Matthew R. Stitt // The Writer’s Archive

Category: 🧾 Field Journal — Unknown Highway

Reports from the roadside. Dispatches from deep field. This ongoing log traces the strange encounters, Kimerian sightings, and breakdowns in the natural order along the Unknown Highway

  • Pilot School

    FLIGHT SCHOOL?

    Napoleon had a small airport. Inside a small group of Kimerian giraffes practice to fly ancient planes.

    Log 05-16: Napoleon, Large Northeast territory.

    I let myself into the airport hanger. I closed the metal door. Inside, the room expanded. The ceiling towering over me. Thin beams tracing lines that married seams of sheet aluminum together.

    To my right a pair of ancient propellered war planes and to my surprise a wooden plane inspired by the Wright brothers.

    I walked forward and toward the center of the hanger. I passed the first plane, a bi-tiered, beautifully restored gem. As I walked past I chuckled as I found a large metal pipe in the pilot seat. A scarf tied around its metallic neck.

    They still fly.
    Prints from this Field Journal entry — and others — available at: matthewrstitt.com

    I passed the bi-plane and walked to the wood-framed, aluminum-clad office space. The door was open so I walked in. Inside was a small hallway and three rooms.

    The Kimerian, I was meeting, sat in the room to the right at the end of the hall. The tall creature met me at the door. His hand outstretched, his long, thin neck towering over my six-foot stature.

    “My people call me Kelune,” he said his voice deep and loud. “I am a Greybeard and an elder.”

    Kelune lead me to a chair, built for a human as he sat upon a tall stool. He asked me to sit but I was unsure if I would be comfortable talking from farther below him.

    The difference in height didn’t seem to bother him as he looked down upon me.

    “I’ll stand,” I said and noticed a smile creep up the elongated nose.

    “I apologize for the height difference,” he said with a chuckle. It’s something I tend to forget. I apologize if the offer to sit felt rude.”

    “It’s fine,” I said and I took a step back so I didn’t have to look up so far.

    “You work for The Network,” he asked.

    “A field reporter.”

    “Wonderful, anything to soften the rough reputation of the Kimerians.”

    He lowered his long neck. Met my eyes with a slight head tilt.

    “So you pilot old planes,” I said abruptly. “Is it a way to escape the world?”

    “Oh yes,” said Kelune. He grinned.

    “We don’t have these on Kimeria… they are magnificent machines…but….”

    “Flying is not about escape,” he said softly. “It is about remembering that the world was always larger than we could walk.”

    He followed me out to the hanger. He shook my hand and walked toward the Wright plane, without another look.

    Napoleon’s airport still breathes. Its ghosts still fly.


    They still fly.
    Prints from this Field Journal entry — and others — available at: matthewrstitt.com
    They still fly.
    Prints from this Field Journal entry — and others — available at: matthewrstitt.com
    They still fly.
    Prints from this Field Journal entry — and others — available at: matthewrstitt.com

  • Are Kimerians more human than we think?

    What I discovered in Elmyra might change everything…

    Log 05-10: Elmyra, Territory of the Reds

    Elmira, where the boundaries between human and Kimerian blur, survival isn’t just about adapting — it’s about integrating. That’s the inspiration behind the Working the Line collection. Each shirt, mug, and print captures a snapshot of life along the Unknown Highway, where the ordinary and the uncanny converge.

    Found an office in the center of town. A weird spine hanging above the door. Some fear but I was determined to record the goings on inside.

    Snuck into the door and found a place to observe.

    A queue of Kimerian waited oblivious of my presence.

    The practitioner, non-human, with a fishlike head stepped into view. She wore a large Top hat and a purple dress with white frills

    Fish-person

    Her patient, a long necked bi-pedal giraffe lay down upon the drop table. The fish-woman then proceeded to apply a treatment.

    I couldn’t differentiate a human from the Kimerian, if they were side-by-side-skill wise.

    Log 05-12: Elmira, Territory of the Reds

    I drove through Elmira. Parked and slid into the chiropractic office. Behind a pair of drop tables were tall, bird-like Kimerians

    One, closest to me was tall, feathers white. The other grey.

    The patient at the first table was a large bull moose. Its bone rack large and spread out from the bulbous nose. The head sat awkwardly on human shoulders.

    Ostrich and Moose

    The other patient on table two was white with black striped zebra lying on her side.

    Ostrich and Zebra

    Despite the prevailing assumption that Kimerians are wholly alien, the observed chiropractic practice reveals a surprising alignment in technique and care, blurring the perceived gap between human and Kimerian. While their forms may differ dramatically, the methods and mannerisms displayed suggest that the divide may be more superficial than substantial. Are the distinctions between us and them only skin deep?