Toll Booth Operators

Every summer, we'd load up the old family station wagon, and make the 24-hour drive to Edmond, Oklahoma from our home in Hatfield, Pennsylvania. There were three kids at that time, so with my parents in the front seat, we had more than enough room in the back. Or so you'd have thought.



Before the start of the trip, my mother would pack everything we were going to need, from a thermos of ice water, to snacks, games, coloring books, etc... You name it, we had it. We even had one of my mother's gymnastics mats stretch across the wayback area for comfort. If you were all the way in the back you could lay down with your pillow and blanket and just zonk out for a state or two. Eventually, however, you got tired of laying down and you'd begin fighting with one of the other siblings to sit in the middle seat. Invariably, they would at that point, have no interest in getting in the wayback.

But that's not my point of the story. I wanted to talk about toll booth operators. And not just any operators. Southern ones.

When we started the trip, in the great Northeast, you'd go through a toll and the person, man or woman, manning the booth would barely look at you. By the time you got through Ohio, you might get eye contact. But once you reached St. Louis, things began to change. The toll booth people started to smile at you. Some might even wave to us kids in the back. By the time we reached Missouri, they were asking where we were from and where we were headed.

About the time you started to notice the dirt on the side of the road was red, they toll booth operators were friendlier than a long lost aunt.