SCARY COOL SAD GOODBYE 84

These 7-hour drives were becoming way too easy, and I’d settled into a trance on Highway 53, northbound toward Superior and onward to Duluth. It was the end of October, the eve of Halloween, and the morning frost was thawing on what remained of passing cornfields. Sheets of fog over the fields parted for the sun to catch in silver ribbon rivers and lakes of mercury. The last of the maple leaves had turned to rust and burgundy, countered with the golden needles of the tamaracks’ last stand. The highway, too, was painted red, streaking expressionistically from the deer corpses that littered the shoulder every few miles, martyrs for the cause of vigilance. Hand-painted signs along the roadside pierced my reverie: “DEFUND THE DNR!” “DON’T STOP PRAYING!” “LIES ARE DESTROYING AMERICA!”