Driving the best part of a trip
In 1977, nobody cared about seat
belts.
So on long trips, if you were just
the right size (and I was in 1977),
you could stretch out on the back
seat of your parent’s car and stare at
the stars through the back window.
That’s where I spent every long
trip to Omaha from everywhere else.
And that’s where I learned to love
road trips in the way only a Mid
westerner can.
In the Midwest, you learn to love
the ride for its own sake. There’s
nothing else really, no scenery or
landmarks. No hills, even.
' Just miles and miles of fields and
brush and sky.
So you love the drive itself. The
constant humming, the way your
head rocks back and forth when you
relax. You count mile markers and
pretend that you’re your own movie
and the radio is your soundtrack.
And you think, “Here’s the part
where I stare pensively out the
window, wondering where I will
stop next on this journey we call
life.”
tsacK men — wnen i was just me
right size, lying on the vinyl seat —
I didn’t realize how stressful driving
could be. 1 never worried that my
dad would fall asleep or make a
mistake, even on long trips.
My trust (or maybe ignorance)
allowed me to abandon all worry the
moment the car started.
The ride was always the best part
of the trip, and it still is ...just like
the ride there, wherever “there” may
be, is always better than the ride
home.
Last weekend, I traveled with a
pack of old high school friends to
South Dakota. There is nothing
inherently exciting about driving to
South Dakota in the middle of the
night. And our destination wasn’t
too thrilling. A wedding.
But I was excited about it all
week. Not about the wedding.
Rainbow Rowell
“For the first feiv hours,
we buzz and giggle and
shout. The riders bounce
off the walls, trying to
adjust to their shrunken
world. ”
Frankly, I didn’t care where we
went. I was just excited about the
road trip and all its ritual.
Like loading up the van with
clean clothes and travel-sized
toiletries. Stuffing in pillows and
blankets. Watching the seats fill
with familiar faces. Making all the
necessary stops: I’m hungry, I’m
thirsty, I have to go to the bathroom.
For the first few hours, we buzz
and giggle and shout. The riders
bounce off the walls, trying to adjust
to their shrunken world.
Because for eight hours, their
world will be nothing more than the
inside of that cheap van, slickery
with strangeness and Armor All.
That and a few dimly lit, barely
cleaned restrooms and maybe a few
feet of concrete between the van and
the gas pump.
Then, when everyone has settled
down and made their spots their
own, my favorite part of the trip
begins. The part where people’s
i»;Oi • x. -,i iutrt ji.nl .yj i+j. .
voices get slower and their faces
glow soft green in the dashboard
lights. The stories and the silences
get longer.
And some — the weak and the
tired, poor saps — fall asleep.
But those of us who stay awake
—and I always, always stay awake
— watch each other change, rocked
to a new state by the spinning
wheels and the ever-growing need
for sleep.
We suck on Cokes that we paid
too much for at the last stop, trying
to stay awake. And then we swing
back and forth from very, very tired '
to somehow beyond tired to very,
very tired again.
Ana l, not so naive ana trusting
and much too big to curl up in my
seat, cast ndrvous glances at the
driver and the road before us.
I always forget where we’re
going, just like I always forget
during the previews just what movie
I came to see. Really, I don’t want
to remember; as long as we’re on
the way there, the trip, the break, the
vacation, and the waking sleep of
the trip itself — everything—has
still just begun.
The wedding was nice, by the
way, but it was secondary. A pause
between trips. A really long bath
room break witji white cake and
country westerb dancing.
And the ride home was like every
other ride home. Grumpy, stiff,
rumpled. Half of the van just '
wanting to go home, just wanting to
sleep. The other half quiet.
And me, my soul sinking with
every mile, knowing my time in the
passenger seat is crumbling.
Knowing that soon, I’ll climb tired
and weak-kneed into a bigger world.
A world with no seat belts, no
soundtrack.
Rowell Is a senior news-editorial, adver
tising and English major and the Dally
Nebraskan managing editor.
Special ed molds intriguing life
Jotting clown every stray thought
that passes through your head is a
bad habit — like incessantly
whistling the odd jingle or popular
tune.
Neither adds anything to your
ability to please.
Either can turn a strong young
man into a wandering lollygaggcr—
making an idler of the virtuous ant.
Both should be quashed in
children lest they pollute the adult.
It’s too late for me, of course — I
have both habits. Or, maybe I
should say, they both have me.
Save your own sons and daugh
ters!
I escaped the normal socializing
process by being bom an extraordi
narily slow learner. By the time all the
other little boys’d already gotten the
whistling beat out of them, I was still
puckering around a wet “whoosh” that
barely passed for sound at all. I would
not leam to actually whistle for
several more years.
It was the same with writing, only
more so.
As a small child I was taken by
worried parents to a specialist who
recommended professional help.
I wasn’t crazy, I was crippled.
“Learning disabled” was a new
term to my folks back in 1969 — it
was a new term to the world.
A paradigm had just shifted in
education theory and I was to be the
lucky beneficiary of the New Way
of Doing Things.
I was sent to a special school.
Though extremely expensive I
think my parents warranted it by
remembering the doom pronounced
by Dr. Jones, the “specialist” I
referred to, who said:
“Mark will never write or draw
like other children.”
He said nothing, alas, of whis
tling.
He only held out the small hope,
a sop to my parents’ bruised
sensibilities, that special education
might do me good, and let it go at
that.
Mark Baldridge
“/ try my best to be like
everyone else: I blame
my parents. ”
They grasped the straw.
Twenty-six hard years later I still
do not write or draw like other
children — in that all the other
children, my age peers, don’t seem
to do much of either...
...while I don’t seem to do much
of anything else.
Oh, yeah, and I whistle.
I’m doomed.
However, I do not fault the
system. Had I been ground through
the mill like the rest of you I’m
certain I would have turned out
more well-adjusted — it’s not the
system’s fault I missed that crucial
window of conformist opportunity.
I try my best to be like everyone
else: I blame my parents.
Not that they did it on purpose —
little did they know they were
building a monster in their boy.
Little did they know I would grow
into the nothing that I am.
But if I had been allowed to fail
gracefully from school — to drop
out with the gear-heads and the pot
heads and the dead-heads and the
hippies — I might have made
something of myself by now.
There is no shame in dropping
out. Or not much shame.
And afterwards one can learn a
trade, or perhaps go on welfare —
eat government cheese.
I never had any trouble reading,
thank God (or whomever), so I’d
still be a citizen of the larger world
of books.
I’d have read everything—
maybe more than I have now:
Between the books I’ve never read
for classes and the books I’ve never
read for pleasure (because of those
classes) there are a lot of books I
just haven’t read in the last 20 years.
I might have read them all.
I certainly would’ve spent my
free time differently, talking with
my dropped-out friends — smoking
dope — about history and science
and how, wouldn’t it be cool if you
could turn into the Loch Ness
Monster just, like, you know, any
time you liked?
Instead, I had to spend every
extra moment I had as a child
scribbling and puffing and trying to
catch up.
Having to work harder than my
peers I found it difficult to stop.
And I still do.
But it could have ended differ
ently.
I would have been happier
maybe. Married by now. I would
certainly be making more money.
*sigh*
I could have been a contender.
Instead, I’ve become that most
pathetic of creatures, the aging
undergraduate.
You may recognize me by my
traditional goatee and notebook —
product of a life spent throbbing
between dreary academia and
crushing, thankless labor.
I will sit, hunched, in coffee
houses, scribbling and doodling for
many years to come.
And in odd moments, when I am
not really conscious of doing it, I’ll
whistle.
Baldridge Is a senior English major and
the Opinion page editor for the Dally Ne
braskan.
guest_
Chuck Sigerson
Third political party
not a viable solution
Americans, with a penchant
for instant gratification, are
concerned that neither the
Republicans nor the Democrats
reflect their views or are acting
quickly enough to solve real or
perceived problems.
Many think there is too much
bickering and not enough action,
and with this concern comes a
call for a change in our system
and the end of the two-party
political system.
Americans should think long
and hard before they change a
political system that has made th<
United States the greatest countr
in the world.
It should be clear, however,
that from the beginning we
actually developed a two “major’
party system, because there have
been numerous small political
parties through the years.
Each of these smaller groups
represented a different viewpoint
— but all failed to capture the
imagination of the public and
move into major party status.
Recently, the election of 1992
provided more than a dozen
candidates for president in more
than a dozen different political
parties.
i ms orings us oack to tne
question: Is a third party really
the answerer.would it create
more problems?
There was a major change in
the course of our country in 1994
Taking a hard turn to the right,
the American public rejected 40
years of continuous Democrat
control of Congress, and 40 year;
of big-govemment programs.
The people looked at our
horrific debt, the explosion of
crime, the endless cycle of
welfare dependency, and saw a
Congress that was unresponsive
and unaccountable, and said “no
more.”
All across America, not a
single incumbent Republican
congressman, senator, or gover
nor running lost — not one!
But Democrats were dropping
like flies, and when the smoke
cleared Republicans held 31
governorships, a majority in the
Senate, and — for the first time
since 1952 — a majority of the
House of Representatives.
All this took place less than
one year ago, and even though
Congress has pursued the most
aggressive legislative policy in
history, there is an apparent
appeal of a third party... or is
there?
Americans like to believe in
heroes and causes.
Ross Perot was a cause in
1992 and his “third party” helped
elect Bill Clinton to the presi
dency.
Jesse Jackson is a hero to
some and he may take a run at the
presidency in 1996.
Colin Powell is a hero to
many, a political unknown to all
but a select few, and, like both of
the others, a media darling.
And there lies the real engine
driving the third party movement.
A third party will not solve a
gridlock problem, it will exacer
bate it.
A third party will not bring a
cohesive government, it will brinj
a bickering, multicoalition
“All across America,
not a single
incumbent Republican
congressman, senator,
or governor running
lost— not onef ”
government.
A third party will not bring
more accountability, it will make
; it more difficult to assess voting
' patterns and assign credit or
blame.
A third party will not bring
, about “better” candidates, it will
bring only “more” candidates into
the system.
Finally, a third party will not
bring us together as a nation, but
has the potential to further divide
us along racial and ethnic lines.
So, if all of these negatives
exist for a third party, why is
there such a clamor for one? In
two words, ideology and news.
Survey after survey has shown
the predominance of liberal views
within members of the media, and
they are not going to stand by idly
while Republicans downsize the
social programs in which they
believe;
By providing massive news
coverage for a third party effort,
• they are creating dissension in
America and are diverting
attention away from the Republi
, can agenda in Congress.
Further, they know a third
party, as in 1992, would help re
elect Bill Clinton and might
reduce or even end the new
Republican majority in Congress.
After 40 years of cozying up to
the liberal-left in Congress, the
press found their friends out of
power after the 1994 elections.
They would like nothing more
than to see their friends back in
power. Just as important is the
“news” factor.
All things considered, sensa
tionalism is a trademark of the
press, and what would be more
sensational than a third party?
Just as the O.J. trial riveted
America to the media, so would a
third party effort. The news
would be spiced up every night,
there would be more candidates
to dissect, more commentary, and
more important, more audience
and advertising revenue.
A third major party would be a
win-win for the press, but would
not help a political system that
has served America well.
The answer is not more
political parties or more candi
dates, but more political partici
pation by Americans.
Millions have fought and died
for our Republic; is it asking too
much for people to take part in
our election process? Pick a
candidate, pick a philosophy, or
pick a party, but most of all, get
involved.
The real answer is not a third
party; the real answer is participa
tion in the system we already
have.
r Slgerson Is the chairman of the Ne
braska Republican Party.
BE OUR GUEST
Contact Mark Baldridge c/o the Daily Nebraskan, 34 Nebraska
Union, 1400 R St., Lincoln, NE 68588.
Or by phone at (402)-472-1782._
