January 26th - 0-0

I had a weird kind of moment today. To understand it, we have to go all the way back to the spring of 1991. While at Ohio Northern University in beautiful downtown Ada, Ohio, I was just starting to date a girl named Rory Clingerman. Great girl, that Rory. Good people. Still the salt of the earth to this day.

Anyway, at one point, she was in her home town and I was at school, and I wanted to go visit her. Ed McKell (also the salt of the earth to this day) let me borrow his car for the trip. This was a very nice car, certainly the best I'd ever driven up to that point in my life, and it had a CD player in it, which was a bonus back in the days when "Compact Disc Digital Audio" was still written on the album covers. I had a nice visit with Rory, I think...I can't even really remember that, nor when it actually happened. Maybe this was the summer of '91 when I was working at ONU as a summer conference coordinator. Regardless, on the trip back, I was driving through the country roads of central Ohio in this great car, listening to Anderson, Bruford, Wakeman and Howe on the CD player, and life just seemed...good. It was peaceful; pleasant. I had a girlfriend. I had friends. I had music. I had peace. It struck me at that moment that it's something I should prolong, because I knew it wouldn't always be like that.



Last night, I tricked myself into feeling that way again. I think it was the car. My '98 Honda Civic is in the shop, so I've got a rental car, a Toyota Camry. This is a nice car, certainly better than I'm used to. So last night, I was driving down the highway in this car with a CD player that actually works and axles that don't sound like they're about to tear off at any moment, and a gas line that's not about to bust wide open, and no dog hair, and a windshield I can see through, and I'm listening to Transvision Vamp, of all things, and that peace settled back over me. It was fleeting, and it was fake, but for a few brief moments as I drove down State Route 8 towards my family in Mogadore, I felt good.

Is it the car that does this? Is it only when I'm driving someone else's car? Is it only when I'm listening to music that most people have forgotten (or never heard of)? Or, am I really still at peace despite all the crap going on around me, and I just need the occasional moment of worry-free calm to realize it? I don't know. But I liked it.

Dump to my running back for four yards.

Hiner's Ball: 2nd and 6 on my own 42.