Ron Burgundy

My first car. He was a burgundy 2004 Chevy Trailblazer, complete with four wheel drive and non-leather seats. He was a beaut and man was he good to me. He went through more with me than any car, or person for that matter, should have to go through with a girl. I don't really have any great picture of him - but here is a nice one of his rear.

In high school, your car practically defines who you are, or at least where I'm from. So you might notice the four stickers on the back. It is fair to say that those also represented all the treasures that filled every inch of Ron. I'll start with the two typical high school stickers, my volleyball and theatre found on the right side.

With volleyball came the beautiful stench that developed in Ron during season; a mix between dirty feet and forced air freshener, occasionally mixed with Hawaiian Febreze. The emergency volleyball supplies Ron held handy at all times consisted of: one all-weather volleyball, a pair of athletic clothes incase a spontaneous sand volleyball game were to occur, knee-pads with a stench that carried for miles, water bottles for hydration and Gatorades if my electrolytes were to get low, a box of Mueller Pre-Wrap in forrest green to tend to my tendonitous and become an instant headband, and of course, socks. Socks of different heights, colors, patterns, and solids. Even though volleyball was my main squeeze, I could still get down on the tennis court. Because of that, my tennis racquet and a three pack of Wilson US Open tennis balls was always available in the trunk, along with a spare frisbee, hacky sack, baseball glove and bathing suite.

Well, if that isn't enough, we move onto the next sticker: theatre. Now with this, Ron was put to a challenge. See, this could include any prop, costume, or set piece you can think of. It has ranged from a pirate costume, tree branches, an Iron Man mask, fake flowers and fruit, a thrown, chainsaw, british hats, gogo boots, and any wig you can imagine. Mullet, Bieber, clown afro, 1970s afro, Repunzel hair, red bob, black goth, blonde locks, and even clip in colored hair pieces. I was known to have the miniature costume closet in my trunk, so when on the go, or even buying food in a drive-thru, we could always provide an interesting twist to an unfortunate stranger's night.

Anyway, if you direct your eyes to the left side of Ron's rear end, you will notice my Young Life sticker and "Earth/Art" sticker from the Modern. In high school I was miss Young Life, and I am still in love with the ministry. I would sport that sticker on on my car now if I still had one. With this, there weren't a lot of objects floating around, besides the flyers that would eventually cover my floor board. With this label came the obligation and opportunity to cart people everywhere. I would pick friends up for club on Monday night, drive my girls around to get snowcones, and stuff people in the trunk when all the seats were filled. And well, with the Modern sticker, I went through a big art phase, where all I wanted to do was go to plays and museums and really care about something, so that sticker really "spoke to me" when I saw it at the Modern. Impulse ya know? Better then a tattoo. 

Poor Ron got picked on by friends and the police more then he could help. He was pretty magical in the way that he could transform into a jungle gym, climbing wall, bed, canvas, and race car. Not only was he bullied by outside forces, but had to deal with a pretty crappy driver. I managed to get pulled over six times while with him, and pushed his max speed to 110 mph a few times when racing after church (luckily I never got pulled over during any of these races). Oh yeah, and he got banged into a mailbox, two stationary cars, and a lot of curbs. He took it like a man though; he was a man. 

Ron had a free spirit. He loved to drive around for hours with no final destination - just cruisin'. He would jam out hard, allowing the radio to blast and his antenna blow in the wind. He always came through whether it was just my daily drive to Starbucks, mudding through the trails, or a friend and I went to Oklahoma on impulse. He was down and ready for any adventure thrown his way. There are times that I see Ron's impostors on the road and find myself missing him; the easy turn of the wheel, the break that wasn't as sensitive as I needed it to be, the quiet purr of his engine starting so my parents couldn't hear when sneaking out, and the stick that would shift from drive to neutral with no command. He always came through when I needed him most, keeping me safe and happy. He provided my freedom, sparks of joy, and means of being spontaneous. He was there when I needed to cry, when I needed to scream, and most importantly, put up with my singing voice when no one else would.

"I don't know how to put this, but I'm kind of a big deal" - Ron Burgundy 

Ron - you are a big deal in my eyes. Thanks for everything. 

Christmas with the Fam

Christmas has always been my favorite time of year because of family. On the Walker side, there are forty-five of us total. Nana and pa, ten aunts and uncles, and now thirty-three cousins including spouses. There is always more food then you can possibly eat, more cookies than chocolate milk to accompany them, and if you think my laugh is bad - with the whole family we could supply energy for a small village with the noise we provide. 

Every christmas memory that pops into mind has two things in common. Setting: Nana and Pa's house. In the picture above we are sitting in a small portion of the front yard. This is their house in Beaumont, Texas, that we went to every year until I was a freshman in high school.  Theirs is the house to the right with the "Chester the Molester" van in the drive way. At the time my uncle Dave drove that beauty around, and had the thickest mustache a man could ask for - thus came his title as Chester. The second thing, cast: (from left to right) Becca (born in 1993), Kelsey (1989), Taylor (1990), and myself (1991). Other people play part, but they are the three cousins I have always been closest too, and thus manage to make it into everyone. 

Now ever since I can remember, the four of us have always received the same general gift. It has varied from Simba stuffed animals, indoor laser tag vests, Mary-Kate and Ashley movies, and easy-bake ovens. The one Christmas I will never forget is the year we all got a Razor scooter with green wheels and a Gameboy complete with Frogger and Pokemon games. 

Yes, yes, I know we look good. And I know I'm the coolest because I had a scooter pet. But seriously, we were obsessed. We missed the annual front yard football game to scoot around the neighborhood, refused to get a ride to the park to play hide-and-go-seak, but had to "drive" ourselves, and barely touched the back yard bounce house we had that year because we couldn't take our scooters inside of it. Once it got dark, and strangers and rabid dogs began to patrol the neighborhood, we would sit inside and play our gameboys. Nana and Pa have never been so good to us. Santa couldn't touch what Nana and Pa could do. 

Now as we continue to grow older, the gifts have changed, and our excitement to "play" with them has withered away. Yet, our excitement to see each other and play with each other will never go away. Even now when our lives look pretty different, Kels is about to start talking about marriage, Tay is partying away at Texas Tech, and Becs is just starting her college life in Austin, we are always kept close by the bonds of family, and particularly, Christmas. 

The Creek.

I grew up in suburbia twenty minutes north of Dallas. My front yard was in a city named Richardson, and my back yard resided in good ole' Garland. My backyard was my barbie dream house. Sure I played inside when I was younger, when I was at friend's houses we would play with barbies or play school. But when we were at my house, you couldn't drag us inside. We had a swing set, slide, hammock, huge trees perfect for climbing, a trampoline, and pool with primo diving ledge. However, the real adventure and fun came beyond the fence.

It was a four foot, black metal fence that held everything in, and kept everything I wanted out. The paint was chipping and it was beginning to lack stability. The door to adventure was old, rusted and virtually impossible to open unless you had the magic touch of an adult. Haley and I would tug at that handle every day one summer until we realized we could just jump the fence. We were in third grade, and once we got over, there was no keeping us away. Somehow, in the middle of suburbia, a thick stretch of land managed to stay populated with huge trees, poison ivy, dead logs, a winding creek, lake, and paths forged by kids before us. We had explored through this land before with our dads when we would go fishing on the dock, but it seemed so much bigger and exciting on our own.

The creek was our summer house. Once you hop the fence, it was a short two minute walk to the bridge that led across the creek, but where most continue forward with the lake as a final destination, we took a sharp right. The ground is all dirt, welcoming your footprints, guiding and misleading explorations. The creek is sunken into the ground, from the path it is probably a solid eight or ten feet under. After following the creek for a little, we would slide down to be creekside. It was shallow for the majority and only a few feet wide in places. Mossy rocks to step across, sand to sink your toes in, leaves for picking, empty water and beer bottles to fill with water, pieces of tile, part of a fence, and rocks to skip. Everybody else's trash that ended up in that small stretch of the creek was our treasure. The smell was a typical stench of dirty water and outside, but to us, it meant more. It meant freedom, creation, imagination, and adventure.

The best part was an old tree, it was our "bedroom". The trunk started up where the path was, but down creekside, where there should have been land that surrounded the roots, it was open air. Over time mother nature managed to push out all of the mud, dirt, rocks, and critters in a six foot area between the bottom of the trunk and where the ground was now to create the best fort a child could ask for. We managed to decorate and furnish it. Where you could easily fall into the creek between two roots, we posted the old fence piece up as a guard. We found an old tire, that became a chair. Golf balls and broken tile went in the bark to add a creative touch. We made ourselves a home.

Despite the threat of bugs, coyotes, bobcats, poison ivy, snakes, and thorn bushes, we would stay down there until the sun set. It was our oasis, where we were free to make up our own world and live whatever life we wanted.

Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been

Out of all the stories this year, this is the one that managed to keep my attention the best by keeping me on edge throughout the whole story. I read Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been two weeks before the class day for it since it was my groups presentation story, yet when my roommate walked in on me reading it she thought I was stress reading for class because I was that sucked into the story. 

So what about it had me that engaged? Really, I don't know. It was a very odd story, and really dark. It was sad watching Connie force herself to grow up much faster then a girl should. It was sad to watch her far-away dreams and romantic fantasy become a sad, crude reality.  Maybe it’s so heartbreaking because so many girls do that now. It is normal for girls to be pregnant and unmarried in high school, magazine’s sell sex, and youthful girls force themselves to be more sexually mature then they are physically, mentally, or spiritually. Maybe the story is so sad because it can be so convicting to our society.

It reminded me a lot of the Yellow Woman; the whole idea of dream versus awake and myth versus reality. For Connie, the music was her dream. She romanticized life using lyrics and rhythm from songs she loved. Yellow woman lived in a myth she had heard growing up, that myth became her reality. Connie’s myth of the music, became her reality, but in a very ugly way – in a way she never before intended or probably thought possible. Her coming of age was thrust upon her, because she put out the temptation. 

The Man Who Was Almost a Man

When it comes to the theme coming of age, this story exemplified it the best to me. It truly shows that not only the decisions you make can define your life, but more than that, the way you deal with your decisions and face the people affected by them. 

Life is about more then just actions, it is more then just a flip of a coin and choosing one way or another. Once you made your decision, the most important part is dealing with it. Being honest in word with friends and family, loving in actions towards all, and being mature and confident in what you are deciding. If there are consequences (and there always are), you must be a man and look them in the face to deal with them. Life is difficult, and is a constant learning process. No one will ever be perfect or learn it all, and everyone will make a bad or wrong choice somewhere along the road. I have made plenty, and in my climax of immature life in the past, I dealt with things the wrong way, and hurt people along the way. I knew it wasn't the right thing to do, but I wasn't able or willing to grow up and be mature at that point in my life. Yet, seeing the way it affected people, that the smallest things you do can leave a huge stamp on someone else's life, makes you realize that running away isn't the answer. I like to think I have matured in the last few years, but it is a process. I like to think I am going through my "coming of age"stage now, so who knows where I will end up. Only God. 

The Lottery

The second story that anyone could ask me about and I would immediately know what to say is The Lottery. Shirley Jackson did such a great job at keeping the ending hidden. I wasn't a big fan of the short story for the first four pages. It moved to slow, with more detail then I really cared for dealing with a box and rituals, after all - it's just a lottery. Well, around page five is when you start to get the hunch that something isn't right, that this lottery isn't normal. Before, I just wasn't quite sure what it was for, could have been money, or food, or no taxes, but definitely something pleasant none the less. Now you realize you don't want to win the lottery. My first reaction is death, but then I second guessed myself by saying there was no way.

Well - there was a way. By stoning her. It is a story that speaks volumes, because it seems to be in a whisper the whole time until you reach the plot twisting climax. I read this story and just assumed it was back in an earlier century. So when you look at the date it was intended for, 1948, it especially seems ridiculous. That is how our society is though. We don't go around randomly stoning one person each year, but when push comes to shove, you don't want to be the one shoved. It is amazing how quickly some people can throw friends "under the bus" when it means they advance further in life, or how so many people have a mindset to not truly care for neighbors and reach out. We are becoming a society where pure kindness and caring shown through face to face interactions of one reaching out to another is dwindling. Sure, maybe you would be sad if someone in your dorm got robbed, but as long as it wasn't you, some might even help the robber. Obviously The Lottery is an extreme example, but still.

Many of us aren't living our lives with the care and love we are called to do, and a huge factor is because it is normal not to. It was normal and expected to stone one person each year. It is normal for divorce to happen and it is expected by most here to receive presents Christmas morning. The society you grow up in has the serious ability to shape you, your beliefs, your expectations in and from life.

I know this post was kind of all over the place, sorry.

Yellow Wall-Paper

If you were to say the name of one of the short stories we read this year, it would take me a while to remember what it was about (if I could truly remember at all). However, there were a few that really stuck with me, proving that they meant something to me - so I will write the next few blogs about those stories.

The first of which is The Yellow Wall-Paper. I'm not clinically crazy, I've always been invited to express my feelings and thoughts, never experienced post-partum depression, and have never been locked in a room with bars on all windows. I don't know why I related to her, or to the story, but for some reason I did. The story was an extremely captivating one. It is easy to read, and you are intrigued to turn the page to hear her next thoughts. It is an extremely sad story, watching our narrator turn from almost innocent and lost, being told to not work and sit in this room. I can't imagine being cooped up all day - I would go crazy too. If you aren't aloud to socialize, to work, paint, create, live life, how can you ever be expected to go back to living a normal life. You can't. She was doomed from the start.

The think what really makes me think about this story is just how infatuated and obsessive she was the inanimate object. Trying to put myself in that state of mind is simply impossible. It really saddens my heart to see the poor state of mind she was in, and the lack of anyone truly helping, anyone asking her what she needs and really listening.