Frustrated Road Rules
Saturday, October 20, 2007 at 04:40PM Man, I must be getting fat. There’s the fact that my baggy pants now fit like I’m on the Loverboy reunion tour, and even more telling is that I just got a call from a guy who wants me to play George Costanza in a commercial. I asked him if he was sure he had the right guy. He did. He worked with me when I hosted the Shootout Boulder Film Fest last weekend and thought I’d be perfect. I always wondered how they cast fat, annoying people for TV and film. How do they communicate that someone is just right for the bald, overweight, selfish guy? I guess they just come right out and say “you’re wonderful for the part” and the ugly person is just happy someone’s talking to them. It also helps when you’re on the Ohio Turnpike and bored out of your gourd.
So that adds to the frustration I already feel for not working out enough, or at all, really, since March. Two things frustrate me, not exercising and not writing. When I do either I feel great but for some reason I’m wired to do ANYTHING to put them off. You want your house painted? Just tell me I should write and I’ll even buy the paint. You need a partner in scrapbooking? Remind me of the importance of cardiovascular health.
Road trips are great because you really can’t do much writing or exercising. You have an excuse to kick back, eat poorly and swear that as soon as you get back you’ll get up early to work out and write and floss and all the other things the denizens of a rest stop in Indiana will inspire you to do. Walking into a convenience store in the rural Midwest is little like one of those Scared Straight programs for adults neglecting their health. I saw a trucker whose voluptuous man-mammaries had me doing push-ups in the bathroom.
But a road trip with family makes for new frustrations. You all remember when your mom would lose it and spray venom out of her eyes while shouting, “That’s it! No one will ever again chew gum/play wiffle ball/breathe again as long as I’m alive!” Well we’ve had some of these impromptu rule-making sessions.
One of those was inspired by my perception that every Interstate exit will have a gas station, you just have to look for it. I don't know what it is, some country boy thing, but if I see a clump of buildings I'm certain it is a bustling center for commerce. Growing up in Colorado, the water tower and surrounding houses you could see for miles on the distant horizon was "downtown" Walden. That's where you could get everything you wanted. As long as it wasn't fresh fruit, the latest fashions or parts for anything but a pickup truck, you could get the necessities for life. But the highway, as a accomodating as it is, offers many off-ramps to false hope.
Heading into Chicago I saw a massive retail outlet area that I could not possibly believe would not have the gas we needed. I convinced Sarah to pull off the freeway despite their not being any official roadside mention of gas stations. I felt it was time to stop living by those big blue signs packed with corporate logos. We would truly be free. And then, with Quin crying and me singing to help stop his crying, a tired and hungry Sarah got caught in traffic by a shopping mall with no gas.
She snapped. A new rule was created. I think the general guideline was that I would have no input ever again on anything, ever, but we compromised. I now must stop thinking that every barn and warehouse is a "downtown" and only get off the road when I'm certain there's a restaurant, gas station or other necessity.
Sarah is not alone in making rules. On the first night, shortly after I poured breast milk all over our baby, I was demoted back to driver. Already demoralized and frustrated, I went to move a bag of M & M's off the parking brake (there's always something on the parking brake impeding its engagement or release) and the little chocolate candies spilled everywhere. Many of them joining a decade of French fries and taco lettuce trapped in the brake's slot.
So no more leaving half-empty bags of anything anywhere was the original edict. It was later trimmed down to something less severe.
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