The Ǫ̷̝̝̦̜͂̾̾̃̈́̔͐͐̚T̴̛̛͇̳̣̝̖͙̂̿̌́̊̏͜H̸̨̨̙̼̮̝̩̘̞͕̥͎̻͈̥̑̃̆̓̀͑͛̔̔̂͝E̴͔͛̈́R̶̨͚͉̜̭̼̟̜̭̬̱̻̖͓̩̭̂͌͜ America

Get your first 30 days free, AND 20% off an annual prescription with the link above!

—

You know what we're talking about. You've known for a long time. You just hadn't thought to look yet.

▬▬▬▬ Tale Foundry Community▬▬▬▬

▬▬▬▬ Tale Foundry Team ▬▬▬▬
• Talebot — The Talent
• The Taleoids — The Talent's Helpers
• Benjamin Cook — Writer, Director, & Voice Actor
• Becca Ghusn — Researcher & Writer

[thefrub]

I spent 10 years as a long haul trucker. One of the first things you notice when seeing the USA from that side is the... sameness. Freeways and loading docks look roughly the same in Montana as they do Atlanta. It messes with your sense of distance. Sit in the drivers seat and follow the blue line for a few days, then go to a loading dock. Did I even move??

[justsomeguyanimations]

As a foreigner who lived in the US for a few months, this is what it feels like
Roads, cars, and strange places in between where humanity tries its best to make sense

[taab]

I dropped my phone right before the audio was overlayed and thought i messed something up💀💀

[CynnamonBiskit]

“A long haul trucker delivers a single coffin to a factory by the sea and watches its owner climb into it”
One of these days someone’s gotta make a Tale Foundry Out Of Context
Love your channel, shared it with my brother who loves writing and he’s gotten some really good ideas for the story he’s working on

[greenhydra]

I swear, it's a coinflip on whether or not these things sound like an SCP.

[tylermorrison]

As a Canadian, the image i associate the most with the Middle-American expanse is the water tower. Something about driving down a highway and seeing a collection of buildings and trees huddled around a water tower in the distance like a little island in a sea of farmland screams America to me visually.

[sorinsecara]

Especially in an episode like this one, 14:05 truly made me think maybe I'm actually travelling to the Other America and losing my mind.

[macandcheese]

I used to be an OTR truck driver. I seen some trippy stuff. The same guy appearing where I’m parking for the night just standing there looking right at me. It happened over and over across thousands of miles and dozens of states.

I once picked up a single paper clip in a 53’ trailer just to deliver 1000 miles into an open field. There was a single man there. He signed and took his paper clip… just standing there holding his paper clip as I drove off.

I once was driving through a small southern town and all of a sudden desert! Nothing but desert as far as the eye can see. All that I had was this one road I was on. I drove for hours and all of a sudden I see the town again. I drove into it and behind me the desert was gone. It was like it was never there.

[CommanderHuggins]

I know exactly the feeling these stories are going for. It’s a feeling I grew up with. When I was a kid, my mom loved taking the family on road trips. We drove all across the contiguous 48 states on thousands of miles of road. And it wasn’t just the interstates either. She loved going off the beaten path. Whenever she could manage it we’d find ourselves taking detours on long stretches of old, single lane roads taking us deep into the middle of nowhere. Often times we were the only ones out there too. It was just us by ourselves on a lonely road in vast, open expanses of wilderness.

It’s difficult to describe in words just how big the US can be. If you’ve only ever driven on the interstates I think it’s fair to say you likely don’t grasp the true enormity of it. There’s something missing from that experience. The interstates are direct, fast, and efficient routes. They take you across the country but not through it, if that makes sense. They’re bustling with activity and you’re never very far from other humans or signs of civilization. They’re familiar. They’re safe. They keep the lesser know parts of the country at a comfortable distance.

But there are so many other roads, quiet and nearly forgotten running all across the US. They can stretch for hundreds of miles. You can travel them for hours without seeing any evidence human life, save for the road itself. Out there, all by yourself so far away that you can’t even pick up a radio station anymore, it can feel like you’re entering a different place, an alternate place. With nothing but the sound of your engine and the road ahead to occupy your thoughts, your mind can wander in this place. You might find yourself thinking things you’d never thought about before. And then, as the day grows long and the sun hangs low in the sky, seemingly out of nowhere you find that you’ve entered a small town. Or maybe what once was a town? All the buildings look run down and long since abandoned. Possibly one of the many forgotten towns from a lost era of American history. You wonder what it was that pushed the people away. But then you notice something. A single gas station still has its lights on. You decide to take the opportunity to top off your tank and maybe grab some snacks for the road since you’re not sure when your next chance will be. As you stand by your car pumping the gas, your eyes start to take account of your surroundings. It’s a little difficult to tell just how big this town was. None of the roads are straight, trees block your lines of sight, and the sun begins to set. But the longer you look the more things you notice. On a side path you notice that a couple of the houses turn on their lights. In the distance you hear the tires of a car driving on an unseen dirt road. There are subtle signs of activity around that you would never have paid attention to in your normal hometown. This town hasn’t been abandoned, at least not entirely. Some still cling to this place, tucked away, hidden from prying eyes. Just as you begin to wonder why anyone would still be here in this almost ghost town you see for the first time in hours another human. He gives you a dirty look as he walks by. And in that moment you know that this place is not meant for you. You are just a traveler passing through and you should not linger. The sun sets as you leave the town. You drive off into the night for the next hundred miles of your journey. The sky is filled with more stars than you’ve ever seen in your entire life. And before long your mind begins to wander again.

[diem]

I think this genera of "Modern Mythical" (what I like to call it), is super cool. A place can be sacred, can be magical, and even if you pave over it and make a super highway, that doesn't dampen the power it has, it's still there. But instead of 'the cursed forest' its now "the highway no one drives down past midnight". Its no longer "The grassy plains that never end" its "the town that you always end up circling back to, no matter how long you drive in a straight line". Power doesn't leave a place because it's been changed, that power remains and adapts to its new environment. But because the environment has changed, and humans have such short memories, we have no idea what these places are. No idea how to counter the power they have and probably just gave that power a better vehicle to wield it's self. I love the Modern Mythical because it directly shows not just the Power affecting humans, but how Humans have affected the Power. We were the ones to change and warp it, and now it is repaying us in kind and showing us what it can do with the new form we gave it.

[abydosianchulac]

Reminds me of a town I turned off the interstate in the South at to get gas. The station at the exit was way too expensive so I followed the signage down the road to the next one, and found the strangest town center I've ever seen. Rows of gorgeous late 19th and early 20th century buildings like something out of an old Western film, but every single one boarded up and shuttered for what looked like decades. The only sign of life was at the 7 Eleven built into the far side of the square, parking lot overflowing with cars and store bustling with people socializing like at a house party. Leaving that almost ghost town, I didn't see any sign of life in any building again till I was back at the interstate.

These broken or falling communities aren't hidden or hard to find; it's just most of us have been taught to look past them.

[Darthzim]

Immediately happy to hear mention of Alice Isn’t Dead. Fantastic example on the “Other America”. It’s made by the Night Vale team, but played significantly more seriously.

[thevoidlookspretty]

This is something I love about America. Our weird is just THERE. Not obvious, just very subtle. I went on vacation from Georgia to Florida, and I know for a fact I passed near a dozen places I ought not have stopped at if I wanted to keep my head right. Heck, the heavenly meadery I found in the back of a trailer park was pushing it.

[mordecaimonarch]

As a resident of the north western US, I must say, there are frequent pieces of nature dotted all over. Or rather, our towns and cities are dotted around nature.

[katherineheasley]

I listened to The Dark Somnium's rendition of "The Left-Right Game" while road-tripping from North Dakota to the West Coast. Fantastic way to listen to it.

[AnAngelForsaken]

Gosh I love this genre. Some other exceptional media I’d put into this category would be: Over the Garden Wall, The Electric State, Welcome to Night Vale, and Night in the Woods. Each has this unique take on the “Other America” genre. How they manage to capture that feeling of the personal and secluded ghost stories that often remain hidden to the world. The hauntings that few eyes get to see and fewer yet can understand.

“Somewhere lost in the clouded annals of history, Lies a place that few have seen. A mysterious place, called The Unknown. Where long-forgotten stories are revealed to those who travel through the wood.”

[Supertenchi]

As an actual Truck driver, I can tell you for a fact there IS a "Other" America!

In fact if you sit down sith ANY "Traveler of the Roads" be it a Trucker, hitchhikers, A Roma. Or hobo Drifter...they will ALL have multiple weird & unexplained Tales & stories.

I honestly didn't believe my Trainer 6 yrs ago when I started, now I got my own stories & encounters to tell 😅.
(Like the Dullahan i encounter on occasion on I-65 going North thru Tennessee toward Kentucky. )

[one.mp]

Not exactly American but all of these stories remind me of the game "The Exit 8." A relatively small game about walking forward, entering the hall to exit 8, entering the hall to exit 8, entering the hall to exit 8, entering the... no that can't be right. It explains itself better than I ever could anyways

[sollasemusic]

I was in marching band in college. The longest trip we took was 8 hours across multiple states. On the way back, I fell asleep and woke up in the dark with just the rumble of the bus and barely anything visible outside. We could’ve been in any of three states depending on how long I slept, but not knowing which one was the beautiful part. Those sorts of American in-between places are far away from everything yet comfortingly familiar. It was one of the most peaceful experiences I’ve ever had.

[vladyvhv]

Tens of thousands of years ago, people first came to North America is groups, from a few different places, at a few different times. While they brought some mythology with them, they would forge new mythology about the world around them. When the Europeans invaded, many of these mythologies were either lost to time, or simply ignored by the non-native peoples. Much of the country has been forcibly changed. But there has always been the undercurrent that spawned the ancient mythologies. The tales of the forests you don't go into, or the plains with no end have morphed into the Backrooms, and Lost Highways. Country Music is rife with ghost stories across multiple generations, both of beneficial and harmful spirits. And people are still crafting these wonderful tales. And there are some truly weird things going on. Like those times when a sport scar shows up in the rear view mirror, getting ready to pass, then you look to your side-view mirror, and it's gone. Looking back to rear view mirror, it's gone. But there were no turnoffs. No crossroads. Just a long stretch of highway. No evidence of a crash behind you. Nothing in the news. And perhaps in an alternate reality, the driver of that car is telling about the time they passed this old pickup truck, but when they checked the rear view after passing, it wasn't there....