“I don't know what I'm going to write about this one,” Cleshonda said, and I agreed. With the rest of our class we stood in the afternoon heat. The sun bore down on us the second we exited the C-SPAN bus and gathered in the parking lot. It had been a brief, unexpected lecture given on a cool couch facing buttons and TV screens.
A chatty man with a black rat tail relayed anecdotes about the big days in C-SPAN history. A camera crew from a local station popped in to film us, which I found ironic, since I'd just told Elizabeth that I'd be O.K., “as long as we aren't filmed, I hate being on TV.” Then after a few jotted notes, a free pen and pamphlet, we were prematurely tossed back into the real world.
Wasn't what I expected at all.
Having toured CNN headquarters last summer, I expected a watered down version—part propaganda, part politics, part control room demonstration. Maybe we would get to do one of those cool fake broadcasts, or deliver the weather, or film something. Although, the CNN tour wasn't exactly what I had expected either, but I did get a wave from one of their anchors...I've forgotten their names now.
But Cleshonda's words rang in my head as I walked back to my car following the field trip. I tried to formulate the beginning of an essay on the C-SPAN bus, but kept hearing my classmates conversations. For a long while, Aaron, and Elizabeth studied the outfit a girl was wearing (she must of gotten dressed with her eyes closed, but they gave her points for...effort). Aaron noted that our guide was definitely not camera ready. We all joked about Bush, discussed Jamaica, and laughed when our teacher asked the guide about fast food. I couldn't remember one small tidbit about C-SPAN, but I laughed all the way home.
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I never did care much for buses.
I started riding the school bus at the same age as most children, five years old when I began kindergarten. Both my parents worked and the school bus only went to the beginning of the dirt road. All the other kids walked the remainder of the way, but Mamma didn’t want me doing that.
Instead, I got off at Ms. Hattie’s house; she had been looking after me since I was just a baby. Daddy was a drunk and Mamma couldn’t do it all by herself.
Ms. Hattie would make me Kool-Aid popsicles for after school, then we’d go way down the dirt road out back of her house and work in the garden she shared with all her neighbors. She’d hold my little hand. Hers was big and rough made from years of hard work.
Before we walked home, a lot of times we’d go over to the cabbage rows. I’d pick out the best looking one and Ms. Hattie would bend down and cut it right off the dirt with an old pocket knife. Then, she’d tear off all the leathery outer leaves that protect the inside part and throw them down for fertilizer. She’d put the cabbage in her apron and we’d walk back up to the house where she put it on to boil.
Some days, if it was still hot enough, we’d walk up the paved road to Blind Pete’s house. He wasn’t really blind, but he did have glasses that looked about like two bottoms from old Co-Cola bottles. He couldn’t see much farther than about a foot in front of his face.
Blind Pete had a big watermelon patch in the old pasture next to his house, and he grew yellow watermelons. I didn’t believe Ms. Hattie the first time she told me, but sure enough there one was when we got over there. A deer had put his hoof through it the night before, and the bright yellow flesh was scattered all around it. We’d cut a watermelon, and Ms. Hattie would tuck in under one arm and take my hand for the walk home.
Whenever we got back from our walk, Ms. Hattie would give me a bath. She always put in her pink bubbling soap that she bought from a lady up the street who sold Avon. After my bath, we’d sit out on the porch eating popsicles or big watermelon slices and spitting out the seeds until Mamma got back from work.
When I got up in school a little ways, Mamma quit her job keeping the books for doctors. Her office was relocating all the way over to LaGrange and she couldn’t be away that far from her family. She didn’t like doctors anyway. If they were in a bad mood, they could be meaner than a damn snake. She decided to go up to the school and keep the books for them, so I didn’t have to ride the bus anymore.
Not too long after Mamma got her new job, she took sick and had to go into the hospital. We all thought she was going to die. Daddy put me in the extended day program at the school so someone could look after me until he got off work. I didn’t like it too much. I asked him why I couldn’t just go back to Ms. Hattie’s. He said that would be fine if she agreed to it, so I was back on the bus.
One day, when Ms. Hattie was combing my hair after my bath, I asked her if she’d come and get me up at the school after classes let out so I wouldn’t have to ride the bus. People look at you all sad and mournful when your Mamma’s dieing and I didn’t want anything to do with them. They didn’t even know my Mamma.
I never did care much for buses.
...................................
Needless to say, I wasn’t all too excited to go look at the C-SPAN bus.
As I sat there listening to the man with the rat-tail going down his back talk about the history of C-SPAN, I started thinking about where all this bus had been and where it was going to go.
For the next year or so, this bus would go to debate after debate as America tuned in to figure out who they were going to elect to be the next President. This made me think of Ms. Hattie.
She was always real proud of her country. On Election Day, she’d put on her Sunday best and go up to the school to take up ballets and run them through the counting machine. Then, she’d hand everyone their “I Voted” stickers with a big smile on her face absolutely glowing with pride to be such a big part of the voting process.
When my class would walk by to lunch, I’d run out of line straight at her. She’d laugh and open her arms to scoop me up in a hug.
I never thought to ask Ms. Hattie how she felt about buses, but I think she would have really liked this one. Too bad the man with the rat-tail didn’t have any Kool-Aid popsicles or watermelon.
Road to the White House
I flip through this album watching the pages fall upon the span of my life. Seeing only a glimpse of the past 24 years, but knowing that the next six months will change the span of these pages, I sit on my raggedy black couch meditating on the things that has change me, and the things that need to be changed in order to better who I’ve become.
I’m different now. Sometimes I wish that I was still innocent without worries, but who am I kidding, there have always been worries, always someone or something to protect.
I remember taking early morning rides to the white house that sat on the corner of Clark and Larfague, where my granny used to cook homemade cornbread on top of the stove. I used to love going to my granny house, so that I could eat some of her cornbread; however at eight those rides to this little white house used to be so long and full of dread because the cream colored walls captured everything that happened in the living room of this small white house on the corner of Clark and Lafargue when I was eight-years-old. I worried then about who was going to save me, from the things that I now, sometimes remember to forget; however, I quickly learned that protecting me is my first priority.
But who’s willing to protect me from the things I’ve done within the past 3 weeks or the things I will do within the next couple of month to make myself feel better right now or to make myself feel worst in the morning because no matter how much I bathe his scent won’t wash off my skin. I can smell the alcohol on his breath as he heavily breath in my face, as he force himself within me. I don’t protest; I just think of the things that I could be doing in the morning or the things I could have been doing before he insisted on wasting 30 minutes of both our lives. I shouldn’t have answered my phone; I shouldn’t have opened my door. I should have put down the glass of liquidized soul stimulating transgression.
Wednesday night I went to the club for the first time in about six months. I went to the bar, ordered my usual and found a table never the dance floor. My intentions were to have a good time with my sister but I wasn’t feeling the club scene. So I looked for my enjoyment at the bottom of my Gray Goose and cranberry juice. I allowed the liquid to overcome the person I needed to be, to satisfy the person that I’ve become in these pictures at the end of this photo album.
I drunk one glass too many before I found the man I didn’t need in my life. He stood at the bottom of my Gray Goose and cranberry juice, blurry. I saw him beneath the ice of the last drink I should have never drunk; because I stupidly made some wrong choices. Or maybe I’m just using the alcohol as an excuse for enticing a man I would have never chosen sober but I had no worries as I consume my salvations. I had no worries, until the morning.
It’s been four days since I’ve met him but he’s somehow assumed that since I’ve allowed him to see me beyond the club that now we are together. He has asked me not to go to the club because there’s no reason for me to be there since I’ve found him; I smiled at his stupidity. He doesn’t know me enough to expect me to call him, so why in hell does he expect more from me then what I was willing to give. One night of very truthful moments that’ll never be recorded in this photo album.
He glanced at photo on my coffee table saying, “I know that cat?” referring to a picture of my big brother.
I quickly asked, “How do you know him?”
“We used to hang out back in the day. He used to stay at the end of Lafargue Street in a white house on the right hand side…. I remember his grandma used to cook cornbread every time I went by. Boy we used to be mannish back in those days. How do you know him?”
“He’s my brother.”
“Your brother? I know your family…. all your cousins.”
With an uninterested look I asked politely, “Please leave, I don’t mess with anyone that knows my family. I have my reputation to protect. My granny would kill me if she thought…..”
I’m no longer innocent like my granny assumes, so when taking the road to the white house on the corner of Clark and Lafargue I am consumed with dread because I have to become someone that only the photos in this album remembers. I’m different then when I was in love, and different from whom I will become after the Gray Goose and cranberry juice soothe me… until the morning; changing me into the person that I need to become. I meditate.
The bus itself is completely decked out. The outside is painted, almost as a traveling advertisement for CSPAN. There are about 6 people that belong to this group of traveling spokespeople. It’s obvious that all of these people are part of a subculture. They’re proud of it. Our guide sits down and begins his speech. I’m sure he’s gone over these same details many times today.
He starts by listing CSPAN’s different outlets and programming. CSPAN, CSPAN 2, CSPAN 3, CSPAN in the classroom, and CSPAN radio. His main points gravitate around the differences between commercially run news giants like CNN, MSNBC, and FoxNews. He even shows the programming and differences between news happening and being presented on CSPAN, and the same news on the other channels. The majority of the other news channels are filled with commercial advertising, streamlined news at the bottom of the screen, and multiple angles and videos of events happening affected by the same events as the speeches that are being covered. It’s pretty distracting.
I like the fact that CSPAN has no advertising. I find it very interesting that it can survive in a society where commercialism and capitalism are major themes throughout all facets of life. It seems that he is proud of his involvement with such an organization. There are only 270 employees working at CSPAN, and only 6 on this traveling bus. The fact that he knows the name of the founder, Bryan Lamb, and speaks so highly of him draws a picture of pride for working for this company. It gives me an even deeper understanding of his feelings toward the company, and his feeling of being part of its subculture.
I soon see that with our group, he has to step outside of his normal speech requirements. After all, as a group of writers, we are also part of a subculture. We are here to ask questions outside of the box, to paint a noncommercialized picture of the experience of this traveling bus. Just in our small group, there are things we can talk about amongst each other that no one else would ever understand. It shows in the writings we share with each other. The whole experience of this bus has brought me to a better understanding of the importance of subcultures. These people need to be off in the world of speech coverage, just like we need to be off in the world of writing, just like everyone feels the need to find a group or family of people with the same interests. We all need our own subcultures to understand our individuality.
Road to the White House (a better version)
I flip through this photo album watching the pages fall upon the span of my life. Seeing only a glimpse of the past 24 years, but knowing that the next six months will change the span of these pages, I sit on my raggedy black couch meditating on the things that has change me, and the things that need to be changed in order to better who I’ve become.
I’m different now; as I always am after a break up. Sometimes I wish that I was still innocent without worries, but who am I kidding, there have always been worries; always someone or something to protect; always something willing to change me.
I remember taking early morning rides to the white house that sat on the corner of Clark and Larfague, where my granny used to cook homemade cornbread on top of the stove. I used to love going to my granny house, so that I could eat some of her cornbread; however at eight those rides to this little white house used to be so long and full of dread because the cream colored walls captured the major event that changed me drastically. Everything that happened in the living room of this small white house on the corner of Clark and Lafargue, when I was eight-years-old, was recorded by cream colored walls now dingy with age. I worried then about who was going to save me, from the things that I now, sometimes remember to forget; however, I quickly learned that protecting me is my first priority; a new task I wasn’t ready to take on…at eight-years-old.
Who’s willing to protect me now from the things I’ve done within the past 3 weeks or the things I will do within the next couple of month to make myself feel better now or to make myself feel worst in the morning because no matter how much I bathe, his scent stays embedded within my skin. I can smell the alcohol on his breath as he heavily breathes in my face, as he forces himself within me. The smell of Remy Martin, the last beverage he consumed, seemed to linger along the contours of my jaw line, as he placed unwanted kisses upon my tainted skin. I don’t protest; I just think of the things that I could be doing in the morning or the things I could have been doing before he insisted on wasting 30 minutes of both our lives. I shouldn’t have answered my phone; I shouldn’t have opened my door. Four days ago I should have put down the glass of liquidized soul stimulating transgression, instead of allowing the solution to define me.
Wednesday night I went to the club for the first time in about six months. I went to the bar, ordered my usual and found a table near the dance floor. My intentions were to have a good time with my sister but I wasn’t feeling the club scene. So I looked for my enjoyment at the bottom of my Gray Goose and cranberry juice, allowing the liquid to overcome the person I needed to be, to satisfy the person that I’ve become in these pictures at the end of this photo album.
I drunk one glass too many before I found the man I didn’t need in my life. He stood at the bottom of my Gray Goose and cranberry juice, blurry. I smiled. He smiled back as he approached my table. I saw him walk towards me, beneath the ice of the last drink I should have never drunk; because I stupidly made some wrong choices. Let me be real. The alcohol was only an excuse; I was willing to give myself for enticing a man I would have never chosen sober. I had no worries as I consume my salvations. I had no worries, until the morning.
It’s been four days since I’ve met him but he’s somehow assumed that since I’ve allowed him to see me beyond the club that now we are together. He has asked me not to go to the club because there’s no reason for me to be there since I’ve found him; I smiled at his stupidity. He doesn’t know me enough to expect me to call him, so why in hell does he expect more from me then what I was willing to give. One night of very truthful moments that’ll never be recorded in this photo album.
He glanced at photo on my coffee table saying, “I know that cat?” referring to a picture of my big brother.
I quickly asked, “How do you know him?”
“We used to hang out back in the day. He used to stay at the end of Lafargue Street in a white house on the right hand side…. I remember his grandma used to cook cornbread every time I went by. Boy we used to be mannish back in those days. How do you know him?”
“He’s my brother.”
“Your brother? I know your family…. all your cousins.”
With an uninterested look I asked politely, “Please leave, I have my reputation to protect. My granny would kill me if she thought….. Yeah, this has been nice but... my granny thinks I’m… innocent.
I’m no longer the little girl my granny remembers, so when taking this long road to the small white house on the corner of Clark and Lafargue, I am consumed with dread because I have to become someone that only the photos in this album remembers. I’m different then I was a month ago, and different from whom I will become after the Gray Goose and cranberry juice soothe me… until the morning; changing me into the person that I need to become.
I meditate as I sit on my raggedy black couch flipping through the photographic record of changes, knowing that tomorrow’s ride will be just as difficult being that I’m conscious of his what has happened four days ago and what will happen tomorrow; when I allow him gain access to who I am at the moment.
I am different now, but still searching for someone to save me.
What is a Rat Tail? A miniature mullet. A skinny ponytail at the base of the skull often braided or held in a tight bundle by a rubber band. An alarmingly long strand of hair extending down the back like the tail of a rodent. A popular hair style in the eighties. Billy Ray Cyrus’ lost cousin.
There’s a man from CSPAN talking to our class about the ins and outs of government broadcast, and all I can concentrate on is his braided rat tail. All it would take is one good snip and he would be free from his trailer park inspired appendage.
What perplexes me even more is that this gentleman isn't from the south. He lives in Washington D.C. and began working for CSPAN long before people even considered such a hair-do. You’d think that a producer or director or maybe even a public relations manager would have suggested a better image, but apparently not. I thought that in the news business, people focused on the present, not the past.
I wonder how often he unbraids it to wash it or to comb it. Or if his wife has ever rolled over onto it in her sleep. It probably hurts the center his back on long flights. I bet if he turned his head all the way to the right, it would flip over his left shoulder.
I was excited about going on this tour of the CSPAN “Road to the Whitehouse” bus. It’s funny how these creative writing field trips work. The places I initially felt would be very interesting seem not to be, and the places I was not so enthused about it, turn out to be great. Today, of all the buttons, cameras, and gadgets, the rat tail is by far the most remarkable.
Finally, my C-SPAN story. I didn't get to go on the tour of the bus with the rest of the class, because my family was in town that day. Instead, I had to go earlier before class started. When I arrived to the humanities parking lot that sunny day, I stood outside the bus for a few minutes trying to take it all in.
It was an advertisement on wheels for C-SPAN.
I waited around a few minutes for some others to show up so that we could get the grand tour. When we finally got inside, our guide to the glory of C-SPAN began going over all the different listings for C-SPAN. Who knew there would be so many different stations for one tv program.
I start to zone out about five minutes into the poor guys speech. I think we are his first group today, so the speech is a test run.
I've never really watched the news, or even C-SPAN for that matter. I live in my own world when it comes to the news, some people call that denial.
I try to snap myself back into reality, because I can hear his speech starting to wind down. He asks if anyone has anymore questions, and it appears as if everyone else in our group had also let their minds wander. All I see are blank stares all around the room. Everyone itching to get up and leave the bus.
Small Change Bus Trip
How far could we possibly go on a parked bus? Needless to say, in the case of the C-Span Bus, not far at all. The outside of the bus was elaborately decorated with patriotic symbols and a diverse group of people representing a multicultural viewing audience. On the front of the bus the title “Road to the White House” allowed for the assumption that the C-Span bus would be a political strategy on wheels. Oh no, not more Bush supporters, not more senseless reasons to justify an unjust war! Would there be small monitors with images of a problematic president, casualties of a war, in which we have lost count, Republican Congressman advocating the deployment of more troops, young husbands, fathers, anxious students trapped by the terms of a G.I. Bill. Maybe they will show Nancy Pelowski, Republicans get your life jackets for the flood gates have opened. Maybe, Madam Speaker of the House will pour out pools of political rhetorical overflowing with ways to right the wrongs of a contaminated nation. This holy water could penetrate
Paula Harris
Creative Non-Fiction
Small Change Bus Trip
How far could we possibly go on a parked bus? Needless to say, in the case of the C-Span Bus, not far at all. The outside of the bus was elaborately decorated with patriotic symbols and a diverse group of people representing a multicultural viewing audience. On the front of the bus, the title “Road to the White House” allowed for the assumption that the C-Span bus would be a political strategy on wheels. Oh no, not more Bush supporters, not more senseless reasons to justify an unjust war! Would there be small monitors with images of a problematic president, casualties of a war, in which we have lost count, Republican Congressman advocating the deployment of more troops, young husbands, fathers, anxious students trapped by the terms of a G.I. Bill? Maybe they will show Nanci Pelowski. Republicans get your life jackets for the flood gates have opened! Maybe, Madam Speaker of the House will pour out pools of political rhetorical overflowing with ways to right the wrongs of a contaminated nation. This holy water could penetrate the disguises of Pedi file Republicans, overpaid, underperforming members of Congress, maybe even allow for an absolution from the sins they have committed against a naïve society.
While waiting to get on the bus, a lost time dime caught the reflection of the sun casting a reflection on my hand. I picked it up thinking there would definitely be no money to be found on the “Road to the White House,” not for me anyway. (my people group is of no political concern this time, Bush does not need our support, he is already in office and besides Conzaleeza Rice speaks for all of us, right?!
After waiting for a while, our class boarded the bus. It was smaller than I expected. One long, couch-like seat embroidered with stars reassured me that this bus must a political strategy on wheels. Nevertheless, I became a part of the sandwich made up of instructor, classmates, and some rather annoying couple. I glanced around to try and find something informative, only to notice the rest of the crew enjoying a late lunch, which Mr. Alford commented on the nutritional value of or lack there of. I only gathered bits and pieces of what a guy with an annoyingly long braid hanging from his head, was saying….
We are a non-commercial network,
We cover public affairs,
The government does not fund us,
We receive our funding from cable companies,
We are not profit seeking,
The guy with the braid concluding by saying, “Never pass up a chance to do something you want to do, you may never get the opportunity again.” With that, someone alerted him that the next group was ready to board the bus. As we exited the bus, I reached for a free pen and some pamphlets in hope that I would get some information on exactly what C-Span was all about. Besides, if I did not get anything else out of this, I can say I got to see what the inside of the C-Span bus actually looked like. I could also say I actually experienced what it felt like to be videoed by a real life news reporter. It’s like you become unconsciously (so fake). My hair was a mess and I didn’t have any of that stuff those news anchors call make up caked on my face. Nevertheless, keeping it real, I stood in front of the camera and said something that seems like the right thing to say. But, I can say I seized the opportunity to be on camera. Who knows, I many never get that chance again (thinking back to what the guy with the long braid said). So, I left with some useful advice and some small change. I guess I didn’t leave empty handed.
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