Antique Heaven

18 wheelers roll by causing rocks to crumble down US 81 in Addington, Oklahoma, a former stop along the Chisholm Trail. Sitting across the street from a row of desolate red and white brick buildings and broken window panes is a white barn and filling station.

A driver notices a hangman's noose surrounded by porcelain gas pumps, metallic advertisements and an open casket that would make Bob Dalton quiver. Tires immediately proceed to the right and the vehicle stops.

 

Nerves creep up like footsteps entering a haunted house. White pearly gates greet the soul with the angelic "Addington Station Antiques" sign lying just below the tin roof. As the door opens, eyes widen as the leery body proceeds into a room decorated by stucco walls and Norman Rockwell era kitchen cupboards. Pat Webb, who lost her husband in 2006, continues to run the former barn and 1920s filling station and grocery store. She sits by the cash register looking up at a television showcasing the store's inventory. The customer continues to orient themselves. "Can I help you?" she asks. "Just looking around," the customer replies.

After providing them with a map of the store, she immediately shutters any curiosity. "You can look around, but you can't take pictures of the merchandise." Fair enough. Upon rejecting her offer for coffee, (102 degree weather and someone drinks coffee?!) brown Ariats shuffle to the left where a door leads the soul into a time capsule known as the Chisholm Tunnel.

From a 1950s pitch black public pay phone that Marty McFly used in Lou's Cafe to call Doc Brown to various metallic signs including Red Crown Gasoline and a Tennessee and Mississippi Peace Officers Association, streams of Americana flow through the depths of the nostalgic's soul.

While the wallet begs to make an appearance, the memory of the checking account cools the urge and awakens the body from its heavenly dream.

Head tilted down in defeat, the impoverished body walks out of the store. Gravel flies from the tip of the dusty boots as they wander around the corner.

A gleam of hope resurrects the spirit.