‘Oaken and ancient, swollen with old rainwater and mold, scarred by time and graffiti, the most distinct of which is the word ‘LOVE’ carved so deep that the wood is bound to crack along those letters, ‘The Revelation Post’ swings freely in the outskirts of Minneapolis: a dangerous muse. Previously a fence, ‘The Revelation Post’ was swallowed and raised by a tree that roiled up and began to consume the power cords above it, prompting the county to kill the thing and move the lines three feet back. The tangled fence and tree and cord were left to hang from the abandoned post, their removal falling between the jurisdictions of a number of disinterred departments. It brained a woman the following week, whipped up in a storm wind, and cured her of nagging writer’s block which meant, of course, that she spread the word.

The local government’s attempts to destroy or even just secure ‘The Revelation Post’ have been met with opposition, both from citizenry and from ‘The Post’ itself which seems to have a defensive knack for granting debilitating revelations when in danger, sending interlopers home to really think about their choices and to make amends as best they can.’

Hector and I arrive at ‘The Revelation Post’ on a windy day. A man lies unconscious nearby, bleeding from a fresh head wound. He comes to when I shake him and stands, refuses help, and walks away deep in thought. ‘The Post’ swings erratically, gentle and vicious in turns. I look back at the man, now a dot on the horizon. Still standing, at least. But wobbling.

I put Hector in the kennel and pin a note to my jacket with some relevant medical details. Namely: don’t call an ambulance. I don’t have insurance and I certainly don’t have money. I’ve written instructions for feeding Hector on the back.

The onion pages indicate that there is a perfect spot for being granted revelations here. That someone has marked it with an ‘X’ based on a revelation of their own. I crawl about and pull dirt up until I find it: a wooden ‘X’ buried and spray painted with the message ‘For Inspiration.’

‘The Revelation Post’ whistles above my head.

It’s only when I have everything in order that I come to terms with the fact that I won’t be able to bring myself to stand on the ‘X.’ I’ve never been into self-harm, even when it’s good for me. I feed Hector a carrot through the bars of the kennel and move to re-bury the ‘X’ and I squat just a little too high. I feel the blow on the back of my head and the world blinks.

When I regain my senses, I have the distinct feeling that I should give this up before it kills me.

But that’s something I’ve known for a while.

-traveler

‘The ‘Perm-a-Potty Field’ in southern Alabama is an unmissable attraction, not because it is pleasant in any sense of the word, but because it is huge and neon and it smells as though a shit-laden truck crashed into a lake of formaldehyde. Society assures us that chemical toilets break waste down but we all know it’s still there, that it’s not something else, and there’s no greater evidence than the ‘Perm-a-Potty Field’ which may as well hold an ocean of excrement in its thin chemical disguise.

Satellite images indicate that the field is 159 potties long and 98 potties wide, evenly spaced and growing all the time. The man that owns the field is a mystery. He answers no calls. Speaks only to the companies that will sell or rent him more potties for the field. He pays off politicians who might raise a stink, as it were, and he lives far away. Somewhere cleaner and fresher and duller.

The ‘Perm-a-Potty Field’ is open to the public but it is not welcoming. No signs indicate that a traveler should use these toilets- they would be lying if they did. The outer potties are filthy beyond saving. The inners are hit and miss but reaching them means spending longer in that stinking invisible cloud. In those staticky plastic corridors.

People have died in the ‘Perm-a-Potty Field.’ That’s not true, but eventually it will be. It would be a shame to be the first, wouldn’t it?’

-an excerpt, Autumn by the Wayside

‘One frequently neglected aspect of the North American Continental Divide is that it’s nearly 10’ across in some places, meaning that there exists a strip of land that drains neither toward the Pacific nor toward the Atlantic Coast. Along this strip on a windless day, a traveler might collect a bottle of ‘Scaredy Water,’ named for its unwillingness to choose a side. ‘Scaredy Water Ponds’ are ephemeral even within their seasons, but the safest bet is New Mexico’s ‘Shiver Pool,’ named for the trembling motion of the windswept water and its deep cold.’

Scaredy water is supposed to be good for making decisions. That’s what the internet witches say. Drink it. Shower in it. Spill it on the ground and scry for omens. They don’t agree on how to use it. Just the purpose.

Autumn is actually the worst time to visit ‘Shiver Pool.’ There’s supposed to be a spring feeding it from somewhere underground but it’s supplemented by rain and snow to such an extent that by the time fall comes around, it’s more like a ‘Shiver Marsh.’ Still, the water collected there shows the tell-tale signs of ‘scardiness.’ It moves like loose jello and it shrinks from touch and it does both so slightly that it makes me doubt it’s doing either.

I fill a bottle with my hands safely tucked into rubber gloves from the first aid kit. I don’t want the stuff on me or in me but it’s bound to be something I can bargain with down the road. Once it’s sealed up and patted dry, I reconnoiter the area and, finding myself alone, pull the handgun from my bag.

It’s in pieces now, black and silver. It took me hours to get it apart, both because I was referencing videos on an amateurishly encrypted connection and because I was afraid it would go off at any moment, even after I had pulled out the bullets and the firing pin and a few other integral things. I’ve read that guns are heavier than they look but I don’t think that’s the case. Considering what they can do put together, the gathered pieces seem incredibly light.

With a new set of gloves, I plop the handgun into the ‘Shiver Pool’ and set up camp for the evening. I’ll let them soak there overnight and after they’ve dried a couple days and I after I’ve watched a few more videos about cleaning the pieces and putting them back together, I’ll have an untraceable gun and five untraceable bullets. If there comes a time to use it, I hope that the scaredy water treatment will work to grant me the resolve to pull the trigger or else that it will grant me the hesitation I need to overcome an obstacle more peaceably.

One or the other.

-traveler

‘Out in the cold-scraped plains of North Dakota and not at all far from the ‘Nekoma Pyramid,’ a silver obelisk pierces the sky and lights up red when ferromagnetic materials are brought near. That is ‘The Dakota Obelisk’s’ sole purpose as far as anyone knows, to gauge whether something is, in its own words, ‘magnetic.’ ‘Magnetic’ is the word that is cut out of ‘The Obelisk’s’ silver shell, that glows red via hidden lights when such material is in range. In the tradition of the motel vacancy signs, a single green ‘No’ can also be seen at the right angle, dim enough to be confused for a reflection or for a spot of glow-in-the-dark paint and lit as long as ‘The Obelisk’ is left alone.

And left alone it often is.

Shoulder-height chain-link suggests, but does not enforce, a boundary. Signs near ‘The Obelisk’ warn against proximity. They bear markings that resemble but are not, a skull with cross bones, radioactive triangles, and a human figure strangulating on a rope. They sometimes bear no marking at all, worn by the persistent prairie winds. They are wooden and held together with glue so as not to prompt ‘The Dakota Obelisk’s’ red response, which can be seen for miles around.’

“What?” I look around, as though there were anyone in the vicinity to talk to. “This can’t be right.”

I press Hector up against ‘The Obelisk’ and it lights up red in a way that makes my skeleton vibrate and my eyes blur. Hector scrabbles at the surface and I set him down again. ‘The Obelisk’ goes dark.

I check and re-check my pockets. No metal. I make sure I’m not wearing pants with rivets- that my shoes have no metal rings for the laces. I press my face up against ‘The Obelisk,’ thinking it might be the fillings in my mouth. It’s cold and unreactive against my cheek. Hector brushes the nub of his tail against ‘The Obelisk’ and my vision fills with red static. The word ‘magnetic’ burns in my peripheries as I feel about on the ground, otherwise blind, trying to find and coax the rabbit away from the metal surface.

Hector hops away on his own, toward a tuft of dry grass, and I collapse. My skin is tight and dry. My teeth feel unfamiliar in my mouth.

I had planned on climbing the utility rung ladder of ‘The Dakota Obelisk’ to the top, where it’s said that everything tested against the tower and left behind has been absorbed and deposited. Instead, I throw rocks at the top until a handful of nails and a handgun fall to the ground.

I wish it had been anything but a gun, so useful and terrible.

-traveler

‘There is an inconspicuous turn-off past the long right curve of I-75 in the southern-most portion of Florida which acts as a de-facto parking lot for viewing, taunting, or getting shot by ‘The Last American Cowboy.’ Signposts indicate the safe distances one might do any of these things, though these signs are also de-facto in that if ‘The Last American Cowboy’ ever chose to run down from the crest of the hill and shoot a distant heckler, there would be nothing standing in his way.

‘The Last American Cowboy’ looks like a man- like a cowboy straight from a spaghetti western. He’s been arrested many times and tried in court, sentenced to various lengths of time in jail. He’s been shot and seemingly killed. He bounces back from jailtime and death in the way only rich white men seem to do. Within a week he’s back up on the hill, shouting yee-hahs and shooting at anyone that comes too close. In this regard, he is more like a ghost or a spirit, but that calls into question the validity of his claim- that he is the last American cowboy. Does it count if you are already dead? If you were never, in the human sense, alive?

It matters less because it is his claim- the only answer he’ll give when asked to identify himself and the easiest way to get under his skin. He doesn’t like to be questioned along these lines. He doesn’t like being reminded that other cowboys do still exist. Given his effective immortality, he could simply answer that he will be the last cowboy eventually, even if it requires the extinction of man. Instead, he shoots those questioners in range, shoots at the sky, twirls his revolvers, spits in the dust.

Ignore signs that claim there is a safe ‘lasso zone.’ They are placed by the cowboy or someone associated with him, just far enough in to be covered by Castle Doctrine. In the long tradition of American cowboys, this one is out for blood.’

-an excerpt, Autumn by the Wayside