Hilary and Theresa's Road to Nowhere: From Asbury Park to the Promised Land

After four days of glorious weather in Chicago, we left town just as the tornadoes started to drop. We arrived in Cleveland and checked into the worst Motel 6 yet. But we have decided that the secret to happiness in life is to constantly lower our standards (perhaps this explains the success of our 34 year marriage.) Accordingly, our motto has become "if it doesn't have bed-bugs - it's okay by us." I have gotten into the habit of obsessively googling reviews, which can be frightening, but also hilarious. Some of my favorites report the findings of bloodstains in motel bathrooms. I am almost positive there is this one guy out there who finds bloodstains on the bathroom door of every motel he stays at; the reviews read exactly the same. Another favorite started out with "If you value your life you might want to pay a little more and stay somewhere else..." But google I must because the bed-bug hysteria continues to pick up steam as we approach the east coast, and it has taken it's toll on my mental health. If you believe the prognosticators, the country will soon be irreparably infested and in order to remain safe we must immediately return to our houses and never leave them again. So I screen out the motels with bed-bug reviews, even though I don't believe a lot of them. Then, the first thing we do when we walk into a motel room is pull down the sheets and look under the mattress. If the coast is clear, we stay. It was late, there were no bed bugs, so we checked into the Motel 6 just outside of Cleveland.

Had they actually served Indian food at this motel, the smell at 7:00 a.m. when I straggled int the lobby for coffee might not have been so disagreeable. And if I still did drugs, the obvious dealing in the parking lot might have been convenient. And if I enjoyed the sounds of other people... Never mind. Just know that the walls were very thin. BUT, there were no bed-bugs so Shangri-La would do.

It wouldn't be fair to Cleveland to compare it to Chicago. That would be like comparing Oakland to San Francisco. But Cleveland did actually remind me a lot of Oakland. Enormous cultural diversity. Struggles with poverty and violent crime. Huge sports arenas for teams in need of life-support... But there was a palpable depression in Cleveland that I never felt in Oakland. Heavily invested in the steel and auto industry, Cleveland has taken some of the country's biggest economic hits in recent decades. Disappearing jobs and "white-flight" continue to be responsible for the decaying infrastructure and impoverished underclass that you can't help but notice in this city. One local told us that Cleveland's main problem is that it's population peaked 60 years ago. This explained the boarded up schools and churches with for-sale signs. Then Lebron left town. No wonder he is the "Anti-Christ" in these parts.

Making matters worse, getting around the greater Cleveland area was difficult because our Navigators were completely unreliable during this leg of our journey, routinely giving us us ridiculous information. When I asked for directions to the Medina Recreation and Swimming Center, for example, it wanted to know if I meant the "Vagina Recreation Center." Actually, that would have been interesting. Ultimately, we were forced to (gasp) ask for directions. Well, there is this thing called "human error" and every single time we left Shagri-La, we got hopelessly lost. Only it wasn't fun like in Chicago and we ended up in some neighborhoods that were very sketchy to say the least. The road signs were no help at all. Our favorite was "Yield to Blind Pedestrians." Thank you for that reminder Cleveland.

The highlight, of course, was the reason we were there to begin with - Cleveland's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. And our concerns about the sad state of affairs in the city and the world were temporarily assuaged by the special Bruce Springsteen exhibit called "From Asbury Park to the Promised Land." Two floors of all things Bruce. Home movies. Clips of the early bands that he played with - "The Castiles," "Earth" and "Steel Mill" - on his rise to super-stardom. Grammies, photos with the likes of Barack Obama, who upon presenting him with a recent award said "I may be the President, but he's the Boss."

We were not the only people in Ohio with a passion for Springsteen. Bruce holds a special place in the hearts of many Ohioans and was even given a key to the nearby city of Youngstown for his tribute to that town in a song by the same name. The song told the story of an unemployed steel worker and was part of a concept album, "Ghost of Tom Joad," timely still for it's theme of divisions between the wealthy and the working class. Depressing themes for depressing times. Yet these songs were also a clarion call to fight the power and rise above the pain. And as we wandered around the Hall of Fame listening to Springsteen's anthems of love and faith and hope, we started to feel a little better. About the state of affairs in Cleveland and about the state of affairs in America. A fitting testament to the transformative power of rock and roll.