Excerpt: Heading West

Mike sat back in the dark colored, wooden booth and took a large drink from his glass of beer, finishing it in just a few gulps. He paused a moment, seemingly to savor the taste of his cold, frothy, beverage and then set the pint glass on the table with a satisfying “thunk”. “You see, the problem is not that we are not capable of finding the truth, the problem is that the truth is nowhere to be found.”

Sam let out a long groan and replied “Oh come on. While I do recognize the fact that the truth is not always easily accessible, especially in certain, complicated, situations, I do not accept that truth is *nowhere* to be found. That kind of across the board, blanket statement is, by its very nature, bound to be false. You just can’t make generalizations like that, Mike.” Sam took a swig from his beer bottle.

Mike motioned to the waitress to come to the table and glowered at Sam. “You are right only in that generalities are never completely accurate, but you must see that there is some…er…truth to my statement.”

Sam pounded the table and yelped “Ah ha! See! You, yourself, just acknowledged that there is truth to be found in your statement, and thus, *somewhere*. I rest my case.”

The waitress appeared at the table. “I’ll have another beer.” Mike said and then looked, questioningly, to Sam. “Me too.” Sam responded. “Sure. Just a sec.” The waitress said as she turned away. “It was a momentary lapse of reason.” Mike explained. “Most certainly brought about by the beer.” Sam snickered. “What I was trying to get across to you is that I’m right.” “Ha!” Sam exclaimed. “You know you’re wrong. You’re only floundering to try and prove that you aren’t, but man, you just can’t do it.”

Mike frowned and pleaded “I guess I didn’t make much sense but maybe you understand what I was *trying* to say?”. Sam raised an eyebrow. “Well, I don’t know for sure. What were you trying to say?” Mike paused a minute and watched the other people in the bar. It had gotten a lot more crowded since he and Sam sat down. He looked back at Sam. “I guess I was trying to say the truth is a lot harder to come by than I previously realized.” Sam nodded and played with a toothpick. “You need to remember that just because its hard, it doesn’t mean its not worth it.”
Mike and Sam sat quietly, sipping their beers. The waitress stopped at their table and another round was ordered. Mike spent a long while watching the other patrons once more, and Sam went to work breaking his toothpick into as many little pieces as he could. Suddenly, Sam dropped the toothpick and nearly shouted “I know what we need to do!”. Mike turned to look at Sam. “I hope it doesn’t involve me doing anything other than sit here and drink beer. I’m kinda comfortable.” Sam said “No. Well, not yet, at least.” Mike stared at Sam.

“We need to go on a road trip.” Sam said while grinning.