Ohio Girl

I stop almost every morning at the same convenience store where I purchase some form of caffeine and a protein bar. I am convinced that the protein bar is way better for me than the candy bar that I really want. I don’t buy a banana, though, which would be better than both.

The convenience store is at a crossroads; it marks the intersection of those heading from country to city–or vice versa—although there is far less of the vice versa crowd. The parking lot is often full of trucks loaded down with farm gear and it is not unusual for a man to say “M’am” all while nodding, tipping his hat, and holding the door. I LOVE that, I must admit.

I pulled in today behind a beater pick-up loaded down with rusted, scrap metal—so rusted, so deeply brown, it reminded me of the shaved milk chocolate on the top of a fancy cake. I see people scrapping all the time lately. Folks have come knocking at the door offering to haul away Grandpa’s old tractors and split the proceeds. Many of the cases in my recent grand jury service involved people scrapping the junked-out cars of other people, without permission.

A man, with greased-lined cracks in his hands and beer on his breath, said “well hello” as he held the door. No hat, no “m’am.” His own beater truck was filled with barefoot children and a woman giving me the look of death as he looked me up and down. He looked at my empty, rust-free car with the same leer.

Another man came in, interrupting my pleasantries with the clerk, to ask for four dollars in gas—not even enough for a gallon. He was hurried with furrowed brow and muttered his hope that it would be enough to get him the rest of the way home.

A man with too much cologne was using the pay phone as I left. It was the first time I had seen a pay phone, much less one in use, in ages. I heard him ask the person on the other end if there was work today. He looked back at his truck filled with tools and asked if there might be work Monday then. His voice was over-calm.

When I got in the car the radio was announcing cheap gas spots in the area. As I pulled out another beater truck was pulling in. No farm gear, no hat, and I was already missing the “m’am.”

My hair keeps curling despite the fact that I flat-ironed it just this morning. The humidity in
Cleveland has reached that level that reduces us all to whining 90 year olds-decrying the heat, but recalling when it was way worse back in ‘32. It is difficult to tell where the Lake Erie horizon ends and the heavy sky takes over. It is thus way too humid for writing a proper first posting.

Back in the fall-when it was pleasantly brisk-Ohio was the center of the presidential election showdown. This is something I journaled at that time:

At midnight, southbound 71 departing from Cleveland was all mine. Northbound belonged to John Kerry, or maybe it was George Bush.  It was too dark to see what the buses said, Believe in America, or Yes We Can.  A wall of police cars flanked the caravan. “Huh,” I said to my dog riding in back. She looked up to peer at the flashing lights, yawned, and slept through the Ohio flatlands all the way to the southwest corner.

The harried Ohio visits of both candidates mirror my own criss-crossing of the state. Originally from Reily Township, a stones throw from Indiana and close to Cincinnati, I have lived in Cleveland for the last several years. I make the journey south to see family as often as I can. I am intimate with the exits of 71 as well as the back road routes. My urban environment slowly shifts to small towns to farmland, like the changing of seasons. The color of politics shifts as well, as the Kerry-blue of the northeast slowly gives way to a sea of Bush-red in the south.   

This shifting political landscape can be traced within my own family. A social worker, I voted for Nader in the last election. Perhaps to make up for the vague guilt of a wasted vote, I am now enthusiastically behind Kerry. I need a candidate who can muster at least a little sincerity for the people with whom I work-the poor, the struggling, the families barely getting by. 

My brother and his wife, who live in a suburb near Cincinnati, are Bush supporters. Their allegiance centers around a show of strength in the war on terror. In my brother’s world of sales, a show of strength–staying the course–means food on the table for his children.

My parents in Reily are serially disappointed by the extent to which those they help to elect, Republican or Democrat, have improved their lives. My Father, a steelworker, has watched plants around him move overseas. He has survived layoffs, experienced a decline in wages, and lives in fear of his factory closing before he can reach retirement. This stress is constantly compounded by his care of my grandparents who are nearly indigent and facing heart disease and Alzheimer’s. “I’m not crazy about Kerry,” he says, “but I don’t think we can survive much more of Bush.”

And then there is my sister, the non-voter. Busy with raising her daughter and working full-time, she is distracted from the threads of politics running through her daily life.   

Political debates over Saturday-night pizza can become lively with this bunch. My brother and I are most likely to raise our voices, my Mom and sister most likely to roll their eyes. But discord quickly gives way to agreement on the basics; working to keep the bills paid, caring for family, maintaining the Ohio we love for the next generation. All of whom, as we talk, busily play with trucks and crayons on the floor.