curmugeon | My history part four

My history part four.

We were heading south. Somewhere along the way we caught the Blue Ridge Parkway. The time so far was good. I was getting used to the southern drawls and eating grits. We made it to Alabama. We soon found ourselves in Meridian Mississippi. This was deep south. The car had an oil leak to be fixed and it was going to take a few days. We checked into a hotel downtown while the car was being repaired. I saw the reality of segregation now. It was in your face. The hotel had segregated rooms. It had a separate desk and entrance for blacks. Our room was on the fifth floor. The elevator did not stop on the first three floors because this was the white elevator. You heard the n word often in the street or in conversations. We wanted to get to hell out of there. When we did leave we quickly moved on to Texas.

Texas was big. I think it took three days to cross. I recall listening to Marty Robbins singing on the radio as we entered El Paso. We were heading west.