Disneyland is ostensibly the happiest place on Earth. I was asked to chaperone a field trip there and I feared that it wouldn’t be the happiest place on earth as a teacher-on-duty. Added to the stresses of standing in long lines in the hot sun while other people’s toddlers fuss and their teenagers grope each other would be the rigors of being a teacher on a field trip. There would be a sick kid, the teenagers groping each other would be ours and there would be the strong possibility that someone would be lost or stolen or would break or steal something. I took the assignment because I knew a good story would come out of it but I didn’t know the story would happen before we even left our own backyard.
We were traveling to California by bus, along Interstate 10 and I knew that something good happen but my karma was forecasting something happening at Disneyland; an incident involving vomit or maybe a sunburn/dehydration combo – even an incident at the contest our students were going to be competing at. I knew the buses could break down but if they did I was pretty confident they wouldn’t break down near a town.
The bus didn’t break down but the driver was a professional - something she iterated many times – and she noted a problem and stopped before it became a disaster. I was not on that bus, I was on another – had I been on that bus the driver would have failed to notice and we would have been in a horrific accident. We did, however, pull into the magical land of Cataclasite, Arizona*.
I knew we were in someplace special when I stepped off the bus at the truck stop and saw a sea of gleaming cars on cinder-blocks – my picture didn’t come out well and I am really disappointed because it was truly, truly beautiful. The cars were older models, mainly from the Seventies but some from the Eighties. There was also a great deal of old metal office furnishings letting me know that I was in Arizona’s Appalachia. I’ve been longing for Kentucky – the blue grass, the rolling hills, trees and the folksy people and I was excited that someone in Arizona had recreated the less inviting parts of home for me.
I got back onto the bus after talking to the teachers whose field trip it was and realized that the children, realizing their predicament had displayed their knowledge of literature to the crisis and had made someone their leader ala Lord of the Flies. I might be getting it wrong but I’m a history teacher and I tried to put Lord of the Flies out of my mind since I was voted, “Most likely to be Piggy.” On of my friend’s children had been made their king and he was sporting a new hairdo to demonstrate his tribal nature and dominance over the tribe.
I started a travelogue using my iPhone to communicate back to his mother the happenings of the trip, in the manner of a diary. Day One – One of the buses broke down, marooning us in Cataclasite, Arizona. Day Two – The Children have Gone all Lord of the Flies on us, and elected Grant their King. Day Three – We’re apparently in Kentucky. I thought this was terribly clever and was met with rave response by Grant’s mother but I didn’t know the half of it. We were at the truck stop of Cataclasite and not in Cataclasite proper. We would be limping into Cataclasite proper to have the bus fixed and the children would wait in their central business district (McDonalds, Burger King, gas station and a smattering of tourist oriented stores).
The kids were great but there was a store there that was flying an American flag – with John Wayne on it, a Canadian Flag, the Mexican Flag and the Confederate Battle Cross.
Now, I knew we were some place special when I saw the Confederate Battle Cross. I know that people view it as a symbol of many things besides racism, intolerance or a shameful period of our history but it reminds me that the Civil War was about States Rights – mainly the state’s right to make its own laws in regard to owning other human beings. I was surprised to see it flying in Arizona since Arizona wasn’t a state at the time. I’m always nervous when I see that flapping in the wind, in the back of your pickup or tattooed to your baby. It was then that I realized that perhaps we’d wandered into a version of West Virginia – since it doesn’t make sense for the Confederate Battle Cross to wave their either and reported, Day Four - We've wandered into the fourth ring of hell, a desert version of West Virginia.
Day Five – We’ve gone searching for food, we’ve found Burger King. Granted, I don’t like to eat at Burger King. I eat McDonalds, Wendy’s if I’m feeling fancy and Taco Bell if I want something exotic. I’m trash but Battle Crosses making me nervous I stayed with the pack. The Burger King was attached to a store so the kids who followed the parade of teachers were wandering in there and found Trucker Hats. Our leader on the trip, a teacher we’ll call Kerstin, bought a trucker hat to keep the sun off. Day Six: Kerstin attempts blending in with the locals to find a mechanic for the bus.
By this time we had gathered the children in an area I was calling, “the village green,” because it was the only place to gather the children and the only place with grass. Children in Arizona have a inborn need to trample green grass when they see it because such a thing is an abomination in their eyes. We found ourselves across the street from the Confederate Canadian Embassy and a few of us decided to cross the street and see what was in it.
Day Seven: We arrive at the Confederate Canadian Embassy in hopes they'll help us. The Confederate Embassy was something special. I am sure it has a proper name and wasn’t actually an embassy or consul for a country that doesn’t exist but it fit well into the story that we had stumbled upon such a thing. Everything in Arizona is dusty but the merchandise in this store had that dust found only on things have been sitting idle near frying bacon for a long time. You could buy underwear, souvenirs of the town and flags of the surrounding countries, the United States with John Wayne on it as well as “Open” and “Welcome” flags. Oh, you could also buy a Confederate Battle Cross – which we passed on. I initially though the flag with John Wayne on it was Willie Nelson – had it been Willie I would have gotten EVERYONE I KNOW a flag. That would have been awesome.

This store however was scary but nicely complimented by the store next to it selling alcohol and tobacco with the wooden Indian. There are times when I can tell I’ve spent a lot of time in Kentucky and others when I know deep down in my heart I’m a Hebrew from the East Coast. This was one of them. Day Eight: The Natives have fixed our bus, and point us out of their town after passing the peace pipe – which we passed on. Seriously, we don’t know where they’ve been.
Regrettably, our buses were in fine working order after only three hours in Cataclasite and we were on our way to the competition and ultimately Disneyland. Back on the bus Kerstin said, prophetically, “that was a blogger’s dream – you probably enjoyed that more than Disneyland.”
*There is no Cataclasite, Arizona but I’m hoping that no one in Quartzite, Arizona – the town this took place in – will find this on a search engine we’ll call, “Google” and become offended.
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