January. Midsummer in Canberra. Hot, dry. T-shirt, short pants and sandals. Relief comes in the long daylight saving evenings when the sun slides down behind the Brindabellas and the shadows of the gum trees lengthen out across the valley.

My wife’s sister arrived at the door with a bottle of champagne. I looked at it and at her. Blank.

“Ah, happy birthday?”

“Don’t be silly. It’s for Kerri.”

Oh yes. My wife. She was off to America in a couple of days. Some government conference. Every three months she was abroad. Stockholm, Berlin, Paris…

I fetched flutes, poured the chilled wine, and we sat outside on the deck, talking in the warm mellowing evening.

“I’d love to be going with her,” I said. Washington DC. Kerri had two conferences to attend, and would be spending a week there, all expenses paid, courtesy of the Australian taxpayer and the UN. I thought about Washington – the Smithsonians, the galleries, the grand buildings, the White House. Arlington and JFK. The heart of America.

But I’d never travelled far. We’d gone to New Zealand on our honeymoon twenty years earlier, and then again for a second holiday, two teenagers in the back seat. That was it. I’d travel further one day. One day…

“Well, why don’t you?”

I thought about this. We were doing okay financially, I’d be able to share the hotel room, the internet bookselling business could go hang for a week, the kids were old enough to look after themselves. But international travel! That was a big step.

I excused myself, went inside, a little bubbly as I checked the computer. Canberra to Washington and back was expensive, but not out of the question. Only trouble was that it was too late to book online.

So next morning I was there at Flight Centre, telling a travel agent, “I’d like to fly to Washington. Tomorrow.”

And it was so. That “one day” was on me.

The song

America! The nation dominated the news and the world of my childhood. Still does. The British Empire had crumbled, the Communists didn’t have the media coverage, the Europeans spoke a bunch of incomprehensible, but the Americans were pumping out cool stuff faster and cooler as they launched satellites and boosted communications and finally invented the internet and my life will never be the same.

Americans had the best music, the brightest films, the fastest cars, the sharpest planes…

And the space program. During the Sixties the Soviets lost their early lead as America pushed up rocket after rocket until that memorable black and white day they landed on the moon. The Russians couldn’t compete after that.

As it turned out, neither could the Americans, and space exploration fizzled off into seeing how bored astronauts could get as they went umpty-zillion times around the world in cobbled-together space stations.

Still, it was America that seized my growing imagination, and when in Sunnybank State High School we studied Simon and Garfunkel, I was struck by the poignancy and accuracy of this song.

…I don’t know a soul who’s not been battered
I don’t have a friend who feels at ease
I don’t know a dream that’s not been shattered
or driven to its knees
But it’s all right, it’s all right
For we’ve lived so well so long
Still, when I think of the road
we’re traveling on
I wonder what went wrong
I can’t help it, I wonder what went wrong

And I dreamed I was dying
And I dreamed that my soul rose unexpectedly
And looking back down at me
Smiled reassuringly
And I dreamed I was flying
And high up above my eyes could clearly see
The Statue of Liberty
Sailing away to sea

For we come on the ship they call the Mayflower
We come on the ship that sailed the moon
We come in the age’s most uncertain hours
and sing an American tune…

Isn’t that America all over? Written just shy of the bicentennial of the Declaration of Independence, post Vietnam, Paul Simon – Rhymin’ Simon – had summed up his nation in a few lines. Two hundred years old, creaky at the joints, forgetting stuff, making odd decisions, but still pumping out the hits. A nation founded on some solid notions. Liberty, the pursuit of happiness, equality. It might not always have turned out as it should, but America had a heart of gold, and you could be sure that Uncle Sam would get there in the end.

The place

I’ve been in some magical places in my time. A New Zealand cave with a galaxy of glow-worms lighting our upturned faces drifting in a boat down an underground river. Kissing my wife on top of the Eiffel Tower. Seeing sperm whales off Kaikoura. Standing before Sagrada Familia in awe. The laser light show over Hong Kong Harbour.

Cold in the capital

But there I was, one wondrous week in Washington DC, the fresh snow deep and white down the Mall. I all but had the city to myself, just a few hardy tourists and the odd yellow schoolbus full of interstate kids braving the snow.

Quite frankly, I’d never been so cold in my life. I walked across from Arlington, and the Potomac was frozen over. I’d never seen a frozen river. I’d never seen much in the way of snow, neither. But here were great drifts of it, with homeless people shivering in corners.

Coming from midsummer Australia to frozen America in January, it was a shock in so many ways. But I pulled on my gloves, bought a beanie from a souvenir stand selling off leftovers from the second Bush inauguration, and high-stepped through the snow, enjoying the atmosphere, enjoying the grand buildings, enjoying the emptiness.

I could see that the National Archives were set up for thousands of visitors. But there was just me and a dozen others in the Rotunda for the Charters of Freedom. I could gaze on the Declaration of Liberty and the US Constitution for as long as I wished.

And I did. In many ways, the United States of America is Australia’s big brother. Americans fought the battles of a firstborn, hardwon freedoms that younger siblings gained with ease. Australia’s independence came with ink, not blood. It is only proper to pay some measure of homage to those who went first.

And what a prize they won! The world’s first great modern democracy. The model for the modern age. The shining example, exemplified by the Statue of Liberty holding the torch of freedom high.

Inspiring stuff, and I glowed as I walked out into the snow again. Lofty thoughts were in my head, and it seemed only right that I turn towards the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, where dreams were high as the sky itself.

Another place where the lines stretched around the block in summer. Another place that was just me and a few tourists. I touched a piece of the sky on the way in. A slice of moon rock. For a moment I was magic.

Such amazing aircraft. Here were the highlights of a century of flight, hanging from the ceiling, resting on simulated runways, just a thin wire separating me from the Wright Brothers canvas and string Flyer of 1903.

The Spirit of Saint Louis is there, one of the first planes to fly the Atlantic. One man, one engine, New York to Paris non-stop. The feat fired imaginations around the world.

Its streamlined shape is echoed and refined by that of the Bell X-1 Glamorous Glennis, which the legendary Chuck Yeager piloted to become the first human to exceed the speed of sound. Built like a bullet, this rocket powered craft broke the sound barrier in 1947 and hangs in a corner of the main hall, its needle nose spearing the air.

There are planes and rockets and spacecraft galore. A Boeing 747. John Glenn’s Mercury capsule. A simulated USN aircraft carrier holding naval aircraft on a portion of flight deck. Craft from all eras, from the biplanes of WW1 to the world’s first private spaceship.

A place for kids of all ages. The awe on the face of a five-year old is matched by the sparkle in his grandfather’s eye.

For me, the most magical place of all was there in a corner of the great hall, standing before the very ship that sailed the moon. This was science fiction made true in metal and perspex. This was mankind’s greatest feat. This was a marvel of technology. This wasn’t two guys in a garage, this was a mighty national effort – a triumph of organisation, teamwork, science and sweat.

I never tire of the story of Apollo. It might have seemed routine in the terse phrases of the mission controllers, the endless acronyms of LEM and CSM and MOCR, the flag-waving and the speeches. But it was new and dangerous in the Sixties. The three men who had lived in this tiny gumdrop of a craft for ten days had truly gone where no man had gone before. In space, in time, in history.

They and their comrades were the heroes of my youth. And they still are.

The meal

I ate lunch in the Smithsonian Air and Space. In many ways, it was as quintessentially American as a plate of ribs. Or hog jowls and cornpone. It was fitting.

America on a plate - without the plate

It wasn’t a meal to write home about, unless it was to say in wonder, “Hey, they have McDonalds here in America too!”

It wasn’t a unique experience. Small details of packaging aside, it was exactly the same meal I could have had in the Canberra Centre. Or Kowloon. Or on the Boulevard St Michel. Or off Trafalgar Square.

But it was perfect for the setting. Remember how I mentioned that the grand museums were set up for thousands of visitors? They were, with chains and poles set up to guide lines of tourists zig zag from the street to the entrance, from the door to the counter, past the notable exhibits in an orderly fashion. In the land of the free, this was the home of the queue.

In the basements, in the cafeterias, fast food chains took care of the crowds. Subway, Pizza Hut, Kentucky Fried and McDonalds. Thousands could be fed fast, rather than fed up slowly.

I felt odd indeed, walking straight up to the counter, getting my Big Mac meal in a matter of seconds, and then taking my pick from the hundreds of tables in the vast refectory area. I chose one by the window, where the new Museum of the American Indian challenged the classic columns and porticos lining the Mall.

Perhaps it is fitting that I cannot remember any details of the food. Just the setting. But my readers have had the same meal. The same exact taste and texture. I don’t need to describe the crisp salt taste of the chips, the thrill of the cola going down as the ice cubes clinkle, the tart pickle and sauce on the grilled patties, and the sesame seeds of the buns finding the crevices in our teeth. We know it all too well.

It is not good food. It is fat and carbohydrates, sugar and salt. But it is precisely what I needed on this freezing day before I ventured back outside. A calorie hit of junk food.

And, for the millions of visitors to the various Smithsonians, it is homely food. Familiar in price and taste. There’s no flight into the unknown, no agonising over a decision between (say) the Apollo Sandwich and the Lindbergh Lunch. Instant decision, instant service, instant satisfaction, next please!

The key

Champagne and a Big Mac. I’ve kept the label from the bottle, page one of the scrapbook I made for the trip. It was a HUGE step for me to go to Washington, but once I’d made it, I never stopped. Every year since then I’ve been around the world once or twice.

Sometimes I smile at the young man in his late forties who looked with awe down at the frozen river, the crisp snow, the flame burning over a fallen president. So many stars in his eyes! Every airport was new and exciting. LAX was an adventure where people walked on the wrong side and black men in uniform called you “Sir” as they patted you down for a random security check.

My life has changed beyond imagining. That trip with my wife to Washington DC set me travelling. Usually alone, sometimes with a merry companion or two. On average, I take a flight every ten days, often long-haul. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve flown in and out of Kingsford-Smith. Or Heathrow. Or DFW.

But I can’t lose the excitement of a new city, a new place, a new set of memories. A new meal. I’ve barely tasted America in my five years of travel. I shall return.

Resources

• Blog post about the song, looking back.
• The Big Mac on Wikipedia
• The Big Mac Index in The Economist
• The Smithsonian Air and Space Museum
• Apollo 11 mission in photographs

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Related posts:

1. Looking for America

The first edition of Little House on the Prairie

The Little House on the Prairie books are well-beloved in America. And the world. Tales of family life and struggles on the frontier. Hazards of life and community that rarely touch the real lives of we children of later years, but were very real to the pioneers.

They were hardy folk, not because they wanted it that way, but because they had to be. They tamed the land, they built the towns, they made a nation.

In Australia it was much the same. Not so heavy on the snowstorms, but our pioneers had to cope with drought and bushfires. And locust swarms, eating all and breaking hearts. Two very different lands, but here the essential realities of family survival in a harsh but ultimately rewarding wilderness were the same. The land tested the occupants, and the hardy overcame the challenges, found love and began their own families in a slightly less forbidding environment. Ultimately, it is not the land that is the story, it is the people.

There were nine Little House books in the series:

1. Little House in the Big Woods: Laura’s early childhood in Wisconsin from about 1870.
2. Farmer Boy: The early life of Laura’s later husband, Almanzo Wilder, in New York State.
3. Little House on the Prairie: Laura’s childhood home in Kansas.
4. On the Banks of Plum Creek: The Ingalls family in Minnesota, about 1875.
5. By the Shores of Silver Lake: De Smet, South Dakota in 1879
6. The Long Winter: The severe winter of 1880/81 in South Dakota
7. Little Town on the Prairie: Laura’s adolescence in De Smet, 1881/82
8. These Happy Golden Years: Laura’s teens and courting with Almanzo.
9. The First Four Years: The first years of married life.

These books were written and published in Mansfield, Missouri between 1932 and 1943, and during this period Laura became famous as a beloved author.

A later generation rediscovered the stories when they were made into a television series later, which brought a new boost of life to the books. Safe to say that Laura Ingalls Wilder is a name beloved by people around the world. In America, she occupies a pedestal with Louisa May Alcott, Lucy Maud Montgomery and others.

The place

Skyring in Missouri

Driving a Dodge between Kansas City and Oklahoma City, a small part of the way on Route 66, we booklovers were drawn to the home of Laura Ingalls Wilder. I and a precocious lad of three in the third seat row were the only males in the vehicle, with three generations of women my passengers. I merely operated the steering and foot paddles – all of the direction came from beside and behind me. Not to mention the occasionally snarky voice of the GPS if I made a wrong turn.

Look, Wanda the GPS voice, it’s not as easy as you might think, driving an unfamiliar vehicle on the wrong side of the road. Every intersection, I had to think, “Left is loose, Right is tight.” And every now and then I’d get it wrong, usually when I was feeling confident and satisfied. Luckily my passengers were awake, and the shrieks of dismay and outrage would remind me that I wasn’t in Oz any more.

There was a little fiddly bit of country road before we got there. Themed motels popped up on hillsides. We rounded a bend, and there it was, historic house and farm on one side of the road, car park – and a thoughtful and very welcome amenities block – on the other.

We got out, stretched our legs, used the facilities – it had been a long drive from Kansas City – and posed for photographs beside the sign. I had lugged my taxidriver uniform to the far side of the road, and here I was driving a van load of lovely ladies, opening doors and tucking them into their seatbelts, doing my taxidriver thing, and I wasn’t going to let the occasion pass unrecorded.

This is Rocky Ridge Farm where Laura wrote her books, though it isn’t the subject of any of them. It’s now a shrine to her, her family, and her books. And to America.

If I edit this in visual, I’ll lose the map, but the link remains:

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The house

Rocky Ridge Farm

Having the carpark on the other side of the road leaves the farm looking much as it must have during the years that Laura and Almanzo worked the land, at least up until about 1960, by which time they had both departed. We walked up the drive, past old trees planted a century gone, Halloween decorations here and there. Left was the store, ahead the museum and reception, right the old farmhouse, looking as genuine an American residence as ever I’ve seen.

A little house in its own right, it has grown steadily larger. Originally little more than a kitchen and bedroom, it expanded with the increasing prosperity of the Wilder family, growing rooms and windows and levels.

The entry fee was modest, well worth admission to the museum, a treasure trove of Laura Ingalls Wilder and her books. Here was Pa’s fiddle, from the pages of the earliest book and the earliest years of Laura’s infancy. Still brought out and played every year.

A covered wagon, chairs, desks, craft, photographs, the family bible, a shelf of translated editions of the books. Honestly, I could have staid a week and not admired every item. The real Laura Ingalls Wilder fans must live in rapture here.

The house is accessible from the museum. Small groups under the direction of a guide tour regularly. We entered the oldest part of the house, shoulder to shoulder in the tiny rooms, looking at the original furnishings, listening to the guide talk of the history and people of the cosy home.

The rooms grew bigger with the decades, reflecting the success of the farm and the books. We looked at the places where Laura worked, setting her memories down on paper. Here, in the heart of America, she poured hers out, telling of dangers, romance, nostalgia and childhood dreams.

We finished our tour in a large room with a pleasant outlook. The culmination of a life of effort, Laura would have been at home here, answering her fan mail, writing further books, enjoying retirement.

We left the house for the visitor centre, sitting in on an audio visual narrative of Laura’s life, and then browsing through the shop, with sets of books, biographies, photographs, postcards, craft items and clothing.

The other house

Once the royalties began flowing in, Laura’s daughter Rose bought a house from the Sears catalogue and erected it for her parents over the other side of the hill. It’s within walking distance, but in a car it takes a few minutes to circle around, park and walk up the hill.

Here another guide led us through the house, which must have seemed ultra modern when it was built. Many of the features, such as built-in wardrobes, we take for granted now, but were the amazement of the country when new. Laura and Almanzo lived here for a while, but eventually returned to their homely house with its happy memories.

The key

Rocky Ridge scarecrows

Cornmeal Mush, Bean Porridge (along with the famous rhyme) and Corn Dodgers. Potato Cakes, Creamed Carrots, Fried Parsnips and Succotash, Ma’s Green Tomato Pickles.

And a hundred more, each with a story or snippet of historical information and link to the books. This is a cookbook with depth and flavour, stick-to-your-ribs food to survive a long winter or spend a day on the farm, stick-to-your-brain facts of days long gone.

These are the foods that Laura ate and wrote about through her life. For modern America, long used to bland, processed food, this book is a refreshing taste, a flavour and savour of the real roots of the land.

–Skyring

Resources

• Wikipedia article on Laura Ingalls Wilder
• Amazon Laura Ingalls Wilder store
• Laura Ingalls Wilder historic home
• Little House recipes

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