Time for a Little (A LOT of) Driving…aka: America the Beautiful

I just found this post I wrote in late August on our way to Hillsdale.  Never put it up, but it certainly was a great trip.

So as most of you may or may not know I’ll be starting the next big exciting step of my life at Hillsdale College in a matter of days, and I have been given the lucky privilege of actually bringing my car with me to school.  And no, my car did not fit on the plane.  That means – ROAD TRIP!

Say hello to PB&J’s, a car top cargo holder about the size of me, boxes in the back seat, Classic Rock (and don’t forget Phil Collins) on repeat, and some 2300 miles of driving with my parents in a 1998 Rav4 to Michigan.  I never thought I’d be saying this, but let me tell you, it’s a blast.

Our route has been something like this: Las Vegas to Salt Lake City to Cheyenne through Nebraska to Council Bluff, Iowa, then through Illinois, Indiana, and at last on to Michigan.  Driving cross country teaches you lots of things, like how to drive the Las Vegas Strip at midnight, avoiding motorcyclists, passing trucks, driving through wind gusts, finding amazingly clean rest stops, gas stations, and so on – but most of all it gives some…

PROSPECTIVE

Growing up in LA, and taking trips to Michigan here and there, or maybe a drive or two to Vegas, I thought I knew what this country was about.  What I quickly found out was that I knew NOTHING.  Whether you’re in the city itself, or a suburb, or basically in any sort of main part of California, we seem to think we know how to “live the life”.  We know how Americans live, eat, sleep, breath.  After all, we’re “eclectic”, “diverse”, and full of “culture” – which is all true in it’s own metropolitan sense of the words.  In order to experience a different way of living or a new way of life we have to travel to Africa, India, China, some far away land that sounds nothing whatsoever like the United States.  But when’s the last time you went: “I want to see how someone else lives? I want to see hmmmm….how about Wyoming.”

I’m going to take a little guess at never.

I think city folk could use a little prospective here, travel the country, and see places and people.  Really, truly, see how little of America actually looks like LA, NY, SF, or whatever.  Because like it or not, no matter how spread out they may be, that “fly over country” so many of us dismiss so often, has people living and working and thriving there.  They raise the cattle for our meat, grow the corn, potatoes, wheat, and crops we eat.

Look, Hillsdale is a rural town with those back country dirt roads, and a one screen movie theater.  Wal-Mart seems to be the highlight of the town’s slumming economy, and the rest isn’t much to write home about.  This isn’t LA .  But I’m excited.  I want a new experience, a new prospective, a new taste of life.  Perhaps we’re so spoiled by having every little thing we could want at our fingertips, that we forget that outside of our little cultural bubble, there are other people out there.

Next time you get the chance, jump at the cross country drive, instead of groan.  Look around, here in our own country and learn from the people around you. Plus, it’s just drop dead gorgeous – the sights you will drive though are never ending and breathtaking.

I can’t believe all that I have seen and the beautiful country I have enjoyed – and I’ve only scratched the surface.  Not until now could I truly understand “America the Beautiful”.

*Update: since this post was originally written, that Rav4 has been totaled by no fault of my own.  Thank rural Michigan drivers for that one.  I have learned to drive (and survive) in the snow, appreciate the sun, and long for a real “city”.  Still after being back “home” in California, I can’t wait to get back to Hillsdale.  It seems that’s where my heart is – or at least it rests with the people there.

my boyfriend, Dan's, family farm. Isn't it beautiful!

 

Entering Wyoming, the "Big Sky State"

A Time for Film

If there was one thing I learned from the Film and Literature Class I took senior year from one of my favorite high school teachers, it was that those moving pictures worth remembering, worth your time, and worthy of being considered “art” are films.  Movies are entertainment.  That’s not to say that watching your favorite romantic comedy isn’t something to love, or that newly released “bromance” ought to be passed up – they all have their place.  But there is something truly special about a film that is as aesthetically pleasing as it is entertaining.

When you think about it, directors, actors, producers, and films, are asking a lot from their audience.  We are expected to set aside usually at least two hours of our lives in a sedentary state of awe, belief, captivation, emotion, and we sure don’t want it to feel like a whole two hours.  So in that way, we can be quite demanding.  Slowly but surely, I have gained an appreciation of more “artsy” films.  Those that have a purpose and a vision, are trying out a technique, technology, or are playing games with its audience.  Sometimes the mere cinematography of a film can make it entertaining even with a lacking or unimportant story line.

Still, the quintessential film is one that does it all.  It makes you laugh, cry, smirk, question, evolve, reveal, and leaves you satisfied but wanting more.  And it is this, for the most part, what I just don’t see in new films.  What is it that seems void or empty in modern picture making?  Is it the actors? The technology?  The writing? The music? Or some combination of all of these? Regardless, I find a year where “Avatar” and the “Hurtlocker” are runners up for Best Picture, to be a disappointing one.  Sure I had my own issues with Avatar (think Pocahontas rewritten along with fern gully, instead with blue aliens and the incredibly evil American white man), but overall I liked the Hurtlocker.  I just don’t think it was best picture material.   I do have to admit I was captivated by “The King’s Speech”.  I thought it was more than entertaining, well shot, moving, pointed, and layered.  Still, I find myself disappointed that this was all the film industry had to offer.

This all leads to one thing: I return to the classics.  Watching old movies has become one of my favorite pastimes and its one of those things I have always loved, but now appreciate even more.  There is nothing more quintessential than Humphrey Boggart’s side mouthed “Here’s lookin’ at you kid”, or the rough romance of Clark Gable’s frankly not giving a damn.  No closing scene will be quite as pointed or captivating as Francis Ford Copolla’s in The Godfather.  And no two people will ever be as beautifully depressingly picturesque as Paul Newman and Elizabeth Taylor in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.

In our computer age, SDI, high def technology, we have lost an eye for film beyond pixels, special effects, and 3D.  The careful placement of shots, angles, and frames, all once much more carefully structured with the human eye (and heart) is now left to programs, computers, and the push of a button rather than the physical moving of a camera.  Trick shots and difficult takes have lost their allure, and have removed the artistry from filmmaking.  Gone are the “Hitchcocks” who were trained and flourished in silent film, perfecting how to illustrate every move, breath, and idea of a scene without a sound to clue us in or a word to describe.

But I’m not a film snob…excuse me while I go prepare to watch Harry Potter 7 Part II.

Is there any film more perfect than the pairing of Humphrey Boggart and Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca?

A Time for….Choosing

Why Conservatism should be the movement of CHOICE

Returning to my little classical liberal arts, constitutional haven in the heart of southern Michigan after a whirl-wind four day excursion to CPAC in our nation’s capital, I have some thoughts.  Shocking – I know…

First, the little things:  if you want to increase your event attendance, provide food; unless you’re delivering a name as big as “Ann Coulter” in which case,  throw food in the opposite direction to send those weak, hungry people scammering away, making your event somewhat manageable and out of everyone else’s way.

Second, whatever your political, career, or life ambitions may be, they are not going to come true at CPAC.  This is not a Disney movie, and you are not wishing to become a “real boy”.  You will not meet your future chief of staff or campaign manager, future investor for your great new media outlet, or your future wife.  So stop talking yourself up, handing out your business card, and making blatantly obvious your bare left ring finder.  Also, please, please, please stop eyeing the college students.  No, half of them haven’t figured out that CPAC is not a nightclub, and no, we do not need any more intern incidents in DC.

Thirdly, (Ron Paul supporters take note) we work within a two party political system.  Don’t like it?  Then be original – not simply an extreme faction on one specific political issue.  Look, I am no GOP establishmentarian, and I love the Tea Party.  I am a huge supporter of groups, people, and organizations that seek to push politicians a certain direction.  I get it, you’re passionate, but that doesn’t mean you need to put up your own candidate.  I guess I kind of have an axe to grind with 3^rd parties.  They seem overly focused on singular issues.  Ask a Green Party member about their views on the Federal Reserve, or a Libertarian about abortion.  Both will probably give you circular indefensible answers.  Why?  Because their platform can’t run a country.  (Mind you, I have more sympathy for Libertarians than for Green Party candidates, but the fact doesn’t change that both are simply deviations on the left and the right).  So get out there, get excited, be loud, and make waves, but realize they are only ripples in the grand scheme of things and that Ron Paul winning the CPAC straw poll is trivial, at best.

So what is my point, and why did I blatantly rip off Ronald Reagan in my post’s title?  I am tired of the Liberals and the Democrats being all about “Choice”.  Why do they always get to set the language?  Choice is NOT about abortion.  When faced with moral right and moral wrong, there is no right choice to end a human life.  (But this argument is for another post).  My point is that the Conservative movement is about embracing liberty (tip of the hat to Tammy Bruce).  The choice to spend your money as you please outside of government intervention, the choice to start your own business, to innovate, to eat what you want, think how you want, live your life the way you want it, worship as you please, raise your own children, and choose what kind of life you want to make for yourself .  So I’m all about “Freedom of Choice”.  Actually I’m all for a “woman’s right to choose”….and you know what, I’m even for a man’s right to choose too.

Old "Rawhide" himself