Los Angeles
While packing to leave Houston I felt a mounting anxiety about the bellman, whom I’d grown to hate. He’d be waiting downstairs, and while finishing my exercises, I imagined the many things I’d say when he inevitably tried to wrestle away my bag. “Sir, no,” I’d say. “I said no.” If he took it anyway, I’d simply leave him without a tip and say, “Look, I told you not to help.”
Fifteen minutes before checkout I carried the typewriter down to the lobby. They’d gotten me a Selectric rather than a Wheelwriter, and it weighed a ton. “Oh, you didn’t have to do that,” the man at the front desk said. “We would have sent Larry to fetch it.”
The bellman, who I guess was named Larry, swooped in to scold me. “Now, that’s not right,” he said. “Mr. Sedaris, whenever you’re ready, I’ll go get that suitcase. Goodness, carrying that heavy typewriter all by yourself.”
I said I wouldn’t be needing any help, and he skulked off to bide his time. A car was coming at eleven, and as I waited out front, he moved in to brag about his city. “Houston’s a beautiful place, but best of all is our people,” he said. “The friendliest folks on earth.” He said he’d once gone to New York and tried to engage a stranger in conversation. “The guy said, ‘Look, I don’t know you and I don’t want to know you, so just buzz off.’” Larry shook his head. “That ain’t no way to be ’cause, see, I’m from Texas. I like to see a smile.”
The car pulled up and he pried my suitcase out of my hands. “Really,” I insisted, “I can do it myself.” The driver opened the door to the backseat, and Larry ran around and opened the opposite one, saying, “This is the side a person should get in on.” I wish I could say I’d given him nothing, but of course I caved in, hating him all the while.
April 20, 2002
Escondido, California
According to my complimentary postcard, the Rancho Bernardo Inn boasts an eighteen-hole championship golf course, two award-winning restaurants, twelve tennis courts, a full-service spa, and a fitness center. “Lovely outdoor pool and courtyard areas are accentuated by the numerous antique fountains imported from Italy and Spain. Rancho Bernardo Inn guests enjoy the warmth, taste, and style of a fine country home.” My room is very pleasant and features a private deck overlooking one of the many wishing wells mentioned whenever someone is giving you directions. “Turn left at the wishing well,” the concierge says, or “Walk past the wishing well.”
I looked into my wishing well yesterday afternoon, expecting sparkling coins, and found a Bic pen floating beside a golf tee.
April 22, 2002
Eugene, Oregon
Yesterday’s highlight was washing my clothes. There’s a combination Laundromat, tanning booth, and espresso bar over near the university, and while walking to it I passed a large antiques mall, empty in the way such places usually are. I went in, and an elderly saleswoman followed behind as I wandered from room to room, pretending to admire the beer steins and World’s Fair mementos. My favorite object was a lamp with a base made of stacked books. They’re common enough, but usually the books are classics: leather-bound editions of Plato and Mark Twain. Here they amounted to American Drug Index, Bugles and a Tiger, Management Policy and Strategy, and Slimnastics. I copied the titles as the saleswoman walked back to the register and told her associate, “Well, at least he’s writing something down. That’s always a good sign.”
April 26, 2002
Portland
I went into the bathroom after my walk with Lisa yesterday afternoon, and when I came out there was a hostage situation on TV. “I’ve always been straight with you,” a man said. “Take me, not her.” The killer pointed a gun at a woman’s neck. “Back off or she’s dead!” he shouted. “I’m serious.”
Lisa had made it for all of ten minutes before turning on the television in our hotel room. It was five o’clock in the afternoon and she was lying in bed in her pajamas. “I love Portland,” she said when I asked what she was doing. “Have you seen this show?”
Having watched so many similar programs in her lifetime, Lisa is able to divine the future. The killer’s wife tries to talk him down and confesses that she’s pregnant. “That’s true, all right,” Lisa said. “But it’s not his baby.” Moments later I learned that she was right. The real father was the killer’s brother.
“They’re going to shoot him the moment he turns that gun over,” Lisa predicted. I was thinking, No way, the guy’s too good-looking to die. But the moment he handed in his weapon, a bullet came through the car window and caught him in the neck.
“That always happens,” Lisa said. I thought she might treat the commercials the same way, saying, “Those stains are going to come right out,” but the ads are too predictable, so she ignores them.
Earlier yesterday morning, after the plane had been sitting on the Minneapolis runway for forty-five minutes, the pilot announced it would take three and a half hours to fly to Portland. For the first time since beginning the tour, I honestly didn’t think I could live that long. What made the flight unbearable was my excitement over seeing Lisa. We landed at two thirty and I found her by the baggage claim, sitting patiently with her rolling suitcase.
In the afternoon we took a walk through downtown. “Can I ask you something?” Lisa said. “How often do you and Hugh have sex?” A man on the curb stopped to watch the passing traffic, and I waited until we were safely across the street to tell her, wondering if this was what other middle-aged brothers and sisters talked about. I answered her, of course, as it would never have occurred to me not to. We talked about it again later that night while lying in bed.
April 27, 2002
Seattle
I normally try to keep my hotel rooms just so, but within minutes of arriving Lisa had the lamps blazing and the television on. Things were piled on the coffee table and she was sitting on the sofa watching a made-for-TV movie while looking over a sheet of algebra problems. She’s taking a math class at Forsyth Tech and currently holds a 102.7 average. When asked how it could be over 100, she tapped her pencil against her forehead and said, “Extra credit.”
Lisa’s able to do anything while watching TV. Yesterday morning while I packed to leave, she caught the last half hour of Matlock. “Isn’t it true,” Andy Griffith asked the defendant, “isn’t it true that you bought the briefcase and planted it on Coach Williams?”
“Don’t you just love him?” Lisa asked.
May 1, 2002