CHAPTER 33: Billie’s speed-bump lesson serves well as the Gang meanders around Arkansas’ hot-spring destinations.

Crossing the Arkansas state line Buck resumed the effort of introducing Billie to “Old-timey” roots music. The song he cued up as they crossed the state line was a portrait of abject poverty. My Name Is John Johanna, famously recorded by Kelly Harrell & The Virginia String Band in 1925. The song is also known as The State of Arkansas and tells the tale of a traveler’s hard luck:

My name is John Johanna, i came from Buffalo town. For nine long years i’ve traveled this wide wide world around. Through ups and downs and miseries and some good days i saw, But i never knew what misery was ’til i went to Arkansas.

Boiled to its essence, the song is about a great human grift known as the “bait-and-switch.” Advertise one thing and deliver another.

“Sounds a lot like the fabled ‘American Dream,’” Jack piped in from the galley.

“Ah yes,” said Buck. “Maybe the song can make its way into Professor T’s analysis of the nation’s ‘fibrillating heart.’” Buck hadn’t intended to start a serious discussion. He just wanted to set the mood as the Bus rolled into Arkansas.

Billie wasn’t concerned with any of that. She had read somewhere about the condition of Arkansas’ meandering roads and kept her eyes peeled for those famous vehicle-wrecking potholes. 

“Be careful, i have family here,” said Billie keeping her eyes on the road. “My North Little Rock relatives are a hearty bunch. Their hospitality is legendary, and their dry wit never fails to put a smile on my face. They’ll welcome you with open arms, but don’t be surprised if they also give you a sideways glance and a knowing smirk. Folksy wisdom and modern cynicism coexist with these guys.

“Some say Arkansas is one of the most beautiful states in the union,” said Billie. And following the meandering highways toward North Little Rock proved her right. Endless green rolling landscape. It kept Billie on her toes and provided no end of fascination for Professor T as it reminded him of the dense wooded areas of Oregon. He kept his eyes peeled for Sasquatch. 

For hot springs action, Arkansas has it in spades. It’s home to several natural hot spring sites, and they were headed for the most famous of them all, Hot Springs National Park. 

But first, the work. The gang met Billie’s relatives for dinner at the North Little Rock Cracker Barrel. “Comfort Food Central,” said Professor T. 

“Well, sure…we, won’t knock ‘em for that.” Billie had made the introductions all around, and now, her aunt, who had never met a stranger, was singing the praises of the many mom & pop restaurants serving authentic southern cuisine for the budget conscious. 

“Billie knows,” said her aunt. “You remember, darling, when the family gathered for Great Grandpa’s funeral, after most of the attendees had gone, we walked to a diner near our house. The one they opened in the early 1960s…remember?”

“Oh yeah, I remember the biscuits and gravy. It was divine,” said Billie. “I still don’t think I’ve experienced any better.”

“But Cracker Barrel is fine,” said Billie’s aunt. “I don’t think your bus would find a place to park at the diner, anyway.”

“It’s all good,” said Jack. “Sometimes you just have to work with what you have.”

“We’re heading to Shorter College in the morning. It’s our next stop for focus-group interviews,” said Professor T. “We’re doing our best to visit a wide diversity of campuses, the big public and privates, the medium size state comprehensives, the Ivy Leaguers, and the small faith-based non-profits. We can’t visit them all, of course, but we want our data to come from a wide variety of perspectives.”

“Well,” said Billie’s uncle, “Shorter is super small, but i’ve heard good things…a community college actually revered by the community.”

The next day, room reserved, snacks obtained, recording equipment in place, Buck, basically a spectator, chair wrangler, and snack custodian, settled on a metal folding chair that felt about three sizes too narrow. He watched as Jack and Professor T, with clipboards on their knees, prepared to capture the data. 

Suddenly, Buck was aware of how loud the creak of his boot leather sounded in the quiet room. Lord, don’t let us look like interrogators, he mused. He watched several participants file in: a grandmother with a worn study Bible resting on top of her nursing syllabus, two young men with tired eyes who probably just clocked off a third-shift warehouse job, and a few teenagers with bright, nervous energy. On the wall behind them the portrait of the college’s founding reverend right beside a framed print of the Jordan River.

Keep your mouth shut and your ears wide open, Buck thinks to himself. We’re here to listen, not run the fence line.

As the conversations got rolling, the rhythm in the room caught Buck off guard in the best way. Back home in Texas, folks talk slow and guard their words like water in August. Here, there’s a music to it…a cadence of soft assents, nods, and the occasional quiet “Amen” when someone speaks a heavy truth. When a young woman started talking about how hard it is to pay for gas to drive across the county line just to make an eight o’clock lab, something inside him ached with familiarity.

That’s the same hill my cousin has to climb, he thinks. Different dirt, same damn hill.

Yet beneath the common ground, he catches the distinct weight of their stories…the generational pride tied to this specific patch of Arkansas ground, the sacred duty they feel toward ancestors who weren’t able to read a book, let alone earn a degree. It isn’t just ambition…it’s stewardship. Faith isn’t just Sunday best here…it’s an engine.

He sees Professor T scribbling notes furiously, catching himself smiling when the grandmother laughs and calls the group to order before he even has a chance to intervene. They didn’t need us to build a bridge, Buck realized, feeling smaller in the best possible way. They just need us to document the truth of what they’ve already built.

As the gang packed away gear, picked up trash, and replaced tables and chairs wrapping up the session, Buck quietly wondered what the singer of that old-timey song about Arkansas would think about the state now. Still strikingly beautiful, but also still plagued by poverty in the south delta, scarce access to public services, and health care.  But after meeting Billie’s relatives and the focus-group session, Buck came away impressed by the folks in the “Natural State” for their razor wit and their built-in resilience. 

NEXT WEEK:
Red Rock, Texas. Then back home for Buck… Corpus Christi

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