Le Road: Saskatchewan

I used to drive a lot out here. Now we have what you call a crew: S & S. They both have big beards and sunglasses. Road Warriors. I sit in the back, nod off here and there, doglike. Read, ruminate, maybe make a little road diary.

So we’re on the highway eastbound towards Saskatoon. This is as exotic a landscape as any I’ve seen, precisely because there’s nothing, unless you count the white bottom, the blue above and the power lines. Emptiness. Maybe it’s the crack they put in Tim Hortons, but it’s somehow making sense right now why desert people have been so prolific in their religious output. All this sky, all these blanks to fill. It’s also clear why everybody drives a giant pickup. It’s a spatial relativity issue: furniture that matches the wallpaper. Though I don’t know when they find in all this nothing to put around in the back. Presumably they have some tools to lug around when this endless expanse of ground thaws and the wheat sprouts up.

Before any thaw, it will have to be not -37 celsius, which is the current temperature. I’m not positive if that’s with the windchill or just the mercury straight up, nor what difference it makes at this point in the game. Again with the exotic: S1 is scraping thick flakes of iced condensation off the inside of his window. And S2 has been cruising up the oncoming traffic lane for long, easy minutes passing 18-wheelers, since he can see the road all the way until it thins into a grey pinpoint on the horizon. We’re playing at a place called Amigo’s tonight. They serve Mexcian food. Caliente.