Roads and arteries branching out in every direction. What would the earth be without roads? A trackless ocean. A jungle. The first road through the wilderness must have seemed like a grand accomplishment. Direction, orientation, communication. Then two roads, three roads… Then millions of roads. A spider web and in the center of it man, the creator, caught like a fly.
We are travelling seventy miles an hour, or perhaps I imagine it. Not a word exchanged between us. He may be afraid to hear me say that I am hungry or that I have no place to sleep. He may be thinking where to dump me out if I begin to act suspiciously. Now and then he lights a cigarette on the electric grill. The gadget fascinates me. It’s like a little electric chair.
«I’m turning off here,» says the driver suddenly. «Where are you going?»
«You can leave me out here… thanks.»
I step out into a fine drizzle. It’s darkling. Roads leading to everywhere. I must decide where I want to go. I must have an objective.
I stand so deep in trance that I let a hundred cars go by without looking up. I haven’t even an extra handkerchief, I discover. I was going to wipe my glasses but then, what’s the use? I don’t have to see too well or feel too well or think too well. I’m not going anywhere. When I get tired I can drop down and go to sleep. Animals sleep in the rain, why not man? If I could become an animal I would be getting somewhere.
A truck pulls up beside me; the driver is looking for a match.
«Can I give you a lift?» he asks.
I hop in without asking where to. The rain conies down harder, it has become pitch black suddenly. I have no idea where we’re bound and I don’t want to know. I feel content to be out of the rain sitting next to a warm body.
This guy is more convivial. He talks a lot about matches, how important they are when you need them, how easy it is to lose them, and so on. He makes conversation out of anything. It seems strange to talk so earnestly about nothing at all when really there are the most tremendous problems to be solved. Except for the fact that we are talking about material trifles this is the sort of conversation that might be carried on in a French salon. The roads have connected everything up so marvelously that even emptiness can be transported with ease.
As we pull into the outskirts of a big town I ask him where we are.
«Why this is Philly,» he says. «Where did you think you were?»
«I don’t know,» I said, «I had no idea… You’re going to New York, I suppose?»
He grunted. Then he added: «You don’t seem to care very much one way or another. You act like you were just riding around in the dark.»
«You said it. That’s just what I’m doing… riding around in the dark.»
I sank back and listened to him tell about guys walking around in the dark looking for a place to flop. He talked about them very much as a horticulturist would talk about certain species of shrubs. He was a «space-binder», as Korbyski puts it, a guy riding the highways and byways all by his lonesome. What lay to either side of the traffic lanes was the veldt, and the creatures inhabiting that void were vagrants hungrily bumming a ride.
The more he talked the more wistfully I thought of the meaning of shelter. After all, the cellar hadn’t been too bad. Out in the world people were just as poorly off. The only difference between them and me was that they went out and got what they needed; they sweated for it, they tricked one another, they fought one another tooth and nail. I had none of those problems. My only problem was how to live with myself day in and day out.
I was thinking how ridiculous and pathetic it would be to sneak back into the cellar and find a little corner all to myself where I could curl up and pull the roof down over my ears. I would crawl in like a dog with his tail between his legs. I wouldn’t bother them any more with jealous scenes. I would be grateful for any crumbs that were handed me. If she wanted to bring her lovers in and make love to them in my presence it would be all right too. One doesn’t bite the hand that feeds one. Now that I had seen the world I wouldn’t ever complain again. Anything was better than to be left standing in the rain and not know where you want to go. After all, I still had a mind. I could lie in the dark and think, think as much as I chose, or as little. The people outside would be running to and fro, moving things about, buying, selling, putting money in the bank and taking it out again. That was horrible. I wouldn’t ever want to do that. I would much prefer to pretend that I was an animal, say a dog, and have a bone thrown to me now and then. If I behaved decently I would be petted and stroked. I might find a good master who would take me out on a leash and let me make pipi everywhere. I might meet another dog. one of the opposite sex, and pull off a quick one now and then. Oh, I knew how to be quiet now and obedient. I had learned my little lesson. I would curl up in a corner near the hearth, just as quiet and gentle as you please. They would have to be terribly mean to kick me out. Besides, if I showed that I didn’t need anything, didn’t ask any favors, if I let them carry on just as if they were by themselves, what harm could come by giving me a little place in the corner?
The thing was to sneak in while they were out, so that they couldn’t shut the gate in my face.
At this point in my reverie the most disquieting thought took hold of me. What if they had fled? What if the house were deserted?
Somewhere near Elizabeth we came to a halt. There was something wrong with the engine. It seemed wiser to get out and hail another car than to wait around all night. I walked to the nearest gas station and hung around for a car to take me into New York. I waited over an hour and then got impatient and lit off down the gloomy lane on my own two legs. The rain had abated; it was just a thin drizzle. Now and then, thinking how lovely it would be to crawl into the dog kennel, I broke into a trot. Elizabeth was about fifteen miles off.
Once I got so overjoyed that I broke into song. Louder and louder I sang, as if to let them know I was coming. Of course I wouldn’t enter the house singing—that would frighten them to death.
The singing made me hungry. I bought a Hershey Almond Bar at a little stand beside the road. It was delicious. See, you’re not so badly off, I said to myself. You’re not eating bones or refuse yet. You may get some good dishes before you die. What are you thinking of—lamb stew? You mustn’t think about palatable things… think only of bones and refuse. From now on it’s a dog’s life.
I was sitting on a big rock somewhere this side of Elizabeth when I saw a big truck approaching. It was the fellow I had left farther back. I hopped in. He started talking about engines, what ails them, what makes them go, and so on. «We’ll soon be there,» lie said suddenly, apropos of nothing.
«Where?» I asked.
«New York, of course… where do you think?»
«Oh, New York, yeah. I forgot.»
«Say, what the hell are you going to do in New York, if I ain’t getting too personal?»
«I’m going to rejoin my family.»
«You been away long?»
«About ten years,» I said, drawing the words out meditatively.
«Ten years! That’s a hell of a long time. What were you doing, just bumming around?»
«Yeah, just bumming around.»
«I guess they’ll be glad to see you… your folks.»
«I guess they will.»
«You don’t seem to be so sure of it,» he said, giving me a quizzical look.
«That’s true. Well, you know how it is.»
«I guess so,» he answered. «I meet lots of guys like you. Always come back to the roost some time or other.»
He said roost, I said kennel—under my breath, to be sure. I liked kennel better. Roost was for roosters, pigeons, birds of feather that lay eggs. I wasn’t going to lay no eggs. Bones and refuse, bones and refuse, bones and refuse. I repeated it over and over, to give myself the moral strength to crawl back like a beaten dog.
I borrowed a nickel from him on leaving and ducked into the subway. I felt tired, hungry, weather-beaten. The passengers looked sick to me. As though some one had just let them out of the hoose-gow or the alms house. I had been out in the world, far, far away. For ten years I had been knocking about and
