I found myself in the mountain town of Highlands, North Carolina for a wedding last week. I remember spending time in this town on more than one of my million miles worth of motorcycle adventures over the years. Back then, Highlands was a quaint little town with homey restaurants and inexpensive lodging. Now I’m struck by how different - how foreign - how overwhelmingly expensive - everything is.
For starters, the high-end rental car we’re driving on this trip doesn’t seem the least bit out of place here. In fact, anything less would scream poverty. As we walk through the three-block long downtown, I spot numerous BMW’s, Mercedes, and even a Bentley Continental GT Speed Coupe which carries a $364,565 price tag. This used to be a great place for motorcyclists on a budget to enjoy some of the most beautiful roads in the eastern U.S. Today, I don’t see a single rider. Obviously, Highlands has traded it’s humble past for an upscale present.
This showy elitism flows from the angled parking spaces right through the shops that line the street. Clothiers for men and women ooze upper-class prices. A hat that would sell for around $50 in Costa Rica can be had here for a mere $365. We walk into a jewelry store. The very first thing the husband and wife ownership team inform us of is that everything in the store is pure gold, which is selling for $2,665 per ounce today. The unspoken but clear message is: If you’re not planning on spending thousands of dollars, don’t waste our time. We didn’t.
When it came time for lunch, we found a pizza shop. How expensive can that be, right? After ingesting a fairly good pizza, a shared salad, a beer and a glass of wine, we were presented with a bill that exceeded a hundred bucks! For five days, we seek out modest meals and always end up with triple-digit price tags. Even breakfast, consisting of two scrambled eggs with a piece of store-grade white bread, a one-biscuit and gravy plate, and two cups of basic coffee (nowhere near as good as Costa Rican joe) cost us nearly $50.
Turns out, it wasn’t just this town. Our trip began and ended with a day in the Atlanta area. Lunches there didn’t quite hit the triple-digit mark, but they were close enough to make it clear that this explosion of prices in The United States is a problem everywhere. For example, our last meal in Atlanta at a large national chain restaurant, which consisted of a hamburger and fries, a salad, a beer and a glass of wine exceeded $80.
It wasn’t just prices that kept us off balance. We were surprised at how angry the country has become. Drivers honking their horns, flipping the bird, and making dangerous moves against other cars were commonplace experiences. We had one waitress who never returned to check on us after the food came out. Then, when we asked for a second drink, she made a show of crushing up our check and threw it away. She proceeded to ignore us for fifteen minutes, finally sending the busboy to bring the second drinks to our table. She never returned with an updated check, making us walk around the restaurant in search of her to pay our bill. She was so angry at us for ordering a second drink that she wouldn’t even talk to us as we paid…which did not include a tip. At least I gave her a reason to hate us, albeit after the fact.
In contact after contact during this trip, we encountered angry people who made it known that we were putting them out, just by being there. Gone are the smiles, the “thank you” after dropping a hundred bucks for a pizza, the human camaraderie. Maybe it’s because we have gotten so accustomed to living in a happy country that we noticed this change even more acutely. Maybe it’s because the political winds of The United States have released contemptuous undertones, allowing this negative attitude to rise to the surface.
I have been living in my Distant Perspective from Costa Rica for well more than four years now, and although I expected surprises during this trip back to the States, I feel like I’ve walked through a time warp. Experiences like these never happen here. We have our own twists and bumps to life, for sure. But I can buy an entire wardrobe for the cost of a hat in the U.S. I can get an excellent breakfast for ten bucks, and a perfectly grilled, fresh whole fish with risotto and a salad in an upscale restaurant for $30. And I absolutely guarantee it will be delivered with a genuine smile…not an angry scowl.
I now understand how what is seen through a telescope, in other words a Distant Perspective, can often be deceiving. It’s not always as flat as it looks from way out here. Those wrinkles in the time-space continuum that affect life in the United States dissipate long before they reach these little latitudes. That doesn’t mean this perspective is inferior. To the contrary, it is a grand scale observation of a moment. It is one plane of information at one point in time. It means no more, nor no less, than that.
It also means, I’m in no hurry to make my next trip.
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