I wonder, reader, if there may be a Medusa in me, for when I look upon others and see myself reflected there, I turn to stone.

-traveler

Sometimes the author of Shitholes, in an effort to invoke mystery or flex his purple pen, is scant on details that would, to a more traditional travel writer, be of some importance. Forgetting the sheer size and mobility of a carnivorous tree, for instance, or neglecting to mention a plague of sinkholes in a town that doubles as the last fairway of a golf course that spans the nation (Par 6).

With a length of dry rope in my hands and a groaning sickness in my stomach, I consider that the author seems to have done justice to the condition of ‘The Place Over Another.’

‘‘The Place Over Another’ is hardly a place (it being a rickety tire swing anchored to a dying tree) and what exists under it is hardly a place either (it being an abyss).

This is not to say that they are not impressive.

The tire of the swing once belonged to a tractor and, as such, can comfortably contain the bulk of a child and a small pool of stagnant water that exists there in perpetuity. The weight of riding has pulled the tree from the earth such that it now leans over the abyss and touches down on the other side with a dainty branch. Its vast root system is exposed save for a single, thick tendril that holds it in place and provides it with the nutrition necessary for survival. In the autumn months this tree is known to dangle apples in precarious places and to drop them noiselessly into the ‘Other’ as though threatening (or simply warning away) onlookers. The knot of rope that clings to the tire has fused with age and water into a great, brittle lump of fiber that creaks with warning under the lightest load- that creaks, sometimes, without instigation.

The combination of these things cannot be called safe except to say that it has not yet failed.

The abyss is impressive in an altogether different sort of way. It is deep enough to be endless and dark save for a pinprick of light in the center that riders of the swing say is a keyhole view to another world, visible only from the top.

Nobody who has made this claim has yet traveled downward.’

The tire hung over the center of the abyss and was absolutely without movement when I arrived. With a long prodding stick and the better part of an hour I was able to set it in motion and to catch it without slipping a careless foot over the edge. Now I stand, the sweat of my palms seeping into the rope.

And I place a leg inside.

As my weight transfers to the cracked rubber the tire begins to drag itself back to the abyss and I let it drag me along, sending the prodder through its hollow diameter and bracing myself for the edge. There is a stab of regret when it comes- the phantom ‘what-if’ that haunts moments like these but I will it away and stare determinedly down, seeking the glimpse of another world and finding, like those before me, that it is only a reflection of ours in a pool of water and apples.

Having performed my due diligence, I settle into the tire and find an unlikely restfulness in its movement. I sleep above the abyss and the pond and the reflection of our sky- a series of nested circles like a great eye, below.

-traveler

I stop on a hill in the outskirts of a city. Neither the city, nor its hill, are featured in Autumn by the Wayside. I rest in a patch of grass and shake one of Alice’s picks into my hand, turning it over several times and then bringing it to my mouth quickly, as an impulse.

Bitter, and understandably so.

The pick’s sisters jostle in their vial, warped from their soaking in ‘The Watery Grave’ and restless, I think, or blown by an otherworldly wind. The sun sets and the bitterness passes, giving way to the flavor of wood and a feeling of calm.

This has been a long trip- longer than I meant it to be. It has taken up time that may have been lent to better causes. I haven’t bettered the world. I have traded old burdens for new ones. I am physically less than I once was. I am, at times, mentally desolate. I often act only for the sake of acting.

Alice’s pick softens in the darkness. It wanders between the corners of my mouth, testing the air. It waits and it slowly dissolves and when I take a long, reflective breath, it leaps into the back of my throat and churns out a choking darkness that rises, in time, to blot the light from my eyes.

I see a woman in the darkness, Alice, and she holds hostage my air until I agree to a list of strangled promises- petty things that would only matter to the dead. I cough and expel a cloud of blood and splinters.

Within a week I find a bored mechanic to fasten one of the five remaining picks to the speedometer, the needle of which hasn’t moved in a year.

It moves now.

-traveler

‘Let us reflect, for a moment, on the stubborn existence of the electronic shooting gallery. Let us, in fact, describe in plain terms what an electronic shooting gallery is.

In dormancy, an electronic shooting gallery is a man-sized diorama- a cartoon still-life of the American west riddled with bullseyes and sectioned off from the world by a row of battered guns (firing harmless lasers, no matter the make or model). Fed money, the gallery lights up and the guns activate- unlimited ammo for a limited time (the American bullet buffet). Fired upon, the gallery wakes and responds to the shots with any number of charming reactions: a farmer shouts, a bird squawks in fright, a can launches itself off a fence (and then returns to the fence unharmed, ready for the sharp shooter’s second go-round).

That’s the key to it, reader.

The essence of the electronic shooting gallery is contained in the returning of the can. It is an embodiment of the arcade machine’s manic naivety, an insistence that most actions are blissfully free of consequence. We know, of course, that the opposite is true; that every action is the harbinger of unspeakable consequence. We know this, even if it seems we don’t.

This instinctual knowledge is why the subversion at ‘The Nice House’ provokes such visceral reaction in those that play its game.’

‘The Nice House’ is situated like a lost window at the end of a short corridor to the bathrooms of a no-name convenience store. The window looks into a very normal living room where the mock-up of a nuclear family pays careful attention to a blank television screen. It’s strikingly different than your run-of-the-mill western gallery, with the exception of the guns which are, in turn, strikingly out of place.

I hesitate with a quarter in my palm. It’s been my experience that engaging a thing that is otherwise inactive opens one up to blame for what occurs in its waking and I have a hunch that this is a thing made to sow regret. I know, too, that I will play the game eventually and the arrival of several other interested parties pushes me over the edge. The coin drops and the TV clicks on to a news segment regarding a string of murders. Dozens of red targets shine to life in the living room.

With expectant eyes on my back, I pick up a gun and begin the awful charade.

-traveler

It’s rare that I choose not to pull off the highway for some oddity that might exist there. Much of the time it’s mundane- the artwork of an off-season farmer or the shrine of some unnamed enthusiast. More than once I’ve found an entry for Shitholes that may have otherwise gone overlooked, that had gone suspiciously overlooked, in fact (my certainty that the book is changing grows with the thing itself, now a paperback tome that drags on my shoulders). The pleasure of making these impromptu stops has ceded to necessity over this long trip. Pleasure is ceding generally, I’m afraid, like the brisk nights of late summer give way early to the fall.

Considering this compulsion, it’s strange that I exit outer Greenville (a detour for gas) and spot a statue across the median- the statue of a man looking off in the direction of the sunset (or, because it’s morning, where the sunset will be). Stranger still that the man is borne out of dirt, with little suggestion of a foundation to hold him in place.

I run across the highway, though there is not a car in sight.

‘There has always been a statue outside of Greenville, Ohio, the unassuming shape of a man with his back to the road and his-’

The statue shifts and I jump back, dropping the already-battered copy of Autumn by the Wayside in the gravel. Its pages curl in guilty smiles.

The statue is not a statue at all, but a painted man. A cardboard plaque at his feet fills in the rest, or, if not the rest, then some:

“ACTOR DONATED BY THE GREENVILLE LIVING STATUES TO REMEMBER THAT WHICH INSPIRED SO MANY OF US.”

The statue, the man, breathes heavily and leans away when I stoop to pick up the fallen book. People can be cruel, I suppose. He’s right to be on the defensive.

‘There has always been a statue outside of Greenville, Ohio, the unassuming shape of a man with his back to the road and his eyes set on the horizon.

Or, that’s what is said by the few people who claim to remember.

In a span of time that has been narrowed to the last 50 years, the original statue was stolen and a local group of ‘living statues’ has stepped in to faithfully fill the absence. So swift were they in taking to this monumental task nobody is sure when the statue was replaced or how long the ‘Greenville Living Statues’ have paid their strange, silent tribute.

Strange because the ‘Greenville Living Statues’ don’t seem to exist outside of this task. Strange because only one actor seems to have been photographed all these long years. Strange, too, because nobody has witnessed a changing of the guard despite the occasional webcam project or marathon stakeout. The statue is flesh, this has been proven many times and many ways, but the humanity of it has been called into question numerous times.

The children of Greenville tell the story of a statue that was granted life it did not want (or could not comprehend). Their explanation is as good as any that has been put forth previous to this author’s visit.’

It hurts me to watch the ‘statue;’ it seems to strain under the pressure of my gaze. It struggles to remain still, holding its breath for long moments and quietly heaving the next. Its eyes creep toward mine and quickly turn back to the field before us.

It’s a strange world and people keep strange hobbies. I’ve learned not to judge, but there is a certain pity I feel for those, like myself, who find themselves so consumed.

-traveler