St. Louis and the Arch of Perspective
Two days later, we crossed the Mississippi River on the old Chain of Rocks Bridge, the skeletal steel trusses groaning under the afternoon traffic. St. Louis rose before us like a polished silver needle piercing a gray autumn sky.
We parked at an RV campground just across the river in Illinois, then took a city bus into downtown. Jason wanted to see the Gateway Arch. I hadn’t been to St. Louis since 1978, when Emily and I drove through in a beat-up Ford Maverick with two hundred dollars in our savings account and a road map taped to the glove box.
Standing at the base of the monument, looking up at its impossibly smooth curve against the clouds, made you feel wonderfully, terrifyingly small.
“Mom talked about this place all the time,” Jason said, his hands shoved deep into his jacket pockets. “She said when they came here in the seventies, she was terrified the car was going to break down before they hit Missouri.”
