Rain tapped a wet Morse Code on the windshield as my son and I headed toward Panaca on Utah Highway 56. Sunshine spiked through fleeing November storm clouds.
"Only about four more hours to go," I said.
We had been traveling only for two hours. Our destination was Elko. I would scout a Nevada 3A state playoff semifinal game between Spring Creek and Truckee high schools the next afternoon. I wasn't looking forward to the mind-numbing trip north on US 93. At night. Without Prozac. Probably without guardian angels. (They'd be bored, too.)
US 93 started out promisingly enough with access to Cathedral Gorge State Park, a badlands-fantasy land of erosion, sun and space. But we couldn't stop there. We had a football game in cold storage waiting.
Out past Pioche, the traffic thinned to nothing. Out past Pioche there is nothing.
I did, however, manage to enjoy a sunset of smoldering red coals and the strangeness of vacant distance: darkness filtering into the basins like Espresso; silence that you feel more than hear; rejoicing for approaching headlights.
The road sign pointed to Atlanta. We laughed.
"I don't see the Georgia Dome or the Peach Tree Hotel out here," I said.
"I don't think you will in our lifetime," my son said.
A gaunt, bearded man, probably in his 40s, hiked south along the shoulder of US 93. He carried all his possessions on his back. He resolutely hoofed it, hoping for a ride.
"Looks like me after a bad week of fantasy football," I said.
He soon was swallowed by the thickening darkness. Everything was vaporizing in the dark. Tiny thickets of blue lights winked in the distance.
"Who would be living out there?" my son wondered.
"Not us."
The highway climbed to Ely. Conner Summit was licked with a thin smear of snow. We gassed up at Ely (at $2.57 a gallon for the oil companies' skim-milk unleaded) and drove into the void.
Past McGill, traffic ceased. Night crushed the basins and ranges. I felt a profound loneliness, a fear that squeezed the breath from my lungs, an insignificance that made me want to turn south to the nearest roadside tavern. But I kept driving.
Lage's Junction, a pool of light at the junction where US 93 and US 93 Alternate split, looked like blessed civilization. But we pushed northwest toward Wells. We passed Currie 15 miles later. Currie, for some unknown reason, always has perked my interest. When I saw it the first time it was bathed in strange orange sunshine at the end of the day. Now it was drowned in darkness. Only one light shone from the kitchen of a mobile home.
"Who would live here?" my son wondered.
"Dead aliens from Area 51."
"I should have known."
Vaguely luminescent snow seemed to float in the sky ahead. It was our first look at the massive Ruby Mountains rising out of the darkness, the windy peaks tearing storm clouds into tatters. The highway paralleled the Rubies through Clover Valley, crossed some low hills and dropped into Wells.
"After all that nothingness Wells looks like a metropolis," I said.
"Fifty more miles to Elko. What are you having for dinner when we get there?"
"A nice rare steak and some dark draft beer. What about you?"
"Shrimp maybe.or a steak and shrimp. No beer."
We raced to Elko and checked into the hotel. A female employee, probably about 17 years-old, reluctantly approached the front desk clerk.
"There's a guest who will be coming in on the airport shuttle bus," she said. "We got a call from her home.her daughter just died. I have to tell her."
"Hey, if you don't want to do it, I'll do it," the clerk said. He looked all of 18 or 19 years-old. Already, his voice sounded world-weary.
This experience ought to look pretty impressive on the ol' resume: hotel front desk clerk.duties include delivering the worst of all possible news to guests.salary, $8 per hour. I thought about the impending high school football game.
Those kids are lucky; they get to play football tomorrow. It's win or lose, not life or death. If good fortune remains with them, they'll never have to tell someone his or her child has just died.
Up to the room; a quick shower, change of clothes, then back down to the restaurant. The top sirloin steak was great, the three amber bock draft beers were even better. My son ended up having prime rib.
We waited inside my truck, windows rolled up, in the Spring Creek High School parking lot. Temperature was in the 40s. A sharp wind snapped flags but failed to disperse the overcast gloom. There was an hour and a half left until game time.
"We'll have to get out eventually and find a good place to film the game," I said.
Spectators began to arrive. Truckee High School coaches and fans were wearing windbreakers and shorts. Shorts!
"These people are howling mad," I muttered. I pulled on a sweater and two jackets. It won't be enough.
It was a late-arriving crowd. The bleachers filled up about five minutes before kickoff. The Spring Creek crowd was festive. The Spartans went undefeated all season and their fans fully expected the team to ride into the state championship game in Reno.
Football's important here. Football is important in every other Nevada small town, too, but up north it is the main event.
During the first quarter, two men and their wives were talking about a recent altercation in a local tavern.
"You don't want to fight with them big ol' Battle Mountain miners," one of the women said.
"It wasn't us," her husband said. "It was Chris. He don't care."
Spring Mountain scored first and held the 7-0 lead throughout the first half. The crowd, possibly sobered by the chilly gray afternoon and the cold hot dogs and coffee, seemed sluggish. A local radio personality commandeered the microphone inside the press box and exhorted the spectators to cheer like mad dogs. They responded.
But Truckee responded, too. The Wolverines constructed two good-looking drives and leaped in front, 17-7.
Out beyond the football field, the grim yellow hills were marbled with sun and shadow. Winter was marching into town. It was already mid-November and the season would be finished quickly and cruelly. Winter would set in and remain for a long time. Beyond the hills, the Ruby Mountains towered over the Great Basin Desert, mighty blocks of granite topped with gleaming snow.
Truckee won, 31-13. We rushed back to the truck.
"I can't feel my feet," my son said.
"Me either. Don't know how I'm walking. From now on, I'm only going to scout games in he tropics."
We passed through Wells at sunset. The long orange light burnished the dead desert grass in an amber glow. Seven more hours on the road.
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