Book of Sketches by Jack Kerouac Read Free Book Online Page A

cars — Staring
porch people — bakery trucks —
but I got a spot ride
to junction — & there in
storm, got ride to High Point
— but woops, already wrote
this — Walked clear to
Furniture factories at junction,
& stood an hour 45 minutes, near
bleak aluminum warehouse
with tin chimnies with
Chinese hats, & smoke, &
Southern RR yards —
& funny Kellostone apt.
house with Italian in-porches
with potted palms, silent
& dismal & unfriendly
in the blank gray day —
Certain again I was
lost — But — ride to
     
    junction from a guy (I
forget now!) — &
there, on open hiway, I
get ride from new car
to Hickory N.C. 90
miles — with furniture
veneer wood agent who
knows Yokleys of Mt. Airy
& talked & was intelligent
(Sheepshead Bay, book review
for High Point etc.) —
at Hickory I was at
foot of my worse trip
— mountains — but had
no time to despair, a
blond hero boy in a
red rocket 88 (’52)
with frizzly dog (half
terryland Terrier & Sheep
dog) — zoomed off to
100 mile straightaway —
was only going to Kansas City
— 1000 miles! — I
helped him drive — we
rolled thru Mountains fast,
thru Asheville (Tom Wolfe
sign on road) — (right
across Woodpen St.) —
     
    to Knoxville, to Louisville
at midnight (pickt up
lost hitch hiker in rain
outside Mt Vernon, Ky.)
— but Oh those Cumberland
Mtns. from Lake City
& LaFollette Tenn. thru
Jellico to almost Corbin
Ky. — dismal, bleak,
I dreamed em, hillbilly
shacks, hairy buttes, smoke,
raw, fog — wow — at
Louisville the great Ohio,
     
    the redbrick wholesale
bldgs., soft night, — cross
to New Albany, Ind.,
where I drove straight
across the Vincennes etc.
to St Louis in the morning —
he drove to Columbia
Mo. — I drove another 60 mi.
to Boonville — outside
Warrenton he wanted to
show — attendant —
ranout gas — on road —
went 117 M.P.H.!!!
Kansas City Kansas at
noon — I lost dark
glasses in his car — wild
kid — KC washed in
station, spent money
on cokes & crackers
& ice cream — ride
to junction — Two Texas
     
    boys work in car shops
for Santa Fe RR in El
Paso drove me Topeka
— got there just as boys
were coming out of
work in Rocky Mt N C
car shops! — moving —
Then Beryl Schweitzer,
Negro All American back
from Kansas State, drove
me to Manhattan Kans.
— we talked — Then
two cowboys, the driver
14, drove to Riley
on Route 24 — talked
about horses, calves, roping,
drinking, girls, cross country
riding on “Satan” their
unshod bronc — etc. — with
red hankies of cowboys
hanging on dashboard in
old rattly car — cowboy
Sam called my seabag
war bag — ! — at
Riley I despaired, got
truck to junction — sun
going down — 2 boys
who come home from work
drove me to Clay Center,
where I ate tuna in
backyard — & it got
dark, I was souldead,
I wanted to die —
so got poorboy port
wine, then $1.75 hotel
room with fan, sink —
right on tracks of R I R R
or C B Q — slept 12
hour log — washed, shaved,
wrote, ate sardines —
     
    500 miles to Denver, I
have $1.46 — but
feel alive again & even
that I will be saved, i.e.,
I am not a dead duck,
not a criminal, a
bum, an idiot, a fool
— but a great poet
& a good man — &
now that’s settled I
will stop worrying about
my position — & — concentrate
on working for stakes
on Sp. RR so I can go
write in peace, get
my innerworld lifework
underway, Part II,
for Doctor Sax was
certainly part one!
     
    Clay Center Window —
creamy snowy silo rising
Farmers Union CO-OP —
green roof & old gables
(once English style) of
Clay Center RR depot —
redbrick 1-story Plumbing &
Electrical Co. — cars
& small trucks parked
on angle — rickety
brokendown shacks on tracks
— rickety graywood oldhouse
under noble trees, signs
on small barn, weeds, piles
of barrels or bldg. material
in back — someone is hammering
on a plank — W P Stark
Lumber Co. hugetruck backin
in a truckstop across the
tracks — fellow in blue
baseball hat in P&E doorway
     
    is jacking up a car —