Day 2 - Ghetto Transactions. Homeland Security Hitting Home. Ice Cream Gettaway.

I spent the morning mostly lunging in only my boardshorts. I forgot about sunscreen until it was really too late. I spent enough time watching the Stallion girls run laps and do stretches -- soaking up the sun and the beauty, trying to stay out of the way. But eventually I grew tired and thought I better keep moving.

So I rearranged my backpack, and packed up my tent. As I passed in behind where some uniformed girls were playing catch, a couple of them missed the ball by accident, and I tossed it back. I got smiles all round, and a couple cute thank yous too. These sorts of things sometimes happen on purpose. You have an extended plane. And on that plane you have two intersecting lines (continuing on indefinitely, never to meet again -- under our system of mathematics anyways). Before I left the schoolground I refilled my waterbottle with water from the big orange Gatorade jug, and mixed in a packet of tang I brought along. I also stole a green tennis ball that was just lying by itself in the parking lot (the springiest tennis ball I've ever seen). They really did have way too many tennis balls.

Looking back, it probably wasn't the best choice to come down to Columbus. I spent the whole day burning up in the sun, not getting a hope of a ride even. At first I got stuck in what I took to be a sort of near-suburban ghetto area. On the one hand, the people seemed really interesting, and in some cases cool (think the guy with the green and yellow mowhawk driving the rusty muscle car, or the guy in the sporty car with the windows down and pumping hip-hop drum n' bass beats seemingly playing from the engine). But on the other hand I felt like I just couldn't connect with them (and vice versa). Then again, I was being introduced to a whole new culture -- Escalades straight out of a BET music video, crazy cornrow styles I've never seen before, and white trash heavy metal Nirvana remixes.

I think I clued into the whole ghetto-ness of the neighbourhood with one particular exchange. First a car filled with beautiful black women drove up. I guess they thought I was a homeless bum, and so they handed me a five dollar bill and told me to get something to eat. Following this, a car full of not quite so beautiful black women pulled up, and one of them asked me if she could actually borrow a dollar. So seeing as I was already taken aback by the pity-cash donation I had just received, and seeing as this woman obviously needed the money more than I did -- I mean she literally asked me if she could BORROW a dollar -- and since the whole ghetto monetary-flow-thing was tripping me out -- I said sure. I handed her the five. She took it. And she even went to the trouble to rifle around in her bag for four one dollar bills, arranged them neatly, and placed them carefully in by outstretched palm. Needless to say, I didn't get a ride there. But I was richer for the experience of the underground american ghetto transaction. So I hoofed it to the interstate, feeling pretty good -- except for the pain of my sunburnt back that was growing stronger by the minute.

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I eventually got a ride to Ohio State University with a girl who stopped off first to say "Hi" to her boyfriend in a motorcycle repair shop in a back alley. It was called the Rice Patty. She said I could crash at her place if I needed. But I said, naw, I'm gonna try to get outta town if I can. After getting kicked off the heart of campus by some college rent-a-cop types, I headed up for a bite to eat on the city's main drag and student magnet, High Street.

Exhausted, I sat in a diner that never closes. I soaked it all in: The home-style "apple spice" filled chocolate donut for 90 cents. The American cheerleading championships playing on two TVs, featuring squads from more than one city nearby, and narrated with excitement by a technical play-by-play announcer. The punky counter girl who knew half of the patrons. The wide-eyed college kids, cute as hell, wearing courdoroy blazers and button up shirts, reading up for exams.

Two guys with short hair sat next to me talking pretty easy, using a lot of in-depth mechanical terminology I couldn't follow. I thought at first they were chatting about job opportunities and cadets. But then it hit me -- they're talking about Iraq. And so I tapped into stories of suicide (a friend of course), post traumatic stress (guy gets sent home, and now the people around town find him sitting on the top of watertowers), I hear about unfair discipline and the shame that comes with dropping in rank. And I hear about all the residual effects.

In my own memory it plays back in snippets: "...that was in Falluja...at one of the checkpoints they hit...met up with a convoy...came straight in from 2 o'clock...didn't see nothin' commin'...vehicle right in front exploded -- BOOM...shraptnel straight to the chest, he didn't even feel it."

The story was related from this red head sitting at the corner of the diner bar to his skinnier friend without much emotion, as if he were swapping baseball cards, or talking about the Indy 500. But you know, his high school buddie's death really did hit home: "So that night, right after the funeral, I went right to the bar. Started drinking. Took a taxi, went to another bar, drank some more. Took another taxi, went to another bar, and drank. And it was like that, taxi, bar, taxi, bair -- just on and on you know..." And his voice trailed off.

But there was still no emotion in his words, just reflection. How could there be? Here this sort of story, one that rocks worlds and shatters families and friendships, is a dime a dozen. It's modus operandi -- a fact of life for Americana. Tears won't do anything. Because it's not gonna stop anytime soon.

"I tried to get out of Columbus a few times," he told me later. He laughed saying, "It just never worked. It's really hard. There was one time I was just gonna go. Go down there to Florida. I was gonna go live down there for a bit. I almost couldn't get the day off of work. And when I went to leave, my car broke down. But I was like, fuck it, ima make this shit work. You know?" So he pulled off some last minute automobile rig up, slammed his foot on the gas and headed into the sunrise. South. "Problem was, when I got to Florida I couldn't find a job. Not where I was looking, anyways. So I had to come back." And he had a hard enough time returning, too. He broke down on the freeway, only making it to the Carolinas by setting up a way he could drive by reaching through the floor and manually shifting hears -- which had to be done backwards from normal, of course. Once he got to South Carolina, he hooked up with a NASCAR mechanic he knew who beefed up his machine so he could make it back to Ohio.

And so he never left Columbus, but continues to work shifts in the diner -- hitting sorority keggers with buddies, where they'll see over 50 kegs of beer and a ratio of five girls to every guy. But then again, he could end up in Iraq one day. It's nice to know that a guy like that's got options.

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The US is pretty serious when it comes down to business. So the burly dude from the burger joint on the corner said he wanted me off "thier" property. So he assured me he wasn't the "asshole" but that it was the "corporate" thing breathing down his neck forcing him to do all these terrible things. It's funny because I was actually on the edge of the sidewalk nearest the road, which was outside of the sidewalk surrounding the packed student chill spot, which was itself outside of the establishment's own inner pathway. The black muscle guy said they were trying to get an edge in the whole traffic-flow game. But I'm a business man too, so I told him I'd leave if he paid me bus fare. He disappeared, I'm sure reported directly back to the powers that be, and came back in less than five minutes with cash so I could ride the bus. I was glad we could work together to find a win-win. I just can't believe he actually PAID me to leave an area that didn't even belong to his restaurant.

As I made the transfers across town below multi-coloured shining skyscrapers, and took a good look and street-view Columbus, I was reminded of King Street in Toronto, and the grit of Detroit. The bus drivers knew their passengers, and treated them with respect. They seemed to be genuinely enjoying their job too. This was despite their route travelling throught some of the worst parts of the city, and having to deal with the poorest types of people. I'm thinking, let's get Adam Giambrone of Toronto's transit group down here to check how they run it.

It had been dark for hours, and I was still stuck in Columbus. It was now about 20 hours since I had arrived. I decided I would wait a bit longer before giving the Rice Patty motorcycle shop kids a call to chill with them for the night. And if that happened, I would have to start the exit strategy all over again. I was beginning to think I would never leave. So when an ice cream truck picked me up and whisked me away, my excitement wan't just from the free ice cream the old man and two young love birds game me.

I knew that once again I was moving -- on my way... far far far away...