Road Trip 2: Willy

“Rub your hands together furiously, feel the energy, then move your hands apart slowly, the energy fades. That’s what it felt like when we parted in Boston,” he tells me over the phone. 

Leaving poor farmhand C. Willy was so agonizing, remember I told you? that I got drunk and missed my flight out of Boston. When I pulled away from him it felt like the whole Great Wall had disintegrated, bees stopped making honey, and all the stars burned out.

I missed that kook’s boyish energy. He’s one of the mad people Kerouac talks about–the ones that “burn burn burn.” I swear he’s trying to wrestle the whole universe, and it’s costing him shoes and toe nails; soles cannot hold up to his erratic movements and his toe nails are cracked and black. 

So I’m not going to do what I normally do this time of year (trim pot in southern Oregon with hikers), instead I’m meeting up with Willy in the South, and we’re gonna try and find a juke joint, drink some moonshine, two-step, and walk streets with the hustlers, beggars, degenerates, poets, and bleeding hearts.