The drive here reminded me of that scene in the Blair Witch Project when the subjects/hapless victims realized they had been walking in circles and kept passing the same spot over and over again. Between Omaha and Des Moines on I-80, there was no variety whatsoever. About every 10-15 miles there was a Pilot or some other truck stop, along with a collection of obscure fast food establishments, the most humorous (and poorly named) of which, Kum and Go, seemed to appear far too frequently. I must concede that there was one interesting twist from my last time through these parts. Like clockwork, you could recognize each new town a few miles in advance when their massive water tower (shaped like an inverted beer bong) came into view. On this trip, it seemed that these had been replaced by giant windmills. No, not your scenic, Vincent Van Gogh wheatfield, oil painting landscape scenery type windmill, but the ugly, white, futuristic turbine style numbers that dominate the horizon when you enter a place where no human was supposed to live so they try to harness some means of power and sustenance with the help of the high winds, like Palm Springs.
Making things even more vanilla today was the fact that everything was covered in snow. This snow doesn't look like it's going anywhere anytime soon either as the temperature never once went above 32 today. The highlight of the drive was a lone overpass that crossed I-80 just before Des Moines, where, as fate would have it I had another de ja vu. Well, is it really a de ja vu or just a recollection if something actually did happen, and you're sure it happened, and you don't just feel like you've been there, but you actually have? Hmmmmm? You chew on that for a minute.
My vote is for recollection, and in this particular recollection my best friend and I were pulled over on this very stretch of highway back in about '95 by the most terrified state trooper I've ever seen. This guy made Courage the Cowardly Dog (for those of you under 25) and the Cowardly Lion from The Wizard of Oz (for those of you that can make statements like, "I was in school 25 years ago" or "i've worked at _____ for 25 years" or "I remember exactly where I was when I heard that Kennedy was shot...") look like Dirty Harry. In stark contrast to the good ol' boy trooper that pulled us over the previous day in Rock Springs, Wyoming and allowed me to get out of the car and rummage through a bunch of duffle bags in the backseat in search of my driver's license while he looked on as relaxed as George W. Bush during the Florida re-counts , this guy practically yelled his instructions from the back of our vehicle.
"Please place your license and registration out the window where I can see them," he said, voice quivering as he reluctantly approached with his hand on his gun. Practically snatching the aforementioned documents from my friend that was driving, he quickly retreated to his car as if he needed to hurry and call for back-up, having indeed captured the fugitives that had been at-large, and surely armed and dangerous, guilty until proven innocent of...um...being black in Iowa. Oh yeah, and driving 96 mph.
I guess that's part of the charm of life here in The Middle. Things are pretty much what you expect. There's no radical rights, or liberal lefts...just middle. Sure, you might see the occasional mullet (you know, business in the front, party in the back) to shake things up, but you won't see too many that look like me. No, I'm not talking about the tall and good-looking part either. In fact, until I saw a brotha bussin' tables at Biaggi's Italian restaurant a little while ago, I felt like a modern day Atlas, carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders for all of us. Representin' for the under-represented.
I was about to stand on the balcony outside my 4th floor hotel room and steal a page from Will Smith as I proclaimed that "I am Legend". It's a good thing Barack will be here in a couple weeks.
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