Day 1002

I woke up the other day with an overwhelming feeling that I needed to go home. I tried to ignore it, but as I started walking on I-94 towards Milwaukee, this since of doom came over me. It was crushing me and I could not walk any further. So I turned around and went back to the junction of I-90 & I-39 and started walking towards Rockford Illinois until the feeling subsided. I don’t understand what was going on, but I have learned to pay attention to my weird little feelings like that. I don’t know if I’m going back home though, I have not been there in 1002 days….my gosh has it been that long. Over one thousand days of walking……away from home. Home is a place where a family lives…..I would be going back to a house. A house I’m sure is some what run down by now. A house that is an empty shell, of what was once a home. I don’t think I want to see the house again and I know my soul could not bear to see…….. For now I will walk in the general direction and calm my instincts and head towards the South. I did not want to get caught up North in the winter anyway; maybe this was all a way of my guardian angel telling me to get down south before I freeze my butt off again.

I ran into a special kind of idiot the other day. I was coming up on the bridge that goes over Lake Koshkonong (Indian name). And there was this guy sitting in a wood built toll booth at the bridge entrance. I did not think about any one being in it so I was just walking up to the bridge when I heard a SHOT! “Hey” he yelled. You got to pay the toll; no one goes over my bridge with out paying the toll. As I focused on the man in the booth I notice him waving his pistol in the air. I guess he thought this gave him power, so many men crave power. I back up a little raised my arm and pulled out my rifle and with one action I spun it around, cycling a round into the chamber and level a shot right above his head into the wood over the toll booth window. This got his attention so he ducked behind the window pulling his gun in with him; he yelled again. Who do you think you are, you crazy old jackass, the F--king Rifle Man? Then I said; Surly son you don’t want that to be the last words on your lips before you meet God; and if you going to use comparisons I prefer Josh Randal; he was a lot cooler than Lucas McCain. "GOD? What God you crazy old man, there is no god any more!" The man yelled again. And with that statement out of is mouth I spun another round in the rifle and fired a shot towards him for principal sake. That made him throw his gun out of the booth and give up. What’s wrong with you old man? I’m just trying to make a living here! I looked up the road one way and then the other; of coarse no one was in site. And I said; get much business do you? That’s not the point; he said. It’s my booth and my bridge. Okay I said; I’m going to cross your bridge and if you're hungry I can leave you some food, but I got no money. I don’t need your food; he said, just leave. And with that I back across the bridge as I kept my rifle leveled on him (so he would not make a move to pick up his pistol). Once on the other side I duck into the woods so he could not get a clean shot at me. I did not get back on the highway until I was far enough away. Then the shakes caught up with me and I shuddered as I thought about all that could have happen.

I have learned not to back down or show fear to someone with a gun or any one that is being aggressive. I’m not a brave man and in my former (or your) life I would have run from or coward in a situation like that. But I have nothing more to lose, nothing but my life, and it’s not worth much to me any more. So maybe that makes me a little bolder, but I’m still scared and I still shake with fear. Imagine, one man, on an empty road, sitting in a toll booth on one side of a bridge that never gets used. Now that takes a little extra stupid. Or maybe he just longs for something to do, a purpose in life once again.

I broke into one of those mega stores on the out skirts of Rockford. It looked like no one much has been in it, still a good bit of stuff left. I have been able to stock up on everything, even got another box of bullets. I’m going to sleep under its roof tonight, even though I don’t like being closed in if someone happens to come along. I’ve been looking at the tents in the camping section, maybe it’s time for a new one. Moneys no object only the best for this old man. Yep; moneys no object any more………….



Go to Day 1009

Day 998

I have been walking down I-90, 94. The two highways run together all the way in to Madison Wisconsin the State capitol. The days have been some what mild; I feel the wind out of the east. It maybe blowing in off the great lakes. I need to decided if I want to walk on into Milwaukee on I-94 or keep going south on I-90. I would like to see Lake Michigan again, but I don’t know if I have time. I know that sounds stupid, time is all I do have. But I can’t tell what time of year it is. It maybe late summer, but how late? I just don’t want to get caught in the cold north. I still got eight toes left I don’t want to lose any more to frostbite.

I am back now into the green parts of the country and off the prairie, I have trees all around once again. I cut through the woods to get a better look at the town. Madison is a very nice city, with a lake all around it. There are some beautiful lakes in this part of the country. I am on the other side of Lake Monona looking towards the city. I am going to camp here tonight. I don’t know if I want to risk going into the city or not. I need to look for more supplies, but I just don’t know….I have a funny feeling about walking over there.

Clouds are rolling in from the west and I may be in for a storm, so I better make sure the holes are patch in the tent before I go to sleep or I may wake up wet. I am beginning to feel like my old self again, I guess I’m over what ever I had. I got out my string and hook and dug up some worms under a log in the woods. I caught a few fish out of the lake and they’re sizzling on the fire as I write this. I can see an old useless sign by the lake, it stands there for no reason, it means nothing any more.

It is peaceful right now as I watch the two weather fronts get closer in the sky above me. They will collide and the rain will fall. Everything feels new after a rain, if only the rain could wash away the past. I have seen no activity to indicate anyone is in the city across the lake, but more that likely people are there, trying to live, trying like me to survive.

I feel the first drops of rain, goose bumps rise on my skin as the cool rain kisses my arm. It refreshes me and I feel young; if only for a moment. The fish are done, I will eat tonight and I will live to see another dawn.

Go To Day 1002

Day 994

I have put myself behind with my stunt flying and leaving myself exposed to the elements more that I usely do. All I can do is pray that I make good enough time so I do not get caught up north in the winter time. My luck has held out once again and I dodge another bullet that should have taken me out. I know, you (my past self) have been thinking; “why was I making such a big deal about a mosquito bite” when in your day it is just an annoyance. Well here in the future a mosquito bite could be compared to a poisonous snake bite. But if you get bit by a snake you know the poison is the snake’s venom and you have a chance of treating it. But a mosquito can carry any number of virus or poisons that you may or may not survive. I think I sucked enough of the poison out that I did not get the full blown effect of what ever it was. But after three or four days of chills, fever and being semi-lucid, I am very weak. I just hope I can walk out the rest of the poison and get my strength back. It could have been the jump, Nile or even just yellow fever or any number of disease those little flying demons carry. That is why when I can’t find bug spray; I wear long pants, long sleeve shirts and gloves in the heat of the day and at night for sure. I guess I got bit when I was trying to get down out of the plane, at any rate it’s over and I’m back walking. At least there are not that many mosquito's left, it may be good for my chances of being bitten, but not so good for this world.

There is a reason for everything under heaven, a balance that must be maintained. But man could not be satisfied; he had to tip the scales of balance so it served his purpose. Maybe it’s time I tell you about the broken food chain, and why I (your future self) have to watch what I eat and where it comes from. You see before the darkness and the rfid we were struggling to recover from a chain of events set in place back in the early 70’s. When man started messing around with the building blocks of life and turning it around to fit his plans. They created and release of GMO’s into our world altered the state of living tissue and later the food chain. Like everything else it seemed like a good thing at the time, making certain animal tissue compatible for transplants and other useful things. Then we decided to alter plants to better serve our needs. It was all good even approved by the FDA and USDA. But it changed the balance put it place by One smarter than us. When man plays god he is playing on ground not meant for him.

Bugs, those tiny little annoying creatures we squash under our foot or swat with our hand, are part of the balance. Take the Bee for instance, the clumsiest flying thing God ever created, but with out them nothing could grow. They are responsible for pollen getting from here to there so the food chain continues. Don’t break the chain or weaken the links; but man did, because we can not leave well enough alone. Thinking we can improve nature, what an arrogant creature we are. Look to the bee’s for another sign in your time. Then they tried to change the mosquito so it would not carry any more diseases, but that did not turn out as planed.

When you start to modify something you better know what you’re doing, we did not. Transgenic organisms got into the food chain. They mutated, changed food and made people sick and the soil sick as well. Food of every kind became uneatable. Food stopped being caned after a certain date once they realized the source. What I would not give for fresh fruit, vegetables, and meat. I can still see the grocery stores of plenty with all the fresh produce lined up. We took it all for granted, completely for granted…… Fresh was not good enough we had to modify it so it had a longer shelf life or so it would grow faster or had its own built in pesticide and so on. The ground soon got where you could not plant anything else on it. The food chain was disrupted; it was another domino effect that went from plant to animal, until it was too late. We just had to play god!

I get so tired of can food, but it is all I can trust, as long as I watch the date. There are free range cows and chicken (because there is no one left to keep them in pens or behind fences) in certain areas that survived because they were not tagged. But you can not trust that thet're not infected. I can kill wild game and eat some wild vegetable, but I have to be careful. That is why I like staying with the Amish; they still have food that is transgenic free, as long as it has not been infected by neighboring farms. But they are few in numbers and I see them rarely. So I survive on the left over’s, from this empty world.

Beside fresh produce there is one more simple little thing I miss that I bet you would not even think about. Ice, if only I could have one more cool drink with ice in it before I leave this world. Someone told me of a man in old New York that had a generator hook up to an ice maker and was selling ice for a thousand dollars a cube. See; I told you about those fools that still think there is an economy and want to live under the old system of greed. I wonder how long before someone knock him in the head and took it from him. That is why I stay away from the bigger cities. Me, I took the hint, I live simple. I do not want to fight with a generator for a few hours of man made light from what little gas is left in those tanks in the ground. I’m happy just to survive and glad I can…..but I would like some ice……….


Go To Day 998

Day 986

The last few days have been painful and very uncomfortable. I guess in hind sight I might have been better off staying on the ground. There is no fool like an old fool, but this old fool had a fun filled few hours. Maybe it was worth it all, feeling the old hart beating fast again, what a rush.

That morning I pushed the little plane out of the hanger and tied it off and set the brake. I prim the fuel and set the choke and spun the prop, nothing happen. I did it again and again, still nothing. Maybe then I should have walked away, but it started the day before and the run up showed no signs of weakness. So I kept trying, until finely it sputtered to life. I threw my stuff in the back and jump behind the controls. I ran up the engine and went through what I could remember of the pre flight check list. I pulled lose the slip knot and pulled the rope inside, released the brake and the little plane that could, did. It started to roll, I used the peddles to steer and clumsily made my way to the runway. I was a kid again, behind the controls of a big toy. But this time I did not have to make the engine sounds or imagine the thrill, I felt it. It was the most alive I have felt in a long, long time. I taxied on to the runway and said a prayer. I ran the engine up one more time and all seemed good. So I let my toes slip off the top of the rudder peddles releasing the brakes and pushed the throttle in, the plane came to life. I tried to hold it center line going down the runway, but I was out of practice. But the little plane kind of took over as the wind rushed past the rudder and the wings and forced it straighter. The airspeed came up to what I remember being good for take off and I pulled back on the yoke very slightly. I remember what my instructor once told me, airplanes want to fly, they feel clumsy on the ground but once in the air they want to fly, you just got to let them. As the angle of the wing change and it cut into the air, the wheels left the ground and I was airborne, I had always felt I was born to fly. And here I was once again, living out my childhood fantasy.

Mama I want to fly and be a pilot when I grow up…..”I’m sure you do” she said with a condescending pat on the head. Dad can I take flying lessons? “Maybe you could if you'd save your money instead of spending it all”. I think I will join the Air National Guard and learn to fly, “you know they want smart people they don’t let just any one fly you have to go to collage”. One negative comment after another and I let them talk me out of doing what I wanted to do (or worst yet I talk myself out of it). If only once some one had said, you can do anything; maybe I would have believed it my self. But I spent my life staring up at the sky and wondering. Finely someone believed in me and later in life on one special birthday gave me few flying lessons and I kept it up until I soon got my license. I spent a few years flying and proved to myself that I was smart enough and I was right, it felt like something I was born to do. But I was too old and had too much responsibility to make a career out of it by then. So I flew when I could and finally stop when I could afford it no longer. But today I’m on a free ride and I have left the ground behind!

I circled the pattern and tried a few touch and goes to see if I could remember how to land. I did okay, a little rough, but I was sure I could make it on the ground safe when the time came. I saw I-90 and followed it east, since I had no chart or maps for flying I relied on ground references and follow the highway. I decided I would continue on I-90 since I was flying and would make better time. So maybe I will make it to the Great lakes again. I got it up to 3000 feet and the air was brisk and the land was beautiful from up on top. From this view you would have never guessed what had happened below. After an hour I came up on the town of Lacrosse Wisconsin. I knew because I was crossing the Mississippi river below and into another state. I saw the airport and knew it had to be Lacrosse according to the map. I thought about landing at the airport but I did not want to take a chance of not being able to start it again. So I headed on east and kept a look out for my next land marks. The little town of Toma was next where I will turn onto highway I-94 and head toward Milwaukee.


As I spotted the town of Toma I heard the engine cough so I adjusted the throttle to see if it would help, it did not. The engine hesitated and then died, I tried several restarts but no luck; this was it, I’m out of fuel. I found a spot on the highway to set it down, so I line it up as best I could and went into the best glide slop possible. Everything was going fine until I missed spotting some high power lines going across the highway. The tail caught on the wire and sent me into a spin and I wound up crashing into some trees on the side of the highway. I spent the rest of that day and the next trying to get down with my bang up head and twisted leg. I’m on the ground now camping out and trying to heal up before I start walking on down the road. Earth bound again, I guess where I should have stayed, but it sure was a kick in the pants, while it lasted.


A mosquito bit me. First one I’ve had in a long time. I slit the skin at the bite mark and suck out as much poison as I could, but now I will have to wait and see. I have been so careful, I hope I do not die from a stupid bite now……….I would have rather died in the crash. Please don’t let me die like that…..please!




Go To Day 994

Day 981

My extended stay in the town of Albert Lea Minnesota has paid off in many ways. I found a new pair of shoes, plenty of food, clean water and then I found something I had not bargain on. I was walking through town looking it over very cautiously, stocking up on supplies as I came to one store after another. I had finely got all I could carry on my shoulders and was heading out of town. I had decided to take I-35 for awhile and the turn east again before I got into Kansas City (I have no like for that town, just because I knew someone who lived there once). My plan was to walk below the great lakes and avoid all the walking it would take going around them. Even though I was looking forward to seeing them again. Just on the out skirts of town I came up on the Airport. My curiosity got the best of me and I took a look around. I have not seen an aircraft fly in years, how many years I can not tell you, but it has been some time. Just one more thing reserved only for the rich.


You know we (you and I) use to like to fly, it was a grate hobby at one time, remember? I would like to tell you that you took it up again later in life but you (I) never did. Flying like everything else got so expensive, us average folks could not afford it any longer. Like most hobbies people use to enjoy. Our government had turned its back on the middle class long ago; there were the rich and the working poor. If you worked it took all you had to pay all your monthly commitments. Some said it was a depression, but the government would not acknowledge it. Because most everyone was working, people had jobs. Not like the thirties depression when the banks fell and people had no jobs. It’s just that this time people (average people) had to spend every last dime on surviving. And every one had their hands in your pocket every month. Oil was one problem, we never learn, we never changed, we road the horse power in our cars until it killed the economy, and by then it was too late to change. So the oil companies got richer and America got poorer. No one cared that everyone else was being pushed out of business as oil became king. Until everything cost so much because of it, no one was buying anything else unless the needed it. No more fun spending, no more vacations, no more toys for the working guy and girl. They had their hands full just paying for the necessities. And of coarse there is always credit, so the rich can keep getting richer and us poor working fools get poorer while we owe our soul to Master Card gold. No more small business man, only big corporations, so the American dream where each man had an equal chance to get rich if he so desired, went away. It was not a depression; it was a deep depression of the spirit of America. Our whole economy was tittering on the brink of total collapse, all because of GREED! And one more domino would soon fall. Money now though, means nothing, no more than the dirt under my feet. Every society through out mankind’s time on the planet has tried to put value on something worthless. Imagine a piece of printed paper being worth so much that another human being would keep one of his on kind depressed, pushed down, just so they could stand on top. Well it’s over now except for a few idiots I have run into that think they can still buy and sell, some fools never learn. Enough of my ranting…it’s just money has always been the bane of my existence (as you well know) I always struggled, and just when I finely had it all over with and retired, then…..well that’s another story.


While walking around the airport looking at the abandon aircraft, I came up on one hanger that was locked. I found a heavy piece of metal and pried the lock off the door. Inside was a two seat, single engine airplane in pristine condition. It had to be a pre nineteen fifties aircraft that someone lovingly restored. And here it sits waiting for me and ex-pilot to find it. Looking inside the cockpit I realized the restoration had brought the aircraft back to factory. Which meant that it had no modern day conveniences, GPS, VOR or even a radio (not that any of that stuff would work now any way). It had no electric system, no battery; so it could only be propped started. Which meant maybe, just maybe it would fly. I have resisted driving any car that was drivable, because I saw them as part of the problem. Beside you can only get as far as a tank of gas, you can’t pump gas with out power and anyway I just really did not want to. But to fly again, to see the earth one more time from up there, well I just had to try.


So I have spent the last few days trying. There was fuel in the tank and I drain enough out of the wing to tell no water is present. The oil in the engine looked good and I turn the prop to make sure the oil was circulating. I found some rope and tied off the back, and then I chock the wheels and went to the front of the plane. I pulled hard to make sure the plane would not lung forward if it started (I did not want a face full of prop). Then I turn on the magnetos and went to the front and gave the prop a brisk turn, nothing. I tried again and again, still nothing. The fuel was old; the little plane had not been started in years, so I don’t know what I was expecting. But I can dream can’t I. I spent most of that day spinning that prop, and then my stubbornness paid off; I got a sputter of life. I went back around to the cockpit and pushed in the choke a little and pulled out the throttle just a tad more. I spun the prop again and this time it sputtered and caught. The engine came to life! I fell on my backside and laugh at the sound of it. Then it died and silence fell, but it encouraged me and I kept trying until I got it to run for a long time. I sat behind the controls and ran up the engine watching the rpm’s for any sign of weakness. But all seemed good. So now my crazy plan is to fly tomorrow. I went back to town and pack more supplies in the back of this little bird and if all goes well I will fly it until the fuel runs out or I crash, which ever comes first. I may get airborne and the wing fall off or the controls freeze up or a cable could snap. But what the hay, I will have died with a smile on my face. As soon as I get through writing this I will put another time capsule in the ground at the airport. When the sun comes up I will fly once again, God willing I will fly.


If I don’t write anymore, (my younger self) it was sure nice getting all this off my chest. Maybe not so much for you, but the jokes on me because you will never read this anyway. But if you could; just remember don’t waist a moment; each and every one is a precious gift!

Go To Day 986

Day 977

I am sitting by a lake that runs through the town of Albert Lea Minnesota. This area was at one time a park that I can imagine got a lot of use by the town’s people. I close my eyes and feel the warm breeze and contemplate my next move. I am at a cross roads, I could take I 35 south and head towards Kansas City or I could walk on east and walk around the Great lakes again. My main objective is to not get caught up north in the winter like I did my first time through, that mistake almost cost me, but I was just trying to make sure I covered all of New England. I may stay around this town for awhile; I’m in no hurry to decide. So far I have seen no one, but I am keeping my eyes peeled. This is a good size town and some of the stores have been picked through quite a bit, which means people rummaged through them. But when? And are any left? I wonder sometimes how many people are left every where.


I remember hearing the percentages, the body counts. The news people were the first to coin the phrase “The Effect”. All the catastrophes all over the world, happening like a chain of events over the last 20 to 30 years, they reported. Some egg heads had it all figure out how one event causes another. When the quakes hit, we heard the death toll. When the storms would come we heard of all the damages and cost of lives. When the food was contaminated and people got sick and died, we heard the percentages of people infected. One disaster, after another, took many lives but they would be years or least months apart and people would rebuild, move on or try to recover. But when the screams started, there was no television to break the news. No live reports on radio, no head lines in the news paper….just the screams….and there would be no recovering from it, at all!

I remember watching the Ten Commandments when it came on Television the first time. I was too young to see it in the Theaters when it was first released. What a block buster even for TV and all done the hard way, no CG, no animatronics, just good old fashion camera tricks, model building and great directing. But all that did not make as much an impression on me as the scene of the last plague. It was when the death angel took the entire first born of Egypt. I remember very well the pictured scene of the Hebrew families gathered inside their home protected by the lambs blood crossed on the door post. Then they would shudder as they heard the screams of the Egyptians when another first born died. But that paled in comparison to what we had to live through. At night we would lie in bed and hold each other; even though it was so hot we were drenched in sweat. It’s amazing how sound carries at night when there is no electricity flowing through everyone’s homes, no cars on the road, nothing to break the silence, but horrifying screams as another person sees a love one drop dead.

No one knows for sure what happened, because there were no Doctors to figure it out, no scientist to speculate on it and no news people to report the causes. But some how the tags in people cause them to just drop dead. Rfid revenge hit the population hard and fast. I have heard as much as 85 to 90 percent of the people tagged, died. Everyone was effected and most families died out with in a week. Some would shudder and go into a coma that lasted a day, some would seizure and then die and some just fell over dead. I have heard many legends on what might have happen. Some say when the tags went viral they change frequency and interfered with the brain waves or the central nervous system. Others talked about tumors or ruptures in the body, but no one knows for sure. But I have heard it was a global event as well, just like the virus that took down communications and power grids all over the world. Many countries made it mandatory to be tagged, so they could keep up with their population. New born babies tagged at birth, but at least it was voluntary here. But what parent would not want a way to recover or find their child if lost or hurt? It was approved; the FDA said it was safe. So why not have it, why not….

Now no one was left to turn the power back on or fix the big problems….no one, but us few. And we survivors were just sitting ducks for the next round coming our way. Do you have any idea of the diseases that will breed in that kind of death toll, any idea at all? Of course not, in the past this just sounds like a movie plot, or a fictional story. Your thinking; in a world with all the people gone you could live in any house or drive any car. Not if every house had a family of bodies decaying in it or the car people used to race away in a panic was only driven into a tree or just ran off the road when the occupant died. Most of the cars stop being drivable after awhile anyway if the virus hit it before the power went out, it would eventually corrupt the cars computer. I don’t think the designer of the virus every dream it would mutate and do what it did when he planted the first chip. I’m sure he just wanted to shut down a few systems, not the whole world. At least I like to think that was the case.


We survived, in our little house; we survived because of good old fashion stubbornness. We did not get tagged; we paid with cash and regular debit cards and felt like old fools when everyone else rushed through the check out with their speed pay or the Nurse had to actual look up our med records instead of just scanning us. “I do not want to be reduced to a bar code, I’m still a human being”, I would rant. Yes we survived; but what kind of world did we survive into? No government, no National Guard, no military of any kind. Who will clean this up, when will help come? What are we going to do now? That was the questions I saw on her face. And I did not have an answer…………I’m so sorry; I did not have the answers…………ENOUGH! This is a nice area, the lake breeze is comforting and these trees offer nice shade, I think I will camp here tonight and explore around town, tomorrow. Funny thing, even when the night is darkest, there is always a tomorrow.

Go to Day 981