Rusty's Ramblings June 06

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Just Cruisin'

Published:
1-June 2006

The other day my girls and I were driving around a little bit aimlessly. With gas at $3.00 a gallon we like to show our displeasure at our country's dependence on foreign oil by going broke. We'll show them. We had a destination but I can't remember where we were supposed to be.

While we were driving and between the songs we cranked on the radio so we could sing them, we talked. We talked about whatever crossed one of our minds. We were listening to "classic rock". I was using the excuse that I was teaching them the roots of where the music of today comes from. In reality I was just hogging the dial so I didn't have to listen to the noise they like. I know we were supposed to be going somewhere.

I learned why my youngest daughter Kristin's lucky number was eleven. It's the number on her softball uniform. "K" is the eleventh letter of the alphabet. She's also convinced that something wonderful is going to happen to her in her eleventh year. She's 10 now so she's planning ahead. Where the heck were we going?

Kari is the editor of her school newspaper and Kristin is also part of the staff. What I hadn't been aware of was that there had been no school newspaper before Kari started her campaign for one. She basically single handedly badgered, argued, cajoled, and fought the paper into existence. I felt a better understanding of why each meeting had been so important and a fierce pride in her accomplishment. It also became apparent why the faculty advisor had a stutter and a nervous tic I had never noticed before. I should have written down the directions.

Somehow the subject of ballerinas came up. I told my girls that many years ago I had known a girl who seriously danced in a ballet theater. My girls asked which eating disorder she had, anorexia or bulimia. The question itself took me aback a little but I told them she had been an amnesiac bulimic. She'd stuff herself and forget to throw-up. She had a fairly short career. They got a huge kick out of that. Now where are we?

We talked about their grandfather who recently passed away. We talked about heaven and about God. It's funny how death will bring God into a conversation. We talked about their grandmother who now was alone. The girls spoke of their upcoming vacation to go see her and their plans to comfort her and try to ease her pain. Where did this compassion gene come from? I've witnessed them being brutal to each other. Didn't we just pass this place?

We never really did get anywhere. But on our way we all learned some things about each other that we hadn't realized before. We learned how much alike we were as well as how different we were. It was really the most incredible ride to nowhere I have ever taken. At $3.00 a gallon it was about $40.00 well spent.

Using my blinker,

Rusty