Wednesday, October 31, 2018

Halloween on the Rails

by Pa Rock
Ramblin' Tourist

Merriam Websters'  "Word of the Day" today is "lycantrophy" - a delusion that one has become a wolf.  Happy Halloween!

This morning I am in the northwest Arkansas community of Rogers, a once-quiet berg that now is home to more than 50,000 people and stretches across wide expanses of land that were hundreds of cow pastures in my youth.  This corner of Arkansas has grown like crazy over the past few decades thanks to the success of companies like Walmart (boo, hiss), Tyson Foods, and J.B. Hunt Trucking.

This morning Patti and I are joining my sister, Gail, at the train station for the Missouri-Arkansas Railway in Springdale, Arkansas, where we will board a restored old steam train for a two-hour ride through the exceptionally beautiful fall foliage to visit the little flea market town of Van Buren, Arkansas.  We will be on the ground in Van Buren for a couple of hours and then take the train back to Springdale.

It's been twenty years since I have taken this particular trip, and I am anxious to revisit the adventure.

Most little towns in rural Missouri and Arkansas now have flea markets in the buildings that used to house to thriving small businesses.  Thank you, Walmart, for destroying the America of my childhood.

And again, Happy Halloween!

1 comment:

Xobekim said...

The lycanthropic tycoon preyed on his victims believing them to be dingbats. His alibi was rebuffed before both the bar of justice and the court of public opinion in a series of #MeToo trials.