The Torch 85 on Wire Road in Alabama
I just passed Wire Road a few miles back and shades of 1995 headed to Atlanta from New Orleans for Thanksgiving hit me like a ton of bricks. We were driving our Saab – my beloved car – and the transmission went dead and we wound up at the Torch 85. While waiting for Dumb and Dumber to come tow our car, I was perusing the paperback book rack and came upon a book called Lobster Boy – on the cover was a boy, approximately 11 years old, holding up lobster claws for hands. The woman at the counter, who I hadn’t noticed, said to me, “That’s a true story.”
I stopped in at about four motels that wouldn’t have us because I HAVE A SMALL DOG – might as well have had lobster claws for hands. Finally, got in at the Comfort Inn – a brand name that bears no resemblance to the actual place – and as I came around the scary back of the building I was accosted by twenty young teens with Cheerleader written across their tees who screamed when they saw Arlene – “Can I pet her?” “What’s his name?” “She is cuter than my dog!” one even exclaimed. But the icing on the cake was the chaperone who came out to see what the screaming was about and looked Arlene dead in the eye and said – “She has one eye that is one color, and the other eye is the other color.”
12 years later – some parts of the world never change.