Where in the World Are We?

In the last post I asked the question, “Where is everybody going?” The discussion was about the endless swarm of gas-guzzling cars on Southern California freeways.

One of the places they are going, of course, is shopping. That’s what we Americans do. We get in our cars and go shopping.

Last Thursday after work Susan and her daughter and I went shopping. We drove to the northern edge of where we live to go to Costco.

We were going to get some drugs. Costco has by far the cheapest prescription drugs in many miles. We shopped a little, too. We bought some things.

Then we had one of our ritual dinners in the Costco Food Court – hot dogs, pizza, churros.

As we sat eating and chatting and people-watching I began thinking about someone who might work in the research park across the street, live in the suburban townhouse development around the corner, and shop in this shopping center and at the supermarket in the next block. That person and their family, I realized, would lead their entire lives in a bubble that – for all appearances – could be in Detroit, Atlanta, Ocala, or Kansas City. The entire residential and commercial environment in which we sat was completely interchangeable with anyplace else in America – as indistinguishable as 2 pistons in a Ford Ranger. We happened to be sitting in Goleta, California, but there was no evidence of that. No local merchants. No local color, no local anything at all (unless, I suppose, one were a botanist, in which case one might see a scrap of evidence that we were in Southern California and not Vermont).

I did some truck driving a few years back, and I remember one night I was hauling something that took me through the town of Chattanooga, Tennessee. It was nighttime, and I was coming in from the north. I had never been to Chattanooga in my life and was so excited to see what I could see! – even from the highway at night. Chattanooga had meaning for me – probably because of the name, the song. It had to be a wonderful repository of American culture.

I came down the mountain, out of the darkness, and suddenly there were the lights of town!

What greeted me?

Just what I should have expected: a Waffle House. A McDonalds. A Burger King.

That was it. I was in Chattanooga, Tennessee, but I could have been anywhere. 

How comforting and comfortable that must feel, I thought, for many travelers, coming into a strange town and seeing something so … familiar! – the welcoming arches – a place you could stop and not be surprised in any way by what it looked like inside and by what the food tasted like. That special comfort of the American commercial dream, the sense of well being in knowing that a Big Mac is a Big Mac everywhere. It’s a little like swimming in a nice warm lake.

I shopped at Walmart a lot back when I was trucking, not because I wanted to but because it was one of the few places where you could park a semi-truck and trailor and not be in anyone’s way. It was convenient to know that the produce and soft drinks and chips were always in the same location whether you were in Cleveland of Memphis or Phoenix.

So here is what we have done in my lifetime: we have lost a sense of place in America and in the world, trading it in for the interchangeable, the familiar, the predictable, the homogenized.

Did we do that? – Or was it done to us? Is that what we want?

I think that someone should say “enough!”

These Costco hotdogs are the best in the world, by the way. And they are only $1.50 (drink included) – the same price as when they first came out in 1984 (according to their corporate newsletter). By the way, Costco food courts (according to the same newsletter) are not exactly the same everywhere. Oh, they all have the exact same hot dog and soft drink, but in Canada, they offer poutine (French fries with gravy and cheese curds). In the UK, they serve jacket potatoes (baked potatoes with special fillings). In Japan and Korea, their chicken bakes have bulgogi in them. And in Mexico, the pizza is topped with seafood. 

Thanks, Costco, for honoring a sense of place!

In the meantime, as someone who loves to travel, I really miss America. Who will tell the urban and suburban planners? – The commercial architects and contractors? – The mall developers? Who will be the one to say that that will be just about enough of that – enough homogenization of the unique and wonderful American landscape?

“Enough!”

That’s a major role of Mom and Dad – When little kids are doing or saying or eating too much of something, it is the job of the parents to tell them, “That’s enough, now,” or “That will be enough,” or “That will be just about enough of that!” 

Too much noise, too much acting out, too much candy, too much talking back, too much television. That’s enough, now. 

We assume when we grow up that we don’t need anybody saying “enough” anymore. We will have learned when enough is enough, when it is time to get up from the table, when we need to shut up and let someone else talk, when to go to bed, when to end the vacation and go back to work. 

But – after we have grown up – what if it is enough and yet we don’t stop? Who will be the parent to tell us that it is time to cut that out? My father died when I was very young. I don’t remember the sound of his voice, except I remember that he said “Cut that out!” He was emphatic about it. It was his way of saying, “That will be just **** about enough of that!” 

A couple of weeks ago my partner Susan and I drove from Santa Barbara to Agoura Hills just north of LA to see Dr. John from New Orleans play at the Canyon club. It was on a Friday. The trip of about 60 miles took about two and a half hours. Usually on a Friday afternoon, the traffic is bad going the other way as LA comes north for the weekend, but that day it was bad in both directions. At the Canyon Club, dinner is served before the show, and seating is European style with eight at a table, so Susan and I got a chance to meet three other couples. Among the topics of dinner conversation was The Traffic. These folks had come from different directions, and everything everywhere coming and going was stop-and-go, bumper-to-bumper. 

Where was everybody going? 

Dr. John was fabulous! His small band was amazing. Dr. John was – on a side note – pretty upset with British Petroleum for wrecking the coastal areas of his beloved home state of Louisiana. He sang his new song, “Black Gold,” indicting BP for the disastrous spill in the Gulf of Mexico. 

I enjoy vilifying big corporations as much as the next guy. I really do. I cut my teeth on that back in the 60s and 70s. The damage and destruction to life and property and the environment that gigantic corporations have caused in my lifetime are so … I don’t know what to say. 

But that’s not what I was thinking about as Dr. John sang his ranting song. What I couldn’t help thinking about instead was the ocean of traffic I had just driven through to get here – not an ocean of electric cars, hybrids, micro-cars and “fortwo” coupes, but an ocean of mammoth Cadillac and Lincoln Suburbans, triple-axle Hummers, pick-up trucks that belonged on Montana ranches, suburban titans, and (this was near Hollywood) the luxurious and notorious fuel-guzzling Lamborghinis, Bugattis, Ferraris, Bentleys, and Mercedes-Benzs. 

Bumper-to-bumper, stop-and-go. 

I actually saw a guy shaving in his rear view mirror.

One person or one family, all by themselves, enjoying the convenience and luxury of instant mobility in a vehicle of their choosing is not a bad thing. This is, after all, a “free country.” Who does it hurt? Their choice actually helps stimulate the economy.

But collectively we Americans consume 21 million barrels of petroleum per day – not just in our cars but in everything from lipstick and lubricants to motor oil and medications. The United States consumes (according to the Energy Information Administration) more gasoline than South America, Europe, Africa and Asia combined. 

Whose fault is the oil spill in the gulf? There will be a long conversation about that as we search for the culprit, the entity who we can blame and vilify and point the finger at.  

But – what did we expect? Who did we think was going to be in charge of satisfying our voracious appetite for an endless stream of petroleum to fuel our lifestyles? Did we think it was going to be someone who was more interested in the environment than in figuring out how to meet the need? – Someone not unwilling to cut corners to deliver the most oil for the least cost so they could profit more? 

Who is really to blame, as we take out the Ford F-150 4WD or Hummer to run across town to Starbucks for the double Latte? 

And (most important) who will be the one to say? – “That will be just about enough of that.”