The Ozark Plateau is an upland region of the south central United States, extending from southwest Missouri across Arkansas. There are any number of spots in America which classify as being in the middle of nowhere. This is surely one of them. Hundreds of miles southwest of St. Louis, hundreds of miles southeast of Kansas City, it’s here where we, or more accurately I, chose to celebrate my fianc�e’s birthday. The obvious question might be: Why?
And a fair question it is. Our destination is a “resort” close to where I went to college. As an impressionable lad of 20, who was, alas, overly fond of the wares of the nearby Boone’s Farm Winery (the early Seventies were particularly good years for that winery’s trademark strawberry and vintage apple wines), it’s conceivable that the semi-toxic wines, combined with the intervening years, clouded, to some degree, my memory. Be that as it may, I was reasonably certain that there were many trees in the area — this much was true — and that they were alive with color this time of year. This was not one of those years.
My companion, who has never seen real fall foliage, is up to this point not too impressed with the washed-out display of leaves. Aside from the odd orange tree, most of the billions of trees visible aren’t much different from what we can go see along Lake Austin. Still, as we motor along an endless Central Missouri Highway, through the ominously gathering gloom (the weather started poorly, got bad, then worse, and ended in a day-long, icy deluge), I remain uncharacteristically hopeful. It’s late afternoon, and darkness comes early to the Midwest. “Wait,” I trumpet, “until tomorrow.”
Before tomorrow comes, however, we must negotiate the town of Osage Beach. From what I can tell, Osage Beach is kinda like Naples — Italy that is — for hillbillies. The sprawling town is a living monument to white trash culture: abundant custard stands, Opryland Country Stores, all-you-can-chow-down eateries, boat repair shops, elaborate putt-putt golf courses, go-cart tracks, a Harley shop, and racks upon racks of bass boats out of the water for the winter. In the front of every convenience store, along with newspaper stands, are machines looking exactly like soft-drink dispensers except they dispense live bait. Most of these establishments are closed “for the season,” giving the main thoroughfare a spooky, ghostly appearance.
If Osage Beach is Naples, then our hotel is Redneck Fantasy Island. Three large restaurants, a tacky shopping mall, bowling alley, two bars, a video arcade, and six subterranean levels of parking do much to dispel my illusion of a quiet, intimate weekend on the lake. The chaotic check-in process — after a life-and death-struggle for a parking place with an aggressive, blue-haired old lady — contributes significantly to our disorientation, and to a rapidly growing headache. As it will turn out, we have checked in at a slow time. The Disneyland-like mobs of pushy old folks, dowdy high school counselors, and drunken frat boys from Mizzou only increased over the weekend.
And so it’s here, without a colorful tree within 100 miles, that we celebrate Kelly’s birthday. Making the best of the situation, she decides it’ll be fun to go back into town and play some putt-putt golf with the old coach. She’s seen me putt on a real course, boosting herconfidence that I’d be an easy mark faced with the more complex task of putting through a moving windmill, over a small bridge and down a tunnel to a fast, concrete “green.” Unfortunately, at the front door of each establishment, we’re met with this sign: “Thanks, y’all, for a great ’98! See ya next summer.” Each of them closed yesterday.
The birthday girl is now officially depressed — and not too happy, I might mention, with me for bringing her to Hillbilly Hell. We find an open Baskin Robbins, where she pathetically orders a “birthday cone,” which was made, from all appearances, in early August. With Kelly on the verge of tears, I suggest we go back to Fantasy Island and fight the mobs on the hotel’s sorry ass putt-putt course — at least it’s open. The course is empty when we arrive. The little shack’s shut tight. Out to lunch, I figure. We ask a helpful bellman. “Oh, sorry sir,” he says, “they closed for the season at 2:30.”
Immediately after the putt-putt debacle, we enter Mr. D’s Bar and Lounge. Mr. D’s combines a puzzling motif of a Sixties sunken living room, a Chinese restaurant, and an old Shakey’s Pizza parlor. It is at Mr. D’s that our first bit of good luck occurs. Here in the middle of Missouri Tiger country, to the clear disgust of many elderly bar patrons, the UT-Nebraska game is on. Kelly, who rarely drinks at all, follows my lead and quaffs multiple Bailey’s and Coffee, trying hard to put a poor birthday behind her. We find a television set away from anyone else, and settle in for the duration. A full bar at kick-off is soon half-empty. As Texas floats off the field, we’re the only sports fans left. Momentarily buoyed, we venture back out into the cold drizzle to catch what’s billed as a “convenient shuttle” which will, in about 45 minutes, deposit us at our distant room.
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This article appears in November 13 • 1998 and November 13 • 1998 (Cover).