the last book I ever read (South and West: From A Notebook by Joan Didion, excerpt five)

from South and West: From A Notebook by Joan Didion:

At the Ramada Inn in Tuscaloosa I sat outside by the swimming pool about five o’clock one afternoon and read Sally Kempton’s piece in Esquire about her father and other men she had known. There was no sun. The air was as liquid as the pool. Everything seemed to be made of concrete, and damp. A couple of men in short-sleeved nylon shirts sat at another metal table and drank beer from cans. Later we tried to find somewhere open to eat. I called a place on University Boulevard , and the owner said to turn left at the Skyline Drive-in. On the way we got lost and stopped in a gas station to ask directions. The attendant had no idea where University Boulevard was (the University of Alabama is on University Boulevard) but could give us directions to the Skyline.