Longtime roadie and Chicago Sun-Times columnist Dave Hoesktra this week visited with Bob Waldmire as the terminally ill Route 66 artist hunkered down in a converted school bus near his hometown of Springfield, Ill.
Waldmire talks about his favorite Route 66 things (one is in Oklahoma) and about cremation arrangements after he dies (half his ashes will be next to his parents’ ashes; the other half will be scattered along Route 66, including off the Santa Monica Pier and into the Pacific Ocean).
Then there’s this amazing passage about Waldmire by author Michael Wallis:
“In my mind I see the whole highway,” Wallis said from his home in Tulsa. Ok. “I see it stretching from Chicago to Santa Monica, from Lake Michigan to the Pacific. I know its this linear village and I know Bob was on there. So all was right with the world. And that’s not going to change because Bob will still be out there. Its that legacy, the artwork and that incredible presence.
“I remember one day I drove into Glen Rio (on the New Mexico-Texas border) with a bunch of bikers. I went off by myself and absorbed the ‘Death By Interstate’ and there’s an old alignment with grass on the side. In the wind I could hear this laughter.”
It was Bob Waldmire.
He was on his back in his shorts and sandals. Bob was laughing and singing.
“And he was holding up this big tortoise with two hands.” Wallis recalled. “They were talking. I didn’t intrude because I didn’t want to interrupt this conversation. Or whatever. This rendezvous.”
On a related note, you probably ought to pick up a copy of the upcoming issue of the Route 66 Pulse newspaper, which will contain remembrances and tributes to Waldmire when it is published later this month. I’ve already read one tribute, and on that alone, it promises to be a very special issue. I hope I can put some thoughts about Waldmire together myself.