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Another
Nagasaki Breakup
By
Cap'n Sane
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Nagasaki rides in
the "Cadillac" freight train, as Cap'n Sane takes him on a journey of
rediscovery.
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Well,
I heard through the jungle telegraph that my old buddy Nagasaki was in
trouble--and for him it usually came in threes. This time was no
exception. A
wave of Stalinism had washed over the Journal office and Nags had lost
his job
as editor. The Cottonwood Club—a venerable old Lowbagger house—had lost
its
lease. And he was breaking up with his girlfriend. At the time I was at
loose
ends having recently returned from the ocean and swearing never to work
for the
Green Giant again. So I cashed in some of my cubicle-enviro air miles
and
headed for Missoula. One thing a
Lowbagger knows: you’ve always got a wingman. I reached the Cottonwood
Club in
its last days. God it had changed.
Only
Funschie and Nagasaki were left
from the generations of Lowbaggers that had infested the place. They
had two
other roommates. One was an agoraphobic woman with a lot of cats. The
other was
a Van Halen wannabe with a lot of weapons. All signs pointed to it
get-the-hell-outta-town time. As was traditional with Nagasaki he packed one
expedition-sized backpack as we prepared to bolt. Everything else he
owned—also
his tradition--was abandoned. His packing was interrupted by an angry
call from
his girlfriend. I’ll call you right back, he said. And with that we
shouldered
our loads and headed for the freight trains. Go west, young men.
It
didn’t really matter much where we were going. It only mattered that we were going. Any wingman worth
his flaps knows nothing helps a Lowbagger breakup like a walkabout. We
hopped a
westbound Cadillac (a comfy grain car) and rode through the night.
Thompson
Falls. Sand Point. Opportunity. By morning we reached Pasco.
There’s
this funny thing about Pasco. It’s a squat
brown agricultural town nestled between potato fields and a nuclear
dump. And
no matter how Nagasaki and I are
traveling we always get stuck there. If we’re in a car the radiator
will
explode as soon as we hit the town limits. The trains can strand us for
days.
Thank god we’ve never flown over it together.
The Pasco curse settled in—derailment up
ahead—no trains moving for a while. We dismounted the Cadillac in a
pouring
rain and headed for the bridge and the hobo jungle. A bunch of guys
were
already hunkered under it with suitcases of cheap beer. (All the tramps
know
where they can trade food stamps for beer.) Mud was fucking everywhere,
Nagasaki was dead on
his feet so I pulled two abandoned shopping carts over on their sides
as his
platform bed. He passes out while I proceed to get social. One of the
guys grew
up just north of my island. We both frequented a place called the Quack
Quack
in Boss Bedspring’s hometown. 3000 miles away from there under a bridge.
In
this circle Nagasaki and I would
be called tourists. Tramps have this vicious yet tender paternalism
towards the
tourists. To them we just haven’t it figured out. The rails are one of
those semi-permeable
universes for all but the lifers. Like the enviros, raft bums, mushroom
pickers
and others of the bagging ilk these guys have their own lingo, economic
system
(based mostly on foodstamps), cuisine and customs. Yeah, we were
tourists but
in the mud under a bridge the differences between the lowbagging clans
are
pretty much erased.
This
was the start of an epic summer for me and Nagasaki. We finally
got out of Pasco and rolled
into Seattle, couchsurfing
to recharge our Lowbagger batteries. Nags and I hitched up to the
Olympic
Pennisula, up the Elwha, and did a no-map, five-day traverse of the
Olympic
National Park. Yeah, we got stabbed by devil’s club, thrashed by slide
alder,
went half anemic from the mosquitoes and sometimes the going just
sucked. But
it was okay. Like I said: after a Lowbagger breakup it doesn’t matter
where you
are going, just go.
We
hopped to Portland and hitched
to Eugene and the Country Fair. Our last ride in was from this
split-window VW
van. While the driver was at the cash machine getting some patchouli
tickets I
told Nagasaki to grab the
kitten playing in the van—I wanted to do a hippie shot. I threatened to
use it
someday. We met Homebrew Eddie at the fair. He had a booth where we hid
out
during the security sweeps so we could party late and do justice to his
talents.
The
rest of the summer we hitched or hopped, couchsurfed, hung out, ran
rivers,
plotted the overthrow of corporate civilization, tried unsuccessfully
to seduce
women, and drank a helluva lot of beer. We ended up back in Missoula so I could
fly out--having already decided to get the hell out of
Sodom-on-the-Potomac. I
asked Nagasaki what his
plans were. He kinda looks past me and says I don’t know, Cap, but I
think I’m
gonna keep going.
Cap’n
Sane has
been Nagasaki’s wingman through five
real marriages and numerous
temporary ones.
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