Day 4: Dallas and Plano, Texas.

The original plan was to stay on Interstate 40 and drive up to Memphis through Oklahoma City and Little Rocks. Sheena’s uncle lives in Plano near Dallas so a 250 miles deviation looked promising as we could visit them , see Dallas city and then take the historic music highway to Memphis. Plano hence become the first decision point in our plan where we would have driven almost 1,600 miles and we could make a fair assessment (with family) of how much toll the travel is taking on Tara. Abandoning the trip and flying back home was a choice as we have made all the reservations cancellable. Five days into the trip, baby looked cheerful and as excited as we are in visiting new places and trying different things.

We hit US 287 South by 7:30 am after a quick breakfast and icebox filling at Best Western.  Gas prices are at least a dollar cheaper compared to California so we filled in premium fuel thinking a high octane drink could make our SUV peppier. After three and a half hours driving through flat lands, we arrived at the Wichita Falls and took Tara to Lucy Park to ride the slides and swings.    The Original Wichita falls was destroyed by a flood in 19^th century and city built an artificial waterfall in Lucy Park, almost after 100 years, to satisfy the tourists.  We started to Dallas without much delay and arrived at the downtown around   lunch time. The six hours drive through the northern Texas offered some imagery of the economy from the past. Donkey pumps running tirelessly in oil rigs, cattle farms in open green pastures and vast cotton fields would become Texas’s history, a little too soon, when you enter into the bustling Dallas city with post-modern looks and ways of life. 

A sandwich lunch at Leny’s sub shop fueled the downtown walk and we first stopped at Pioneer Plaza to see the largest bronze monument in the world. Depiction here is three cowboys steering seventy longhorns (cattle) down a trail and across a stream spread out in a four acre park ground.  It’s like a four acre supersized picture sketched to capture a cattle drive moment with every possible details.  Several blocks away we could see the tall bank buildings and the JFK memorial square and the weather also got a little better.

An empty tomb –Cenotaph- of John F Kennedy was erected near to Dealey Plaza where he was assassinated in 1963. The memorial is a roofless room like structure made of white precast concrete columns. I felt sad thinking  that President Kennedy, the one who made moon dreams a reality, champion of civil rights , reformer of immigration  and a Pulitzer winning writer,  deserved something better than this . In case you could not make out what these concrete columns meant, there were descriptions available to guide you in the right direction of artistic thinking. I was hesitant to step inside to experience “there is hardly any sound to be heard ... giving the visitor a moment in quiet reflection” ,instead, proceeded to Sixth Floor Museum, a location from where the President was shot. By this time, Sheena’s uncle made several calls  to check the whereabouts and provided navigation tips to get to Plano.

We took the Dallas North tollway and realized that there is no way to pay the toll as it had an all electronic toll collection procedure implemented using a TollTag. Later we were told that license plate is captured in the camera and Hertz will receive an invoice for the toll amount that will be added to our bill. We went straight to a Wholefoods store near Plano to pick up some wine for uncle and chocolate for their youngest daughter, Sarah. We initially thought of carrying some wine from California but soon dropped the plan because the temperature variations could ruin the wine. Wines from Monterey vineyards we frequent were available at the shop and we picked a Hahn Merlot and a Talbott Cabernet Sauvignon to give a flavor of California wines.

   

Plano is one of the big and planned cities in Texas where many corporations like JC Penney, Frito-Lay and Dell have their head quarters. Sheena’s uncle’s family lived there for many years and both of them worked for Frito-Lay as scientists.  They showed us the full product range in their pantry – Lays chips, Doritos, Cheetos and Tostitos; salted, plane cheesed, spiced up, peppered, twisted and colorful –and we kept some to snack during the trip.  The story of manufactured food is a story of intense automation from harvesting to garnishing the packaged chips. It was fun to just listen through while Sheena catches up with her family stories and Tara was enjoying the home and the space playing with beads and toys Aunty engaged her with.  A couple of rounds of Scotch whisky and an elaborate Kerala dinner followed in succession, and then it was time for a ride with uncle to see his workplace and the campus. We also took a quick look at the JC Penney campus that reminded me about GE JCPenney dual card program, an assignment on which I came to the United States first time in 2004.