Dear America,

If you ever have the misfortune to run out of gas on a country road at nightfall, pray that you have the good fortune for it to happen in Arkansas. This happened to me last summer, south of Fayetteville in the Ozark Mountains. It was my first time driving the state. With fifty miles of gas left in the tank, I drove past a gas station, figuring I’d catch the next; with twenty miles left, I realized I was wrong. 

I made it off the highway and halfway up a winding, wooded road. If I could make it to the top of the ridge, I might have been able to coast down toward the tiny town at the bottom of the road. I did not. I glided to a stop as the day’s last light fought its way through the trees. I was calm, and planned to call the insurance company for some assistance, once I’d had a moment.

But not a moment later, I heard a car behind me. It was a beige Cadillac. I put my hand out the window to signal that he or she should drive past me, and I wasn’t going to be able to move. The Cadillac pulled up beside me, and a woman exclaimed, “Now are you outta gas, hon? I thought with them Texas plates that you was gettin’ out to fight!” She laughed and went on, “My house isn’t but three miles on, so I’ll get you some gas.” 

I thanked her. Just before driving off, she said, “I’m Glenda. You stay put, hon.”

I leaned back in my seat. The warm summer air drifted in the window. A few minutes later, a truck pulled up behind me, the only other car I’d seen on that road. And that was how I met Jimmy, Glenda’s boyfriend. He told me that Glenda would be back soon with the gas. But when she returned, she asked him where the gas was. She sent Jimmy off, and with my air conditioning out of order, insisted that I wait with her in the Cadillac.

As I sat in her front seat, she complimented my glasses and told me that she had been an optician. I told her that I was thinking of getting rid of my glasses and having laser surgery to correct my vision. “Are you nervous?” she asked me. 

I told her that I wasn’t. “The risk of the surgery seems pretty low to me,” I said.

She grinned and said, “No, I meant sittin’ here with me in my car in the middle of nowhere.”

I grinned back. Again, I told her that I wasn’t. Glenda put on some music. Her iPod had recently stopped working, she said, but her daughter told her about Spotify. “I’m hooked,” she reported.

Glenda played “All Right Now,” which I told her was the rally song at Stanford where I’d gone to school. Glenda hadn’t been to California, or the other coast actually. I told her that in California the gas costs twice as much, and in New Jersey they pump the gas for you. She asked me where I was coming from. Austin, I told her. Glenda said she had been to Austin, and an old crush lived there now. But she never followed him. She lived all her life in this corner of Arkansas. Her kids were grown, and lived in Fayetteville. Glenda beamed with pride as she told me about their careers and families.

When Jimmy returned with the gas, I thanked them both and tried to offer a token of my gratitude, which was swiftly denied. I hugged Glenda and got back on the road, driving in the opposite direction. Even in the darkness, I saw my two saviors and their Cadillac and truck shrink in my rearview mirror. 

In On the Road, Jack Kerouac asked the question: “What is that feeling when you’re driving away from people and they recede on the plain till you see their specks dispersing? It’s the too-huge world vaulting us, and it’s good-bye. But we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies.”

As I drove on to Missouri and my crazy venture beneath the skies, I thought of Glenda and Jimmy. I thought of their full hearts and lives in a little corner of Arkansas. And I thought of my mad love for the country that could produce such extraordinary, ordinary heroes and put them in my path at a providential moment. I still do.

What you’re reading now is the beginning of a project to capture some of that love. It’s called Love Letters to America, or LLTA. I named it that way because I could write a thousand love letters to America, about all the places and people and happenings that make our nation exceptional. And in my humble opinion, an important part of loving America is to go out and see it. You could call Love Letters to America a travel newsletter.

Starting in a few weeks, you can get these letters in the mail, on paper, for free. This first letter is my introduction, about my second time driving through Arkansas, just before Christmas. 

In one important way, December 21st is the worst day of the year to start a road trip. It’s the shortest day of the year, and on a long road, you really start to feel it. Driving north, one actually loses daylight! I started my journey in Austin, and on the shortest route it’s 15 hours to Iowa City. But despite the short days, I took the long roads. Instead of going through Oklahoma and Kansas, as I usually would, I went east to Arkansas. That meant going through Texarkana, the creatively economically named city at the nexus of Texas, Arkansas, and Louisiana. Stateline Avenue bisects the city / cities: Texarkana Texas on the West sidewalk, Texarkana Arkansas on the East. 

A stately post office straddles the border, as if it were a Korean diplomatic building on the demilitarized zone! Stateline Avenue was empty that night. The sound of Christmas music lured me back onto the Texas side. Under the brick facade of the Perot Theater was a small ice skating rink. The street brimmed with people and families. Next door, a brewery looked ready to overflow. 

On the road from Texarkana to Little Rock are the towns of Hope and Arkadelphia. Hope is the more famous — our 42nd President, William Jefferson Clinton was born there. But if you ask me, Arkadelphia is a better name. It turns out that Arkadelphia used to be called Blakelytown, but in 1839 its residents adopted the classical name. In Hope, I had sweet tea (and was reminded that sweet tea is too sweet for me). 

Driving through a place like Hope is a poignant reminder that America — the Republic and the Empire — is a nation that doesn’t need and doesn’t have a Rome or London. In the places between places, things are happening. Bill Clinton became President! And love him or hate him, the story of “The Man from Hope” is one that compels love for America and its promise, and the promise of the places between places. That’s part of the magic I hope to illuminate with Love Letters to America. Each letter in your mailbox (or inbox if you prefer) will have its own focus. 

The next night, north of Jonesboro — a medium city in Northeast Arkansas at the center of US rice production — I had Arkansas deja vu. On a backroad, a rice paddy shone at last light, just like the woods shone before Glenda rescued me many seasons ago in a different corner of the state. This last light came hours earlier than it had the previous summer; the air was cold; my gas tank was full. I crossed into Missouri and found my rest. The next day I was home. This was a short trip, practical in nature, but enchanting all the same.

Love, 

Maxwell