. There were plenty of people outside, leading to the unsettling conclusion that at least some of these houses must be occupied. The arm-to-sleeve ratio was high, and the tattoo-to-arm ratio even higher.

On the outskirts of town, the gray clouds that had been with us all day finally opened up and poured their rain down upon us in thick, heavy, audible drops. Even then, rays of sun were visible bursting through the clouds in the distance, and soon enough we were free ourselves. The sky was clear ahead, and we got our first glimpse of the San Juan Mountains, the long-awaited terminus of the Great Plains.