Gas Station Opera

In my last post I talked about something unexpected in a hotel shower on our trip to Utah for the Christmas holiday. I wanted to share one more similar experience. On that same trip, we were passing through Oklahoma City and stopped for the night. It was late at night and dark. In front of the hotel was a Seven-Eleven gas station surrounded on either side by other businesses. I was tired. We stopped to fill our gas tank. On outside speakers, music was playing. I hardly paid attention and assumed I was listening to some odd Christmas music. The next morning we enjoyed breakfast, packed up, and headed out for our car. In the cold I could hear the continued music. Less groggy, I could actually understand what I was hearing. The music was not Christmas centered. It was actually opera! Imagine that. Operatic loudspeakers at a Seven-Eleven in Oklahoma City, next to the freeway. On one side of the gas station was a taco shop. On the other a cannabis shop. None of these three businesses screamed ‘opera’ to my conventional way of thinking.

Michelle and I have crisscrossed America on many occasions and have done so on many different highways and byways. Some people gain comfort in how much of our country is the same. Predictability in chain businesses buffers from negative surprises, but they also tend to take away the unexpected, odd experiences that come when someone in an odd place defies conventionality with their approach to business. I always prefer a local eatery over the familiar for example. Even though the gas station in this case was a chain, to make it more localized, whoever was in charge managed to put an offbeat spin on the experience.   
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