I am a motorcoach:

I am Two Four Three (yes, again). Here’s my New-Year’s blog, a week early.

Does it feel to you that the world is racing into 2016? Well, working in a fast-paced environment, part of my job is to slo-o-o-o-w the world down (without backing up traffic or being late). Fast is often crowded and complex. How do I and other MotorCoaches in this noble public service slow the world down? One way is what we call “living early”—that is, being ahead of schedule as a rule. Being ahead of schedule means: no need for pressing to gain back time lost in flawed planning. Being ahead of schedule affords backing off whenever necessary—making room for seeing well, as if in slow-motion. Early initiates and serves dignified measures free of agitation. It is the difference between anxious reacting and calm decisiveness.

The New Year is upon us; and like 2015, it’ll pass soon enough. In the mean time, happy travels!

MEETING THE NEWS on the roadways of America, first-hand, real time, real world news—going out and discovering the news . . .

Route 3, Illinois, traveling from Grand Tower to Cairo.

News of history: This was once Shawnee territory, a fact held in memorial by the Shawnee National Forest (the Trail of Tears State Park is also along this route). Louis Joliet and Father Jacques Marquette explored this “New France” for France in the late 1600s. In 1763, following the treaty ending the French and Indian War, possession passed to England at Forte DeChantes. During the American Revolution the region was captured for the Commonwealth of Virginia, and subsequently was governed under the Northwest Territory, the Indiana Territory, and the Illinois Territory. In 1803 Lewis and Clark set out from this area on their way west with the Corps of discovery. The New Madrid earthquakes of 1811 and 1812 created more than 300,000 acres of wetlands along this route, of which a 6,000 acre remnant continues to welcome migratory fowl. And in 1818 Illinois became the twenty-first state of the Union. All of this and much more can be learned along historic Route 3.

News of Industry: Corn, soybeans, and rice are not the only farm-grown products in southwestern Illinois. The pond fish industry is alive and well in Murphysboro, at Logan Hollow Fish Farm (located along Rt. 3 between Chester and grand Tower). High quality ground water and fertile soil are plentiful in this rich bottomland of the Mississippi River—and ideally suited for raising fingerling pond fish, like Crappie, Bass, Sunfish, Catfish, and Grass Carp. With 60 ponds and over 170 acres of pond, Logan Hollow Fish Farm is the pond stocking resource for many pond owners throughout the region.

News of geography: Route 3 ends at Cairo at the southernmost tip of Illinois—the confluence of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers.

News of local evolution: The streets of Cairo, Illinois report “Once was thriving.” Changing tides of industry had much to do with it. Steamboats and river commerce created shoreline boomtowns like this. Great rivers, like the Ohio and the Mississippi, were the original interstate highways, transporters of goods, people, nations, historic movements. In the mid 19th century inland rail systems proved faster than rivers and locomotives replaced steamboats. Then truck transport upon paved highways rendered this location a detour. Racial tensions of historic proportions also played a part. It’s a story told in concrete, cobblestone, bricks and mortar.

Selfies

That’s me hangin’ out with some of the farm help at River Bend Seed Company, Gerard and Crain Farms, McClure, Illinois. (Six pics and I could not prompt a smile from this guy. Hey, farming is tough work; I get it.)
The prominent crops produced in this area are soybeans and corn I learned.
“No wheat?” I asked, like the naïve, shiny red motorcoach I am.
“Wheat! No one’s doing wheat around here,” he answered.
“What’s wrong with wheat?” I returned.
“First off, no one wants to haul that messy stuff. Any wheat farmer will tell you . . . ‘If you’ve got a crack it’ll find it.’ Second, the market’s saturated—too much competition, which equates to $7 a bushel . . . not worth it for a crop that requires the land all year, leaving no opportunity for rotating in something else.”
“OK, so how are you doing with corn and soybeans?” I asked.
“We don’t do either.”
“I thought you said . . .”
“We’re a rice farming operation, about three thousand acres worth. We leave the corn and beans to everyone else around us.”
“So why rice? I’ll assume, for starters, it’s easier to deal with than wheat, and less messy.”
“Nope. Nothing easy about it. We run about thirty varieties for human consumption, seed products, and dog food; and we must be cleaned of every single grain before changing from one variety to another. The fields must be flooded at least six inches deep for the roots to develop over winter months, and then drained in the spring. They must be flooded again in early summer and drained again later in the summer so the crops can be sun dried before harvesting. Very labor intensive.”
“So what’s the up-side?” I asked.
“Presently, a market price of $23 a bushel,” he said. “And that’ll go up during the winter months.”

This is the dock at Cairo. See that barge approaching the shore? It is battling the swift currents of the Ohio River to deliver my passengers, a delegation hosted by the Army Corps of Engineers (Fish and Wildlife, Department of Natural Resources, Politicians, even people from China with interests related to the Asian Carp dilemma). They’re concluding a two-day annual river-ways wellbeing checkup. I wait for them on the southernmost shores of Illinois. Across the way is Kentucky. See that bridge in the distance? Immediately beyond it is the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. And further on are the banks of Missouri. Like these two great rivers, momentous movements have met and flowed form here. I’ll share one example. It was here that in 1803 Lewis and Clark and the “Corps of Discovery” learned and practiced celestial navigation, successfully establishing the initial longitude and latitude data to be used on their westward expedition. The data begun at this southern tip of Illinois would later be used to create maps of the western and northern regions of the United States of America.

Quote Of The Day samples

“The Mississippi River carries the mud of thirty states and two provinces 2,000 miles south to the delta and deposits 500 million tons of it there every year. The business of the Mississippi, which it will accomplish in time, is to methodically transport all of Illinois to the Gulf of Mexico.” —Charles Kuralt

“May what I do flow from me like a river, no forcing and no holding back, the way it is with children.” —Rainer Maria Rilke

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