Gator Tails and Buried Caddies. When in Texas...

The rest of my stay on the Mississippi farm went by in a flash. After staying in Montana so long, I decided two weeks was a good amount of time to spend on a farm. Plus, I want to be back in Oregon to spend Thanksgiving with the fam, and that put this part of my journey on a deadline.

Farmer Jon treated me very well during my stay. I finished weeding the gardens, then went to work helping him mount posts for a new goat pen (after these last few farms, I swear my post-digging skills are now wicked sweet). He made sure I didn't work too long and always fed me well. Sadly, we mostly ate processed packaged and frozen food from the local grocery outlet store, but I was in no condition to be picky. I saw the food as just one of Jon's hick traits. The others would be spitting every minute on the minute, naming ducks Poop and Crap and drinking whiskey for breakfast (sorry if I sound like I'm dissing him, but I felt I had to convey the whole experience).

One afternoon, Jon's mother gave me a personal tour through William Faulkner's former home in nearby Oxford. I later found out she was friends with his daughter, Jill, who passed away a few years ago. Jon's mother has a lifetime of experience acting and performing in different formats and was still an active member of a local storytelling guild. I made sure to stay in the area long enough to catch a performance in which the guild told ghost stories around a pumpkin patch at a church (William Faulkner's former church, at that). Some of the stories took place during the Civil War and glorified Southern families, which made me realize I was not likely to hear them anywhere else. It was a great way to spend my last day in Mississippi, and I got back to my yurt just in time to watch a spectacular thunderstorm. The lightning was right above us, and it lit up the whole yurt every time it flashed.

Faulkner's house, study and whiskey of choice.

Another perk of my last day was that I saw a wild armadillo for the first time. Jon told me they were common here. We frequently heard them rummaging through the tall grass around the farm, and one supposedly lived under my yurt, but they managed to evade me until that day. Unfortunately, it was gone by the time i retrieved my camera.

So, along came Monday morning and I hit the road. My next goal was to once again visit my sister and her family in Santa Fe and spend Halloween there. I debated the route for days, torn between taking a long, scenic drive through Louisiana and the far southern end of Texas, or zip across Arkansas and take a faster northern route that I've already seen. In the end, I decided there was no reason to spend any more time in Texas than necessary. It is, after all, Texas.

A few hours later I found myself in Texarkana eating fried alligator tail for lunch. I hate to say it, but it tasted just like chicken.

Fried gator tail. Don't knock it till you've tried it.... or just order chicken tenders because they taste identical.

The rest of that drive was a blur. I spent the night in my car at a rest stop near Wichita Falls, then sped the rest of the way to Santa Fe, only stopping once in Amarillo for a few pictures of Cadillac Ranch. I had seen the half-buried Cadillacs a few years ago when I first drove through this part of the country, but I like the attraction so it was worth the stop.

Cadillac Ranch, an art project created as a statement about the paradoxical simultaneous American fascinations with both a sense of place and roadside attractions—such as the ranch itself—and the mobility and freedom of the automobile... or so says Wikipedia.

So here I am, back in Santa Fe, which has become something of a home base for me. It's only now dawning on me that my WWOOF adventures in the United States are done—for now, anyway. My original intent was to WWOOF in the continental US until winter, then chase summer by traveling to Hawaii and hopefully New Zealand. I always knew money was a big factor in that plan, and my savings are certainly not what they were when I began. Although I still want to travel, I'm beginning to feel it would be prudent to earn some income first, and that means staying still long enough to find a job. For now, I plan to enjoy a week in Santa Fe, then a week with some old friends in California's Bay Area, then Thanksgiving in Oregon. That's when I'll have to make some big decisions.

Stay tuned for this season's exciting conclusion...