After having such a wonderful experience in Joplin, the next day was not so exciting or wonderful. Just one bad situation after another. I finally pulled into Ozark, AR nervous but eager to get another city checked off the list. The first place I pulled into was a 66 gas station. I half expected to hear, "You ain't from round these parts." It was the constant you don't look like you belong here looks that made me shy away from asking too many people about my survey.
"I'm traveling doing a survey of communities and happiness across America and I randomly chose your city. Do you have a couple minutes to answer just a few questions? It would help me out a lot!"
"No."
That was the response I would get if I did manage to make eye contact with someone, or if someone would smile at me in response. I moved from place to place all with no luck. In the end, I sat eating really horrible, I mean awful, Mexican food place hoping I could ask people there. Instead, I ended up forking over 8 dollars for a vegetarian quesadilla (the cheapest real food on the menu)that tasted like cardboard. And still no luck. Ok, fine, I decided to sit in my car and try to think of where to go next. I called hostels in New Orleans to stay the next night and all the hostels without bug infestations were booked. So I knew I didn't want to go there yet but it was the next stop on my list.
The people in the car next to me had locked their keys in the car and since I was right there, I offered to take them to get a spare as they were really freaking out about it. "No, thanks." they responded bluntly to my offer. Wow--even people needing HELP wouldn't talk to me. I decided with frustration to head to Hope, Arkansas. Already was it getting dark. By 9 PM, the highway I was taking to get there turned windy, pitch black, and cut off all cell reception. Bad idea. I turned around deciding to get a motel room and rest up for the next.
Bad idea again. It was haunted. I won't get into too much for sounding like a crazy person but it was terrifying. I've experience two different haunted places before but nothing with this overpowering evil.
Now it was 1 AM, I was exhausted, and still had no direction. I was too tired to be chosey about my parking lot so I chose Second Baptist Church (hehe) in Conway. The next morning, I sat down to drink coffee at Starbucks and everything opened up from there. The Starbucks was filled with lovely people who were all willing to help me fill out surveys and just be friendly and kind. I had such a good time there!! One of the employees offered me a place to stay with her. At first I wasn't going to take her up on the offer because I wanted to be on the road. The more I thought about it, though, the more I thought it would be a good idea and I'm glad I did. Nicole is a beautiful, generous person who did not have much to give but was willing to share so much. It's incredible how when you feel like you have no direction to go (mine was more literal), and everything goes wrong and you start to despair. Then, everything goes right all at once. Suddenly all those puzzle pieces come together and you start to feel kinda silly for going nuts over something that was working out all along. It was wonderful to be mutually inspiring to one another.
Now, I'm in Columbus, Mississippi heading east to do another set of interviews in Reform, Alabama. Again, nervous but eager to get another city checked off my list. Here's to meeting good people willing to help me.
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