Yet Another Boring Description of My Drive to Delaware
Although I have already sufficiently bored my few readers with a long and excessive description of the Chesapeake Bay Tunnel Bridge (a bridge, I might add, that desperately needs a catchier name), I still have more to say about my journeys up the coast from Virginia to Delaware. The bridge is a marvel, make no doubt about it, but just as interesting is the stretch of Virginia that starts at the southern end of Route 13 in Kiptopeke and ends in the north in New Church. Even if it was a road surrounded on all sides by grey dust, at least the exit signs advertising places like Pungoteague and Accomac are fun to read, and how can you frown when a place like Pocomoke City welcomes you to Maryland at the northern end of your ride.
The stretch of Route 13 though this part of Virginia is basically unmodernized, with good old-fashioned Americana lining both sides as far as the eye can see. Although there are a few spots where you drive past a McDonalds or Food Lion, for most of the drive, new gas stations seem to be the only update to the landscape in the past 25 years. The towns that I drive through alternate between what must have been Native American names, and what the settlers must have decided were appropriate European names. For every Washapreague there is a Cape Charles, for every Nassawadox there is a Temperanceville. I know that these sorts of names can be found all around the country, but on Route 13 the names seem to originate from colonial times, either Native American or British, nothing modern or exotic in between.
While the town markers are interesting, I find the buildings and businesses along the way to be even more intriguing. I pass a broad range of living quarters, churches, restaurants and other businesses, some of which are unchanged by time, and many of which are begging for a change.
When I was working for a company that did environmental assessments of property in preparation for sale (due diligence as they say) I would often be sent to vacant fields or corn fields that would seem to be straightforward cases. It seemed that if I noted the acreage and what was around it, the survey would be pretty much done, except it never was. Usually, when doing a quick inspection of a bunch of trees that seemed rather out of place in the middle of a field, I would find the remains of a house or a barn. For one reason or another, the building had been abandoned and over time the landscape had surrounded it, hugged it and finally consumed it. I always wondered how a building that had once housed a family had been allowed to be swallowed up by the ground it was built on. However, when you drive down Route 13, you can see the process in action.
Most of the houses along Route 13 are old, dating to an era when kelly green asbestos shingles were considered a good idea. Few of the houses have been updated or improved, and while many are well tended, most seem to be getting tired. Some of the houses are completely surrounded by their landscaping. Bushes and trees that might have been decorative when they were planted are now dominating the lot, leaning up against the house and perhaps pushing ever so gently against the walls. I often try to determine (while paying close attention to the road and traveling at the posted speed limit) whether these houses are still occupied, and I often wonder which is worse – to leave your house when the greenery starts to take over, or to continue to live there when you are too old, or too tired, or too poor, or too drug-addled to take some landscaping equipment and reclaim an area for your house.
Besides the homes, there is another grouping of abodes that always catches my eye: the homes for immigrant workers who man the farm fields and chicken processing plants along the way. The buildings look like teeny motels, with a row of windows along the back and a row of doors along the front, where hopefully single men and women spend small amounts of time sleeping between shifts. I hope they are single and sleeping, because to think that a small family is occupying one of those cells, or that someone is spending a great deal of time in one is rather depressing. Once daylight savings time ended and I had a chance to see these buildings up close in the light, I noticed that some of them have Direct TV satellite dishes attached to poles outside the back doors. Maybe in my mind I am over dramatizing the plight of the inhabitants. Maybe these buildings are full of single people who view them as hotel rooms – places to stay while they save money to bring their families to this country or go back to their own and live comfortably. I like to think that when they each workers has save enough, he or she moves on to a better job and a better home and leaves the little room to the next hopeful.
There are two chicken processing plants along Route 13, one in Temperanceville and one in Accomac, and two tomato processing plants. However, I never see much action outside these plants, which I’m sure are manned around the clock. Probably people who are dependent on jobs in these plants (dependent in a way that I have never been) don’t ever think of arriving late or leaving early or lingering outside to smoke a cigarette. I have read stories about chicken chasers and chicken pluckers and other chicken factory workers in the Washington Post. In Delaware, many of the people who work in chicken plants are from Guatemala, and apparently these are examples of jobs that Americans do not want to do, and jobs for which companies recruit immigrants. Between what I imagine to be the harshness of their jobs and the bleakness of their homes, I wonder if they really feel like they have found a piece of the American dream.
If I tire of pondering the immigration dilemma, Route 13 has its share of small local restaurants, some obviously seasonal, some with signs all in Spanish, and some obviously old time local favorites. The most interesting spots though are the “seafood shacks” which are literally seafood shacks. Each has hand-lettered plywood signs advertising fresh crabs, shrimp, and other creatures taken daily from the bay or the ocean. I often try to peer into these shacks to see if someone really is selling seafood, or if the shack has been abandoned and no one had the energy to take down all the signs. More often than not, the seafood shack is in business. One evening as I was driving past one of these establishments, I noticed a man standing at the side of the road who looked like he was hitchhiking. As I got closer I noticed that although he had the hitchhiker stance – shoulder to the road, arm in the air- he was not facing the oncoming traffic. I am not an experienced hitchhiker, but from what I’ve seen on TV, facing the oncoming traffic is an important part of the posture. When I got closer I realized that he was not hitchhiking, he was holding up a shrimp, attempting to draw customers in by showing them the fine product he was selling. I never took marketing in college, but considering how long it took me to figure out what the guy was doing and how far down the road I had traveled before I realized what he had been holding, I think he should consider investing in a big stuffed animal shrimp and holding that up by the side of the road.
The buildings and businesses are not the only attractions to ponder on the trip. In the summertime, I realized that the sides of the roads are lined by crape myrtles and in more than one spot I pass a crape myrtle farm. Some of the fields look cultivated, and some of them look like they have never had a use. I find it strange to come from an area of nonstop development (while on my way to an area of nonstop development) to an area where fields sit overgrown and unused, without a “for sale” sign or zoning notice anywhere.
I am sure that if I turned off Route 13 in either direction at any of the major intersections, I would probably find quaint summer villages and thriving seaside communities - big homes along the water and summer cottages along the bay. However, as with the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel, I am always forging ahead, attempting to reach my destination before the natives in the backseat get restless and start complaining about their accommodations. But someday when the HP returns and we are making our way north in a more leisurely fashion, maybe we will stop to see what is happening down the road in Cape Charles or Kiptopeke. We’ll stop and enjoy a meal from the “Healthy Lunch Menu” at the Great Machipongo Clam Shack in Nassawadox. And we’ll get to meet one or two of the people who live in the houses or work in the establishments along sleepy Route 13.
The stretch of Route 13 though this part of Virginia is basically unmodernized, with good old-fashioned Americana lining both sides as far as the eye can see. Although there are a few spots where you drive past a McDonalds or Food Lion, for most of the drive, new gas stations seem to be the only update to the landscape in the past 25 years. The towns that I drive through alternate between what must have been Native American names, and what the settlers must have decided were appropriate European names. For every Washapreague there is a Cape Charles, for every Nassawadox there is a Temperanceville. I know that these sorts of names can be found all around the country, but on Route 13 the names seem to originate from colonial times, either Native American or British, nothing modern or exotic in between.
While the town markers are interesting, I find the buildings and businesses along the way to be even more intriguing. I pass a broad range of living quarters, churches, restaurants and other businesses, some of which are unchanged by time, and many of which are begging for a change.
When I was working for a company that did environmental assessments of property in preparation for sale (due diligence as they say) I would often be sent to vacant fields or corn fields that would seem to be straightforward cases. It seemed that if I noted the acreage and what was around it, the survey would be pretty much done, except it never was. Usually, when doing a quick inspection of a bunch of trees that seemed rather out of place in the middle of a field, I would find the remains of a house or a barn. For one reason or another, the building had been abandoned and over time the landscape had surrounded it, hugged it and finally consumed it. I always wondered how a building that had once housed a family had been allowed to be swallowed up by the ground it was built on. However, when you drive down Route 13, you can see the process in action.
Most of the houses along Route 13 are old, dating to an era when kelly green asbestos shingles were considered a good idea. Few of the houses have been updated or improved, and while many are well tended, most seem to be getting tired. Some of the houses are completely surrounded by their landscaping. Bushes and trees that might have been decorative when they were planted are now dominating the lot, leaning up against the house and perhaps pushing ever so gently against the walls. I often try to determine (while paying close attention to the road and traveling at the posted speed limit) whether these houses are still occupied, and I often wonder which is worse – to leave your house when the greenery starts to take over, or to continue to live there when you are too old, or too tired, or too poor, or too drug-addled to take some landscaping equipment and reclaim an area for your house.
Besides the homes, there is another grouping of abodes that always catches my eye: the homes for immigrant workers who man the farm fields and chicken processing plants along the way. The buildings look like teeny motels, with a row of windows along the back and a row of doors along the front, where hopefully single men and women spend small amounts of time sleeping between shifts. I hope they are single and sleeping, because to think that a small family is occupying one of those cells, or that someone is spending a great deal of time in one is rather depressing. Once daylight savings time ended and I had a chance to see these buildings up close in the light, I noticed that some of them have Direct TV satellite dishes attached to poles outside the back doors. Maybe in my mind I am over dramatizing the plight of the inhabitants. Maybe these buildings are full of single people who view them as hotel rooms – places to stay while they save money to bring their families to this country or go back to their own and live comfortably. I like to think that when they each workers has save enough, he or she moves on to a better job and a better home and leaves the little room to the next hopeful.
There are two chicken processing plants along Route 13, one in Temperanceville and one in Accomac, and two tomato processing plants. However, I never see much action outside these plants, which I’m sure are manned around the clock. Probably people who are dependent on jobs in these plants (dependent in a way that I have never been) don’t ever think of arriving late or leaving early or lingering outside to smoke a cigarette. I have read stories about chicken chasers and chicken pluckers and other chicken factory workers in the Washington Post. In Delaware, many of the people who work in chicken plants are from Guatemala, and apparently these are examples of jobs that Americans do not want to do, and jobs for which companies recruit immigrants. Between what I imagine to be the harshness of their jobs and the bleakness of their homes, I wonder if they really feel like they have found a piece of the American dream.
If I tire of pondering the immigration dilemma, Route 13 has its share of small local restaurants, some obviously seasonal, some with signs all in Spanish, and some obviously old time local favorites. The most interesting spots though are the “seafood shacks” which are literally seafood shacks. Each has hand-lettered plywood signs advertising fresh crabs, shrimp, and other creatures taken daily from the bay or the ocean. I often try to peer into these shacks to see if someone really is selling seafood, or if the shack has been abandoned and no one had the energy to take down all the signs. More often than not, the seafood shack is in business. One evening as I was driving past one of these establishments, I noticed a man standing at the side of the road who looked like he was hitchhiking. As I got closer I noticed that although he had the hitchhiker stance – shoulder to the road, arm in the air- he was not facing the oncoming traffic. I am not an experienced hitchhiker, but from what I’ve seen on TV, facing the oncoming traffic is an important part of the posture. When I got closer I realized that he was not hitchhiking, he was holding up a shrimp, attempting to draw customers in by showing them the fine product he was selling. I never took marketing in college, but considering how long it took me to figure out what the guy was doing and how far down the road I had traveled before I realized what he had been holding, I think he should consider investing in a big stuffed animal shrimp and holding that up by the side of the road.
The buildings and businesses are not the only attractions to ponder on the trip. In the summertime, I realized that the sides of the roads are lined by crape myrtles and in more than one spot I pass a crape myrtle farm. Some of the fields look cultivated, and some of them look like they have never had a use. I find it strange to come from an area of nonstop development (while on my way to an area of nonstop development) to an area where fields sit overgrown and unused, without a “for sale” sign or zoning notice anywhere.
I am sure that if I turned off Route 13 in either direction at any of the major intersections, I would probably find quaint summer villages and thriving seaside communities - big homes along the water and summer cottages along the bay. However, as with the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel, I am always forging ahead, attempting to reach my destination before the natives in the backseat get restless and start complaining about their accommodations. But someday when the HP returns and we are making our way north in a more leisurely fashion, maybe we will stop to see what is happening down the road in Cape Charles or Kiptopeke. We’ll stop and enjoy a meal from the “Healthy Lunch Menu” at the Great Machipongo Clam Shack in Nassawadox. And we’ll get to meet one or two of the people who live in the houses or work in the establishments along sleepy Route 13.
posted by Shannon at 11:40 PM
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