Ole Hank sang about it in a sad country song, many have been forsaken on it, never to return.
Don't kill me for this, but Hank got it all wrong. The Lost Highway is a place of wonders. A place where the Old America™ can still be seen, sometimes even more than a shadow of itself, the real thing.
We have discovered The Lost Highway here in the New Mexican Desert and I know it exists elsewhere as well. All across this country when one gets away from the mass and crush of humanity found in the more populous areas.
Life moves at a slower pace here, like I think it was meant to. People are still friendly and are still willing to extend a helping hand.
These places and people have been forgotten by most. When one is fortunate enough to stumble on one of these places, it isn't a Stephen King experience, but more of a Mayberry experience. Now, I'm not saying everything is perfect, not at all. Poverty, real poverty is abundant and many of the people are the elderly. Some of the towns are in the slow, painful process of drying up and blowing away.
We could buy land here for as low as $200.00 an acre, but we no longer desire to be owned by those kinds of things. So one day I suspect the cactus and snakes will fully reclaim what they have grudgingly been sharing with us.
You may ask why this is happening. The answer is simple, the young are leaving, ever searching for greener pastures in the form of jobs, doing what they can to break the cycle of poverty. Not that it makes them any happier, but a full stomach can help to make it bearable.
So we enjoy the beauty of the land and the beauty of the genuine smiles of the people, loving being a part of it, while mourning it's passing.
One day we will disappear as well, and sadly, some will say we have been taken by The Lost Highway. Nothing would be further from the truth. You see, we have willingly given ourselves to it, out of love.
Now if they would only put the steel guitar back in country music, along with the country.
