h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Somebody, somewhere keeps a collection of motel room architectural drawings. Framed prints about their house and a floor to ceiling bookshelf containing binders of the floor plans of the typical motel room for this, that and the other class of motel room from the origin of motels to the present. Perhaps I exaggerate; maybe a single binder would hold them all. Motels are hotels that supplied the demand for overnight shelter by the new consumers of automobiles and this large country. Room 138 at the Ramada Limited on East Ocean View Avenue takes up a page in the binder and the description would cite the widespread popularity of this particular floor plan by giving an estimate of the hundreds of thousands of this unit constructed. Of course there are variations but Room 138 and its mirror image are immediately familiar to anyone who has ever spent a night in a motel room.

Looking into the room from the entry door, the back wall has an opening through which a basin on a counter top may be seen. The mirror over the vanity reflects back one’s image as they stand at the door. The tiny room containing the bathroom/shower and the closet full of coat hangers that are too frustrating to use let alone steal flank the vanity. A drop-ceiling overhead houses the noisy heating and cooling unit. In the room the bed extends from one sidewall and a dresser and TV is along the other sidewall. A 40” square table and two chairs are placed in front of the window wall. Very standard. I have slept in this room in Newark, New Jersey; Lander, Wyoming; Key West; and Valdosta, Georgia. My favorite was in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico where an entry wall variation to the standard floor plan had a sliding door to a lanai overlooking a lush garden rather than Room 138’s simple exit door to the parking lot. Tonight the view across the parking lot towards the seven-story condo is partially blocked by a road tractor and grain trailer.

Inside, the walls have gray and purple speckled wallpaper with a slick, easy-cleaning finish that appears not to have been taken advantage of. One nondescript picture hangs over a spacious, king-size bed that is three pillows wide. Brass wall lamps flank the bed. It took four days after my check-in to get a working light bulb for one of them. A low oak dresser with 3 deep side-by-side drawers lines the opposite wall. A framed mirror hangs above the dresser and a TATUNG Autocolor TV with a working remote control sits on the dresser. A small refrigerator sits on the floor beside the dresser in which I have orange juice, beer and a lime. The identical room at the Relax Inn across the street was an extra $10 a week for a refrigerator. Above the fridge I had to put an adapter on the duplex and power cords for the stereo, disk man, TV, and refrigerator snake from this outlet. The beveled-edge mirror on the back wall has a duct tape patch along one broken edge. Above the entrance to the vanity the register for the heater blows a rush of hot air. I think the heater fan has a bad bearing as it’s noisy and clunky when it runs. The back splash for the vanity is poorly set on the wall and is only partially caulked. The mirror above is cracked, and a drywall patch on the drop ceiling looks as though the joint compound was spread with a bare hand and never sanded. Purplish drapes line the window-wall, which faces to the south. I have been leaving them partially open in the day to give sun to a pot of sprouting bulbs I found behind the garage in Eclipse. Cigarette burns stain the plastic edge of the tub that also bears the distinct image of a denim-textured butt print. I have given this strange bas relief a fair amount of thought and have come up with no plausible explanation for how such a thing could have come to be etched into the plastic tub in Room 138.

When I returned this evening and turned on the light I saw a single vacuum track running across the rug towards the back of the room where it stopped abrubtly. The maid’s cleaning efforts are sporadic. The ice bucket holds the water from Tuesday’s ice. Sometimes the trash is emptied and most of the time the towels are replaced. Four or five bars of tiny soap are left daily but used soap from the sink and the shower are retrieved only every other day. I’ve accumulated a lot of soap. Nothing has ever been taken. Most days the maid writes Thank You! for the tip on the Ramada Limited note pad.

geezer3, your description of this room reminds me of all the dingy, used-up rooms I've inhabited during the past three or four decades, and now I want to find this particular room and absorb its ambience. I wish you could open that outside door for me, and lead me across the room to that side-of-the-tub butt print where seeing and touching such a sight would make such a long journey worthwhile. THANKS.

August 13, 2000 : 18:50 EDT. I know that if Room 138 exists I shall see it, geezer 3, yes, see it, and sleep in it, and so my heart is gladdened. CHEERS, geezer3, always, FOREVER.

Sunday 20 Aug 2000 16:40 EDT.
When I stop to contemplate never seeing the butt print on the bathtub of Rm. 138, I am saddened, for I have longed to visit that room and see it. Even today I know this is only one disappointment, a small one, too, in what has been and continues to be a long, long life. CHEERS, geezer3, forever ALWAYS.

I've been WONDERING if that was you, Selimo. I too was concered about the butt print on the tub side when I last drove by and saw that parts of the motel were being 'rehabbed'. God knows, Rm. 138 needed as serious rehabbing, too, but I was very, very comfortable there for a month. CHEERS, to you.

August 21, 2000 11:30 a.m. EDT
Post #8 at MELONS was a strong clue, too. Ah, yes, geezer3, CHEERS, often and FOREVER.

Wednesday Aug 23 2000 07:00 EDT
A weekend having slipped away, thinking now about Room 138 and its rehabbing, I can't help reflecting upon the good times and the bad that those walls have witnessed. For avoiding the bad times, joy; for missing the good times, sadness. Knowing the good times could have been enjoyed, I feel acutely the sadness now for having missed them.
CHEERS, geezer3, always FOREVER.