R. Farrington Elwell: Untitled [Prairie Fire] (1935)
" … the threat of revisiting the wrong side of the tracks will leave right along with us."

Every city features two sides of the railroad tracks bisecting it, one side considered the right side of the tracks and the other, the wrong one. Denver's no different in this respect. Like most prairie towns, even those that never outgrew their founding footprint, railroad tracks slice right through the middle of the place. Denver's unique, though, in that the main body of the city's located on the wrong side of those tracks, at least from my perspective. I refer to that side of the city as Kansas, and I've made it my business to avoid it. It features most of what passes for culture here, which says something, and also hosts the state capitol, Union Station, and Rockies Stadium, but we became exurban once we'd moved into The Foothills. Kansas might have been only a half hour away by car, but between traffic and general inertia, we'd only rarely visit. We'd feel like we were Just Visiting, price tags still dangling from our hat brims as we attempted to navigate its ill-maintained streets. In January every year, they run a herd of Longhorns down through the business district to mark the opening of The Western Stock Show, the city's biggest cultural event. Need I say more?

As disappointing as urban Denver seems, the sprawling suburbia to the East seems several degrees worse. The airport's out there on what was once the eastern edge, now experiencing encroachment from cookie-cutter tract homes and even an unlikely destination resort where one can pay eight bucks to park the car while surrounded by scrub grass prairie, an honor and distinct privilege, I'm sure. The Muse would occasionally implore me to accompany her out there to claim some treasure she'd secured in an online auction. I'd gird my loins and accept her invitation, though I'd grind what's left of my teeth down to nubbins for my trouble. Should we need to hop onto I-25 for some reason, my gums would bleed. Over the course of a century and a half, Denver's grown from an unpromising settlement into an equally unpromising city, current population nearing three million.

We've been here, too, testament to dissatisfaction's mysterious attraction, but we've lived on the right side of the tracks. When people think of Denver, they think of The Rocky Mountains, and one can see the Eastern edge of those, The so-called Front Range, looming along the western horizon, but Denver's geographically in Kansas. Fine dining there leans toward prime buffalo cuts and what I refer to as Railroad Chinese, restaurants apparently founded by slave labor immigrants back when we were still building railroads, when fresh vegetables favored canned peas and dehydrated potatoes, heavy on the MSG, please. Truth hurts and so does supper out. The economy utterly depends upon extractive industries: mineral, oil, and gas exploration, and the attitude accompanying them, which justifies an extraordinary amount of pillaging of public lands and the much-vaunted lifestyles that behavior brings. It has more mega-churches than most entire regions, and damned well needs them. Once staunchly Republican, it's gone purple, now blue, probably due to The Muse's and my influence during our stay.

Anyway, our moving company offered us free boxes, though the actual price insisted that I drive deep into Kansas to collect them. I actively procrastinated, but The Muse hounded me into acceptance. Yesterday morning, once the overnight snowfall had burned off the roads, I undertook this perilous passage. Their warehouse sits way out near-ish the airport, which says something because the airport's located on the far eastern side of nowhere, Kansas, and very few destinations seem very near there in practice. The freeway between here and there has been under constant construction since this city still thought of itself as a cow town, and features an actual cat food factory as perhaps its most prominent sight to see (and smell) along the way. I expected the usual, bumper to bumper semi-trucks with frantic airport traffic cutting each other off, but I lucked out. I'd taken TheSecondCar, still an alien environment for me with its Donkey Kong navigation system and early prototype cruise control, so I could feel truly at home. I found the drive surprisingly enjoyable, traffic modest if not entirely respectful, and I received a warm welcome once I'd found the promised Receiving window. They took my temperature and passed me paper, opening the gate giving me entry to loading dock 16, where James had been directed to take care of me.

It had been years since I'd visited such an industrial complex. It was larger than most Colorado cities, inside, a vast climate-controlled space beneath one huge roof. James seemed enthusiastically pleased to see me and ferried out all the boxes I needed, even heading back inside for another bundle when we discovered that TheSecondCar could take one more. I envied James his place, though his work address sits in freaking Kansas. His enthusiasm infected me, I guess. I drove back to the right side of the tracks with a grin on my face. Not only had I survived the expedition, I'd made what will very likely be my LastTripToKansas, no small accomplishment. Sooner, now, we'll be gone, and the threat of revisiting the wrong side of the tracks will leave right along with us.

©2021 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #HeadingHomeward, #PureSchmaltz