Arkansas: Hope(less) & Texarkana

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We left Memphis and drove through Arkansas just ahead of a nasty winter storm.

Cathedral of St. Andrew in Little Rock

We checked out Little Rock and then continued on to Hope, Arkansas, the childhood home of Bill Clinton.

Hope is full of despair.

Then we were on to Texarkana, which can easily be the set of the next zombie apocalypse movie or it may currently be a zombie training ground. I haven’t actually done a lot of zombie research, so I’m not sure of what signs to look for, but there were cars parked on the streets as if it were a normal town, but there were no people outside and it was sunset going on dusk and there were no lights on inside any buildings. So where were owners of all the cars? We didn’t stay past dusk just in case full dark is when the zombies come out (like I said, I haven’t studied zombies).

Arkansas was the most out of place that I’ve felt in America. Iowa was a close second. In both it was clear that everyone knew I was an outsider and people wanted to know why I was there. In Iowa they were wary but curious and friendly. In Arkansas there was a malevolent feel to their interest. People seemed suspicious of my motives for traveling to their state. Maybe I’m being unfair to Arkansas (because I’ve met plenty of nice people from the state) there was a big winter storm threatening and maybe they could tell I was a yankee and assumed I brought the weather with me. I actually felt like the northeastern winter was tailing me, because unseasonably cold, rainy and icy weather followed me south to Florida and then west all the way to Texas. But whatever the reason for Arkansas’s perceived hostility, I was glad we didn’t have to linger.

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