This has been a challenging weekend, and it’s not over yet. I should qualify that statement, as it is more, or less over. It is Sunday, and I have gotten out of bed sooner than planned, and sooner that I think I should however at this point it’s done. I’m up, and it looks like I’m not going back to bed. There were three days of dirty dishes in the sink this morning. We were almost out of water glasses. As I washed them, listening to NPR reports about Moammar Ghadhafi, and our response to him.
This weekend we have a new automobile. We are firmly in the 21st century now with a 2007 Ford Escape hybrid. It will be even nicer once the vehicle has a place to plug in an mp3 player. I put an mp3 book on a CD and used the CD changer to listen to a James Patterson novel. The story is ending badly, and I’m not sure I want to listen to the rest of it. It worked nicely doing the weekend driving though.
It was Friday. We had a gig in Moses Lake. We left about a quarter after 2 pm. Kristi had made a lunch for us. I loaded the Escape, which was a challenge as it was the first time I’d put our gear in there. The car finally has room for our light boxes, and everything doesn’t fall out on the ground when we open the back door. We start eating almost immediately when we leave home. Friday I had eaten before we left, and didn’t get into the food until I was on Snoqualmie Pass. We’ve been to Moses Lake many, many times and although it keeps changing a little, it is very similar to the Moses Lake that we visited all those many years ago (I can’t remember exactly how many). It is almost exactly a 3 hour drive to Moses Lake, and this time it didn’t snow the entire drive over. There was snow on the pass, and the ski areas were open, but we didn’t have any fall on us.
I was getting used to the Ford Escape. Did I say this was the first time we’d taken this car out on a long drive? It was. The car is comfortable with seat adjustments up, down, backwards, and forwards. I sometimes have difficulties with my back on long drives, but this car doesn’t make me notice my back at all. It has a four cylinder engine, and is an SUV. We had it loaded down with gear, but it ran the speed limit over Tiger Mt., and 75 mph up Snoqualmie Pass until the traffic got too heavy, and I had to slow down to 60.
It is exactly an hour and a half to Cle Elum, and about 5 minutes from there to the rest stop on Indian John Hill. I’ve often wondered what is the story with that place. I mean the “Indian John” part of the place. They should have a plaque there with the story of Indian John, even if they have to make it up. It seems like there should be a “Battle of Indian John Hill”. It would be bloodless, of course, and Indian John would be credited with keeping it that way. I found this poem last week. I’ve been putting my poetry website back together, and consequently looking for the variety of writing I’ve done sporadically over the years. I don’t know when I wrote this poem. When I found it last week, I didn’t remember it at all.
Broken
Broken
Torn up
Busted
Shattered in pieces - lying on the ground
I’m - - -
Under the weight of stones
I feel the shards of sharp rock cut my skin
Today I found out - I’m one of “them”
One of Hitler’s ss
I’m Napoleon’s generals
I am Richard Nixon, George Bush, Theodore Roosevelt
I am a part of the Ku Klux Klan
I stagger under the weight of my new knowledge
I reach out to my victims, ask them for
What?
Forgiveness?
There’s none of that
I struggle to escape my chains
I try to lay my burden down
But I find the stone is in my heart
And cannot be moved
Then I find that I am one of Custer’s men
Committing genocide at Little Big Horn
Blaming my victims
I am a white settler stealing land from the Iroquois
A Virginia planter selling your slavery to myself
Standing on the backs of slaves
Telling myself how brave I am
Not seeing the cowardice of my actions
I am stealing the lifeblood of the planet
I am corporate Amerika
I rape, steal, murder indiscriminately
I am the criminal, calling myself the liberator
I break your spirit as I remove your chains
Don’t you see your invisible chains?
Where was I now? Oh yeah. We were driving to Moses Lake, and had gotten to Indian John Hill. The weather wasn’t bad. It was raining on Indian John Hill, and as I recall it was raining sporadically all the way to Moses Lake. The next major town after Indian John Hill is Ellensburg. We have spent many a night there. Our nights are pretty much the same no matter what town we’re playing in. We check into a motel before we go to work if we’re working two nights, and motel rooms look the same, or same enough any place you want to go. Ellensburg is exactly two hours from home. The state patrol has its’ local office there. I always try to obey the speed limit when I’m going through Ellensburg. I mean, I always obey the speed limit, and other traffic laws wherever I drive. What I mean is that I try not to get speeding tickets, as they have gotten really expensive. I know because I’ve gotten more than my share of them. It may be just part of the package when you do as much driving as we do.
Did I tell you it’s almost exactly 3 hours to Moses Lake from Tacoma? It is, and it was just about 5:30 pm when we got into M.L. That gave me time to purchase some gasoline for our return trip before we went to work. We were playing at the Moses Lake Elks Club. I like that place because they have the stage all the way across the room, and, believe me, those old white folks can be scary. I like being as far from them as I can get, and I hope that none of them are computer literate (mostly they aren’t). There are a few of them who I remember, and who remember us from many years ago when we played at the VFW there. The VFW has long ago gone broke, and is no longer having live music if it still exists as an organization in M.L.
My favorite person in Moses Lake is Mary Warden. She is a native American, and although she is actually a very sweet person always acts like she could kick anybody’s ass. For all I know she could. She has told me about going to Indian school, and sleeping in the back of a cold automobile with her siblings. She is a 7 Day Adventist, and she’s not supposed to dance, but she does it anyway. I remember the first time I saw Mary. It was at the old VFW hall, and she was sitting alone. I don’t like to sit with people usually, but I went over and sat with her. It just got to be a habit, and I guess it still is.
We had an exceptionally large crowd at the Elks on Friday night. The Elks who came really seemed to like us, and they stayed around and danced almost to the end. The guy who gave the nightly “Swelled, and Throbbed” talk forgot his “Absent Member” until I reminded him. He was mondo embarrassed, but I hope grateful to me as well. Maybe we’ll get a raise the next time we play there.
As we were leaving Moses Lake there was a big readerboard over the freeway with the words “Snoqualmie Pass Closed”. That made our little hearts go pitty pat. Oh yes it did. I wanted to just get off I-90 and head straight for Stevens Pass via Wenatchee, but Kristi was having none of it. She must have been tired because she started immediately talking “motel room”. I didn’t want no stinkin’ motel room. I can tell you that. I had it in my head to get back to Tacoma, and I was getting. I did do as she asked me though, and drove to Ellensburg instead of running cross country as my inclination was inclining. In Ellensburg it looked like the pass was open now. They have these little radio stations along the freeway with road conditions on the pass, and they were trying hard to scare us. They said the pass was now open, but we should have snow tires, and it would be snowing, and there would be snow and slush on the road, and the boogie man would be jumping on top of the car and screaming his lungs out all the way over the pass. I’m not one to be easily frightened by idle words about road conditions. Besides, the novel we were listening to on the stereo was pretty good. I was enjoying my ride. I had figured I’d be falling asleep by the time we got to Ellensburg, but I wasn’t. It had been snowing on the pass, and I suspect that Kristi had a pretty good view in a few places. It was kinda pretty even for the driver with the trees all covered with a new sprinkling of snow. Out of Easton the road began to have slush, and snow on it, and got worse until we were well over the pass. The Escape ran right over that pass though like a champ. I passed trucks, cars, vans, and all manner of vehicles both coming, and going. I drove, and I drove, and by a little after 3 am we drove right into our own driveway, unloaded our car. I was crabby by then. I’m grateful that Kristi usually isn’t as crabby as I am.
When we went to bed, we went to sleep. I can certainly speak for myself on this matter. Kristi tells me I snored more than usual. That doesn't surprise me. The phone rang at 9 am the next morning. That means we only had a half hour remaining to sleep anyway, but we knew we had to work Saturday night, and although it was in Tacoma, it was still likely to be a challenge to get through the night.
Three Friends
Steve Kristi Marilyn
We went to the anti-war rally that was the anniversary of the Iraq War, giving a ride to our good friend, Marilyn Kimmerling. The event was in Seattle, and started at the Westlake Mall. It's a convenient place to go, as there is good bus access, and for those of us who are using up the planet by driving, there is a parking garage. It's a funny thing to walk through a mall with anti-war signs under your arm. They have rent-a-cops everywhere, and they have instructions to not let us pollute their hallowed place of commerce with residue of anti-war messaging. They stop you, and instruct you not to let your sign be seen on the message side of it while you are transversing the mall. Even when you get outside, it is still their property. There were police everywhere. If you ever need a cop, just let the local police know you are protesting something. I guess if you're a policeman, you are by default a militarist. It must come with the territory.
Out in front of Westlake mall there were policemen on horses, policemen on bicycles, policemen on foot, and I'm sure there were virtual policemen hanging around in the air like smoke rings produced by the proverbial caterpillar.
