1975 18-Wheel Onion Movie Murals

All 18 wheels were going to the movie theater. There were others, too; this was just outside Tulsa.

Barry picked up his boy and said, “Excited to see a movie?”

“Yes,” said his son, a spry youngster right around the age he should have been going to middle school, but they held him back a year. So he was doing 5th grade again. He asked his Father to honk his horn.

“His dad rubbed his head as he got in, he loved doing that, thought Barry, and then his dad said, “Gosh, you look like Moe from The Three Stooges.”

“Who are they, pop?”

“Hey buddy, let’s buckle up, but they’re an old comedy act. There’s a band that came out a few years ago that took a name from them, you ever hear of The Stooges?”

“Nope.”

His Father’s handlebar mustache was accentuated.

“Hm, thought they were bigger.”

“Don’t know ‘em, pop. What are we saying tonight?”

His dad looked like every trucker you’ve ever seen. He wore jeans, a flannel shirt, a vest, and a trucker’s hat that said “Mongoose.” He was balding, but all you could see was mongoose, and his face was friendly, though Barry’s mother called him a rotten scoundrel.

“Well, I was with the boys up in Evansville, that’s in Indiana, Bear, and they were hankering to see this new movie called Barry Lyndon. Well, now we’re all going.”

“What’s the movie about, pop?”

His dad squinted, but he wasn’t looking down the road, ahead of his headlights, along that familiar, repeating highway.

“Well, son. I hanker it’s about a man named Barry Lydon.” His dad left his leather wheel to look at his boy. “And it was shot with only candles, what d’you think about that?”

His son was too short to see when a car was coming and said, “I don’t know. Any other movies filmed like that?”

“Hell no. They got NASA or Anwar Nasser cameras. I can’t really remember what Bill Joe said, but he did mention the movie was like a painting, like a real-life street mural.”

Barry wore a striped, primary colored sweater. He had a bowl cut and did not stick out amongst his classmates.

“Jim painted a new one downtown.”

“Oh, yeah? What of, my boy? He still painting films he likes?”

“Yeah.”

“Well?”

“Mom won’t let me see it.”

“What?”

“The movie he painted.”

“Well, what did he paint?”

“The Rocky Horror Picture Show.”

Barry had never seen what it takes to get a semi to stop that quickly. They use a special pedal, he heard, from his friend, Michael.

His Father looked him right in the eyes. His nostrils flared, and somehow his ears wiggled a bit.

“Son, you know I hate your mother, but I too forbade you to see that pornography. You know what porno is?”

“No.”

“It’s what your mother watches with her new boyfriend, what’s his name?”

“Harold.”

“Fuckin’ Harold. Son, that movie is about Harold. What we are goin’ to see is art, by Stanley Kubrick.”

“Whose that?”

“I’ve only seen Lolita, you can watch that when you’re older, but boy, I forbade you to see The Rocky Horror Picture Show. What do you think of Harold?”

“He smells like onions and…”

“Stop right there, my boy. That is what the whole movie is about.”

“Onions?”

“Just the people that smell like them.”

“Dad?”

“Yes?”

“Why are you sniffing your pits?”

He looks out his side window. It is black. There is nothing in the fields. He turns the ignition.

“Just making sure I’m not turning into an onion pit.”

“You always smell like oil, pop.”

“That is Christ’s way of telling you to stay away from Onion movies, now come on, we’ve got to haul ass. Hop on the C-B radio.”

“What do you want me to say?”

“Ask them if there’s any police down Easton.”

Barry smiled and shook his head.

“Roger, Roger, this is Barry with Obetroph Williams. Any cops on Easton?”

The other truckers were quick to reply.

“Hell, no. How far down ya’ll at? Barry Lyndon is about to start.”

“Is that you, Buck?”

“Sure is, little buddy. You stoked for the new Kubrick?”

“Whose Stanley Kubrick?”

“Well, he made this movie called Lolita, you can watch it when you’re older, how old are you?”

“Ten.”

“You’re going to love Barry Lyndon, saw it up in Iowa about a week ago.”

“What’s it about Buck?”

“This guy, Barry, screws things up real bad. He’s Irish, though; they do it all the time.”

Barry gulped. His dad gave him another pat on the head.

“Don’t worry, little feller. This ain’t no onion picture.”

His son spoke into the C-B.

“Buck?”

“Yeah, lil’Bear?”

“What’s an onion movie?”

“Well, your pa and I saw this Rocky Horror just south of Newark, and that was full of them onions.”

Opetroth Williams grabbed the radio from his son’s hands.

“That didn’t happen.”

“That you, O.B.?”

“Darn straight it is, now don’t be telling me son we saw one of them onion films.”

“But we did.”

“We watch Kubrick, goddamit. 2001. A Clockwork Orange.”

“What’s a Clockwork Orange?” asked Barry.

“It’s France talk for be quiet a lil’ bit, buddy, we’re almost at the picture show, and we can’t miss any of this?”

“Why not?” asked Barry.

“It’s Kubrick,” said Buck.

He takes the C-B away from his pop.

“What is Kubrick?” asked Barry.

“It’s like 18 wheels going at once. It’s something everyone’s seen but done a lil’ differently. It’d be like your daddy carrying a load, but at the weigh station, they weighed his feelings. Catch me, son?”

Talking into the C-B, Barry asked how much everyone’s feeling weighed, and he received 18 replies from 18 different truck drivers.

“Well, mine, a bit empty at times, Junior,” said Willie McCoy, not to be confused with his Father.

Buck said, “Just plain ol’hungry for some intellectual dialogue between me and what’s presented.”

Jessica chimed in, “Don’t listen to them, Barry. It’s a movie. It can be what you want it to be.”

“Amen, sister,” said Omar. “It’s just a picture.”

“Like the Rocky Horror Picture?” asked Barry.

“Nah,” said Louie Gohmat. “Not like that at all.” You could hear him take off his John Deere trucker hat and scratch himself. “My family is my fullness. I saw Rocky Horror with my wife. She liked it. I didn’t care too much. Don’t like musicals. To each their own.”

Here came big, bad Bob Willis. The air coming in and out of his nostrils clogged the channel.

“Listen to me, boy, and listen good. Your pappy is taking you to some fine art tonight, but that Rocky Horror Picture Show is nothing but an onion field.”

“But what does that mean!” shouted Barry, and for once, his Father, Opetroph, did not interrupt, though most of that had to do with him turning into the drive-in, Pat’s.

“I’ll tell em’,” said Beef. “It’s like an onion field. Have you ever smelled an onion?”

“Yeah,” said Barry.

“Well, just imagine that.”

“I’ve never been in an onion field.”

“Ask yo’, daddy.”

Opetroh grabbed the radio.

“That never happened.”

“Like hell, it didn’t.”

“Hey, let’s not use the H word, I’m with my boy and about to see a Kubrick film.”

“Did someone say Kubrick?” asked Quentin.

Barry watched his Father sigh.

“Quentin, go to Hell.”

“Hell no. Where you guys at? Part one is about to start?”

“I’m here,” said Amy. “They’re done with the snack thing, you know? ‘Let’s all go to the movies, let’s all go to the movies!’”

“Amy,” said Opetroph. “How much do you weigh at a weigh station?”

“Well,” she said. “I guess it’d depend what was on my mind.”

“And if it was nothing.”

“Well,” she said, in a pretty southern accent. “It’d still weigh something.”

“I’m pulling in,” said Obetroph.

“We just rolled up.”

“Is that you, Fiore, Kastansis, and Nicuragua?”

“Damn straight, and we’ve been listening to this whole weight thing. Well, we got nothing to say.”

“I do,” said Liene. “It’s how much you think matters, Barry, and I hope you’re listening.”

“Who isn’t?” asked Daniella.

“Troph took the radio from his boy.”

His pop handed it back to him.

“I’m here, I’m here!”

“Have you ever seen this movie?” asked John.

“I have not, have you?”

“Onions.”

“Oh, shut your trap, John!” said 15 truckers.

“Anyone with me?” asked John.

Paul, Pete, and Joseph said, “No. This is Kubrick.”

Barry smiles. They’re pulling into the onion field. There is no film anywhere, well, at least to the big truck drivers.