I spent all day sleeping in a room at a small, gloomy old hotel
near the railroad line. The bed was big and clean and hard. I woke
up as the sun was getting red — and for about fifteen seconds I
didn’t know who I was! I was far away from home, tired from
traveling, and in a cheap hotel room I’d never seen. I was halfway
across America, at the dividing line between the East of my early
life and the West of my future. And maybe that’s why I truly
forgot who I was, on that strange red afternoon.

Chapter 2 — Halfway across America