Roads to Quoz: An American Mosey

by William Least Heat-Moon

  We skirted the plantation burial ground, and a dismal place it looked; the cattle trampling over it in every direction, except where Mr. K had had an enclosure put round the graves of two white men who had worked on the estate. They were strangers, and of course utterly indifferent to the people here; but by virtue of their white skins, their resting place was protected from the hoofs of the cattle, while the parents and children, wives, husbands, brothers and sisters of the poor slaves, sleeping beside them, might see the graves of those they loved trampled upon and browsed over, desecrated and defiled, from morning till night. There is something intolerably cruel in this disdainful denial of a common humanity pursuing these wretches even when they are hid beneath the earth.

  Today, the chattel system is gone, Butler’s plantation with it, but the rice-field levees and cemetery, I’ve heard, remain as witness.

  12

  Turn Left at the Fan Belt

  ON OUR LAST MORNING aboard the Trotter, a small pod of bottle-nose dolphins broke the water ahead of her bow to lead us toward the wide and choppy St. Marys River bringing down the tannic waters of the great Okefenokee Swamp thirty-three miles west. Not far south lay Fernandina Beach, Florida; for us not the sandy strand of vacation cabins and condos but the old commercial and industrial section that had partly recast itself to accommodate tourism. As if to welcome the boat, a dozen pelicans perched atop pilings, their prodigious beaks resting on their breasts, their eyes alert to our approach. If you cross a heron with a goose, you get a pelican, a bird ungainly in all it does (notably backward crash dives for fish) until it takes up its low and lovely flights just above the waves, its big wings creating a cushion of air substantial enough to support its bulk.

  The boat tied up at the city dock just down the Amelia River from one of the pulp mills. Under a dismal sky, we went topside, saluted farewell to our doughty little tub, disembarked, stashed our bags, and began walking down Centre Street with its refurbished shop-fronts and a capably restored courthouse. We made our way toward Route A1A — the old snowbird highway — which begins or ends there. The breeze was out of a quarter that brought with it from a kraft-paper factory an effluvium not really nostril-plugging but a bouquet making it seem, under the dark sky, we were walking inside a damp grocery sack.

  A woman had told Q that locals liked breakfast at an eatery in an old filling-station still pumping gas but with its grease pit turned into a café. We followed the alphabetized, tree street names south until we saw a station with parked cars and a sign for gasoline but nothing for food, so I asked a couple of pert gaffers sitting outside the station — as is the Southern custom — if we’d found T-Ray’s Burger Station. “You’re there,” one said, the other adding, “Turn left at the fan belt.”

  In what was formerly a double-bay garage, under a picture of an inexpertly painted hamburger captioned with time-bleached letters — STOP IN AND KETCHUP — we took a rickety table with chairs out of somebody’s 1946 kitchen, and ordered up eggs, french toast, and grits. Next to us sat a young couple, hands linked, praying long over tomato omelets and toast but eating faster than canines, then bolting for the door so she could fire up a cigarette, inhale rapidly, puff her cheeks almost maniacally before exhaling smokelessly. She’d gotten all of it, and, after a few drags, she appeared to settle down as if calmed by the hand of her Lord. If you’ve witnessed modern anesthetics delivered, then you’ve seen her performance. It seemed to me their earlier, celestially directed gratitude “for what we are about to receive” might have been more honestly spoken over the tobacco than over the tomato omelet.

  T-Ray’s father stopped by the table to ask how our food was — it was good and honest and reasonable — and I asked about his forty years of business along A1A. He spoke of old north-coast Florida, the shrimp boats, the menhaden fleet. “We used to have a trolley,” he said, pointing outside to the intersection of A1A and Beech Street. “It ran right past there and on to the beach. That’s why the street’s named that.” (Someday I’m going to encourage Q to write a history of America as it gets reported in cafés and taverns and churches, versions that shape local understandings. A woman the other day had told me Queen Isabella had Christopher Columbus executed for torturing Indians: she got the torture right, but as for his demise, he died wealthy in his own bed.)

  South of Fernandina Beach, the Waterway is another kind of voyage, I hear, a route of so many excavated stretches it’s popularly called “The Ditch,” a place that reveals the nature of contemporary Florida and its daily throng of arrivals; once there, one in twenty new residents will operate a watercraft of some sort. Use of the ICW in the state is heavy enough to warrant a special agency to oversee it with specific regulations. Instead of rivers and sounds and creeks and marshes, there are concrete seawalls backed by even bigger walls of tall buildings blocking the Atlantic. It’s for that place — the last miles called the Gold Coast — most Intracoastal boaters are bound.

  Still, I confess, had I come upon a vessel of any sort going farther south, I’d have signed up for much the same reason I’ll go once into a Bible Factory Outlet store, which happens to be the same reason the bear went over the mountain.

  I won’t argue that the local promoters who’ve dubbed Route A1A the “Paradise Highway” are no longer correct, most areas now more verified than otherwise, but I will say, to each his own heaven — or fresh hell. Sometimes it’s a choice between a congestion of vehicles or flying teeth, city black rats or marsh rice-rats, spartina or sports bars, gunkholes or eighteen-hole golf courses. Youse pays your money and takes your choice.

  My choice, my Happy Isles, was three-thousand leagues of ragged and sometimes submerged coastal plain, a country sometimes called Low, a tidal world of blackwater rivers, muddied creeks, rank flats; a soggy, stormbound border cursed in at least one place to keep whites from ever making a dollar off the land, a widely unverified area of brackish water where terra firma is more the exception than a given, a spongy maze of runnels and gutters that defy roads and concrete foundations; a slender realm of fluvial and marine emergence where the controlling, inceptive sea usually lies beyond, unseen although eternally there as the intricate isles are not. To travel such a forever temporary continental-edge is to enter a few leagues of a kingdom come, a land of quoz rich in native booty.

  Valedictories

  An Infinity of Sundry Forms

  In a day to come, world weary, people will no longer regard Creation as entitled to admiration and reverence. The unexcelled All, which is goodness and the greatest of what has been, what is, and what shall be, will slip into danger of perishing, for then people will consider Creation a burden, and they will no longer revere the Whole of the Mystery — this incomparable work, this glorious construction made from an infinity of sundry forms, each part an instrument of the Cosmos which without bias pours forth favor on each of its works from whence is assembled entireties in harmonious diversity. Within every one of them exists everything worthy of veneration, praise, and love. And in that grimness to come, then darkness will be preferred to light, and people will think it better to vanquish than to seek harmony, and they will turn their eyes away from Creation, and the generous-of-heart will be thought fools, the intolerant rational, the destructive brave, and the self-serving clever. And all that attaches to the indefinable soul of Creation will be scorned and reckoned nonsense.

  —The Asclepius of Hermes Trismegistus

  Third Century A.D.

  (Free translation by WLH-M)

  FROM THE NEW QUOZINARY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

  (WITH ILLUSTRATIVE QUOZTATIONS)

  Quoz (kwoz), n. Anything, anywhere, living or otherwise, connecting a human to existence and bringing an individual into the cosmos and integrating one with the immemorial, thereby making each life belong to creation, and so preventing the divorce of the one from the all which brought it into being.

  • The Ancient Abyssinian Book of Quests: “Seek thee therefore the quoz of thy life that thou mayest find abundance surpas
sing understanding.”

  • The Gospel According to the Cosmic Travailleur: “Unto you is given potential according to the measure of the gift of curiosity through which you shall find strength. Wherefore the Cosmic Travailleur saith, Be ye alert that quoz, like stardust from which it ariseth, come unto you and grace your days.”

  • A Natural History of Invisibilities: “Upon the pintle of a quoz do our lives pivot.”

  • Navigating the Gulfs of Heaven: “A quoz is a snubbing post to hold fast the smallest coracle in the severest gale.”

  • Field Guide to the Third Planet: “Pull the cotter pin of a quoz, and watch plenitude slip away like a lost propeller in deep waters.”

  • The Nodgort Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy: “In a human spiritual anatomy, as in existence itself, quoz are ligatures conjoining the heart to the brain.”

  THE NEW QUOZICON ONE-QUARTER-THOUSAND QUOZO-NEOLOGISMS

  FIRST EDITION

  quozabaly

  quozability

  quozable

  quozage

  quozagonize

  quozaic

  quozal

  quozality

  quozamic

  quozanalia

  quozancholia

  quozancy

  quozarama

  quozarchy

  quozardic

  quozarkable

  quozastic

  quozataneous

  quozathesia

  quozation

  quozbibber

  quozbiquitous

  quozbitionist

  quozbolic

  quozbolism

  quozbotic

  quozbrasive

  quozcentric

  quozception

  quozciple

  quozculiar

  quozcumbent

  quozcurism

  quozdantic

  quozdatic

  quozdelity

  quozdemity

  quozdom

  quozdratic

  quozdulgence

  quozdurate

  quozebration

  quozedly

  quozegory

  quozelous

  quozemia

  quozemic

  quozemplate

  quozendary

  quozendence

  quozendental

  quozenious

  quozennium

  quozentical

  quozentient

  quozenuity

  quozeration

  quozerdotal

  quozery

  quozescent

  quozession

  quozeteer

  quozeum

  quozevation

  quozevision

  quozevotion

  quozfibber

  quozfliction

  quozformation

  quozfuddle

  quozfully

  quozgestic

  quozhound

  quoziastic

  quozibilate

  quozibly

  quozicable

  quozicant

  quozication

  quozicide

  quozicize

  quozicord

  quozicular

  quozicum

  quoziety

  quozificial

  quoziform

  quozify

  quozigence

  quozigentsia

  quozigraph

  quoziland

  quozilation

  quozilential

  quozilient

  quozilious

  quozilize

  quozillance

  quozillion

  quoziloquence

  quozilusion

  quozily

  quozimate

  quozimatic

  quoziment

  quozimony

  quozimythical

  quozinarian

  quozinary

  quozinate

  quozinct

  quozineer

  quozing

  quozinity

  quozinize

  quoziosity

  quoziotic

  quozipatetic

  quozipation

  quoziptal

  quozisect

  quozism

  quozistence

  quozistible

  quozitality

  quozitant

  quozitary

  quozite

  quozitecture

  quozitical

  quozition

  quozitis

  quozitism

  quozitive

  quozitration

  quozitudinous

  quoziture

  quozity

  quozlery

  quozless

  quozlet

  quozlibrium

  quozlicity

  quozlingual

  quozliterate

  quozlitic

  quozlivion

  quozmania

  quozmanship

  quozmantic

  quozmatic

  quozmic

  quozmire

  quozmonious

  quozmute

  quoznalysis

  quoznify

  quozniscient

  quoznoiter

  quoznonymous

  quozocracy

  quozodical

  quozoficient

  quozographic

  quozoholic

  quozoid

  quozolary

  quozolate

  quozologer

  quozologic

  quozologist

  quozology

  quozolonious

  quozolution

  quozomancy

  quozomation

  quozomental

  quozometer

  quozomics

  quozompense

  quozonaire

  quozonasm

  quozonastic

  quozonomy

  quozontal

  quozopedia

  quozophile

  quozophobe

  quozopolis

  quozopoly

  quozordinate

  quozorial

  quozorious

  quozorium

  quozory

  quozosive

  quozosopher

  quozosophy

  quozosphere

  quozotic

  quozotive

  quozotypical

  quozparate

  quozpeccable

  quozpendent

  quozphonic

  quozpiration

  quozplex

  quozplicable

  quozpondent

  quozpostolic

  quozquence

  quozquibbler

  quozquisition

  quozrogate

  quozscape

  quozsensate

  quozship

  quozsome

  quozsplendent

  quoztalgia

  quoztarian

  quoztation

  quozterious

  quozterity

  quozterminate

  quozterpolate

  quozticulous

  quoztificate

  quoztility

  quoztiquity

  quoztiste

  quoztival

  quoztraction

  quoztributor

  quoztronic

  quoztropic

  quoztrusive

  quozuberance

  quozumbent

  quozvangelist

  quozvergence

  quozvermental

  quozversary

  quozversation

  quozversible

  quozvert

  quozvocate

  quozways

  quozymoron

  quozynthesis

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  In addition to those people mentioned in the text, I want to thank Geoff Shandler, Karen Landry, Junie Dahn, Karen Andrews, Michael Pietsch, Terry Adams, Keith Hayes, Denise LaCongo, and Mary Tondorf-Dick at Little, Brown and Company. Also designer Laura Lindgren and indexer Ruth Cross. Across America, I’m indebted to:

  Jess Abney
<
br />   Margaret Abney

  William Abney

  Judy Agrelius

  Ed Ailor

  Susan Ailor

  Kelly Archer

  Stephen Archer

  Steven Archer

  Bill Atkins

  Pam Bagnall

  Brad Belk

  Sarah Bishop

  Carolyn and Darwin Britt

  Julie K. Brown

  Larry Brown

  Matthew J. Brown

  Philip A. Brown

  Sandra Brown

  T. Rob Brown

  Roger Brunelle

  Marjorie Bull

  Bill Caldwell

  Norman Caron

  Paul Cary

  Schery Case

  Andy Collins

  June DeWeese

  Joel Dicentes

  Stephen Easton

  Stephen Edington

  Norma Elliott

  Maggie Engen

  Shellie Bell Finfrock

  Marlene Fry

  Tim Gallagher

  Andy Gardner

  Tim Gay

  Steve Green

  Ron Hall

  Deborah Harmon

  Sheridan Harvey

  Hilary Holladay

  William Iseminger

  Trebbe Johnson

  T. R. Kidder

  Pat Lesser

  Barbara Luczkowski

  Maurice Manring

  Mike Mansur

  Bruce McMillan

  Scott Meeker

  John Meffert

  Galen Moyer

  Patrick Muckleroy

  Stanley Nelson

  Bob Poepsel

  Philip Rivet

  Greg Robinson

  Jim Ross

  David Schenker

  Ernie Seckinger

  Bill Shansey

  Joel Silver

  Leslie Simpson

  Jennifer Smith

  Dora St. Martin

  Mike Stair

  Saundra Taylor

  William A. Thomas

  James Wallace

  Doris Wardlow

  Kip Welborn

  Steve Weldon

  Karen Witt

  George Wylder