No one shows any love to Maryland.

I came to this conclusion driving home one night. I was cruising down the 405 while listening to the radio. If you ever listen to the radio in California, you will quickly realize there are thousands of songs about California, mainly because you will hear every single one of them in the course of your drive. “Hotel California,” “Californication,” “California Love,” “Beverly Hills,” “Santa Cruz,” “The Little Old Lady from Pasadena,” “California Girls,” “City of Angels,” “California”–each one played on endless rotation as if all DJs are under strict orders by the Government, lest everyone forgets what State they’re in.

“If an hour has gone by and no Red Hot Chili Peppers has played, people will think this is Alabama,”  State officials have warned all DJs. “Also for the love of god, DON’T PLAY ‘SWEET HOME ALABAMA!’ ”

Maryland is under no illusions about its place in American hearts. If California is treasured and idealized, Maryland is barely remembered, then mistaken for DC. California has the Pacific Ocean. Maryland has the Chesapeake Bay. California has Haight-Ashbury. Maryland has Annapolis. California has Hollywood and Silicon Valley. Maryland has crab fishing. On the Chesapeake. Which, if you’re hoping for a “Deadliest Catch” scenario, is the equivalent of setting cages in the woods and going back every couple of weeks to see if a monumentally stupid deer has wandered into one. And then probably having to let it go when it doesn’t meet federal size requirements.

California has songs. The only song ever written about Maryland is the song about my hometown: “Don’t Go Back to Rockville.” The chorus is the words “Don’t go back to Rockville” repeated six times before ending with “and waste another year.”

But really, in all honesty people, why can’t we revere our panhandled Eastern state? It has nice things like nicer places, and gritty things like gritty places (I defy you to find a grittier city than Baltimore). It has a lot of Government contractors and suburbs. It holds a very interesting Renaissance fair. If you don’t feel like driving to DC, it’s got a lot of theatres that run weird plays. It has strip malls! To be honest, Maryland is on par with California. So where are the power-ballads about Anne Arundel County?

It boils down to one thing: image. To the average American, California is a pretty paradise full of nice pretty people, and no amount of the truth is going to dissuade them. The Cali Ideal is in our culture, ingrained so deeply we have no idea where our palm-tree dreams even began. The way conservatives long for an America that never was, we long for a California that’s more perfect than perfection; never mind failing schools, a bankrupt economy, or the hellish, hellish summer. California’s name even rolls off the tongue; Maryland just doesn’t have the same pizazz.

But don’t fret, Maryland. Your time is coming. Just as SoCal once acted as a beacon to those looking for work and a new way of life, so too does MoCo beckon with it’s Government contracting jobs and it’s well-regarded schools. CA may get young people with dreams while MD gets middle-aged people with mortages, but those middle-aged people have kids. Kids who will grow up a stones throw away from the majestic view of the Capitol Building, going to free museums and hanging out in expansive backyards, playing street hockey on warm summer evenings until the fireflies come out and they can’t even see their water-bottle puck anymore. These are the kids who will grow into the generation that will finally give Maryland it’s break, recognizing it for what it is: not a sexy city but a playground for memories, old and young, which should be treasured in its own right. Those are the kids who will write the songs for Maryland.

Or will move across the country to L.A. Hey, listen to the song folks, and Rockvillians, I will see you BACK in Rockville starting next week!

Don’t Go Back to Rockville

As a girl, I prided myself on my reasoned, logical responses to things deemed icky by the rest of my peers. Lizards, snakes, spiders–especially spiders–fascinated me. I knew from nature programs that they were our friends, eating the bad bugs and vermin we hated and generally avoiding humans at all costs.

“Spiderspiderspiderspiderspider!” the other girls would scream, pointing to the arachnid on our woodpile.

“Ho ho ho,” I’d chortle, perching jauntily next to it. “Don’t you know? Spiders are our friends!”

No, spiders outside did not bother me–nature was a thing to admire and lord over your more squeamish friends. So I was completely prepared when, as I was driving down the freeway, I looked down at the steering wheel to see a giant, giant spider staring back at me.

Ah! I thought to myself. Our friend the spider! Eater of bugs and other vermin we don’t like! Sitting on my steering wheel! Right next to my hand! Logical, rational part of my brain, tell me what I should do in this situation!

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! replied my brain.

“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” I screamed as I hit the emergency blinker, alternately swerving to exit the highway and staring at my hand where the spider was inching ever closer. “Spiderspiderspiderspiderspider!”

To be fair, this wasn’t some delightful woodpile spider. This was an albino monster, looking basically like this:

So this clearly wasn’t going to end well.

I finally made it to a side road where I parked, jumped in the backseat of my car, and began throwing trash at it in a futile attempt to make it leave or die. All that accomplished was to make it crawl into my A/C vent on one side of the car and exit out the A/C vent on the other side. The one closer to me.

Of course.

After a fun half-hour of watching it crawl into the vent, blasting the hot air to make it come out, miss it entirely with my shoe, and watch it crawl back in, I finally succeeded. Springing forward, the battle cry of “spiderspiderspiderspider” on my lips, I managed to smush it flat with a handful of gas receipts. But just as I was about to throw it into the trash, I stopped. My adversary who looked so mutantly large while menacing my hand, now, flattened like a pancake, looked no larger than a pinprick. It was no threat, just a misplaced creature, our friend whose whole existence did nothing but make mine more pleasant and bug-free. In my panic I had reduced it to the two-dimensional monster image I scorned in my youth; in my panic, I had reduced myself to the two-dimensional role, the icked-out girl, that I thought myself above.

I was quiet as I picked up a friend later that night, deep in thought about the matter. Suddenly, my friend pointed at the windshield.

“Oh, cool!” he said.

“What?” I replied.

“There’s a giant spider on the outside of the glass! I think it crawled out of that air vent there! Man, there’s another one! Isn’t that neat?”

The moral of this story is don’t turn on the A/C in my car, because I’ve sprayed as much raid as possible into the vents and it’ll probably poison you if you turn it on. Also, I need a ride.

After spending a full day at the Hollywood DMV, I am now liscened to drive in California (out of state drivers have to take a written test). In honor of this, I shall regale you with the thrilling and terrifying Excerpts from the CA Drivers Handbook!!!

Congratulations new California resident! The CA Drivers Handbook is your first step to becoming a licensed California driver. The following sections explain the rules of the road, as pertains to both Federal and California State Law.

HIGHWAYS:

Highways and Freeways are an integral part of California’s system of roads. When merging onto a highway:

• Signal for at least 5 seconds before entering the on-ramp
• Accelerate to the speed of the cars already on the highway
• Immediately slow as a Cop pulls you over for going the speed of the cars on the highway, which is clearly over the speed limit
• Accelerate and decelerate as dictated by traffic, police, gaps between cars you think your busted sedan can fit into, missed exits, and the inevitable accident

HOV Lanes are clearly marked by diamonds and double yellow lines you may never cross.

PEDESTRIANS:

Pedestrians always have the right of way.

BLIND PEDESTRIANS:

Blind Pedestrians are anybody’s game. 

Haha, no, the CA Driver’s Handbook likes to kid. Seriously, you’ll never see a blind pedestrian.

BICYCLES:

Bikes are your enemy. No matter if you’re a cyclist, or you have friends who are, the moment you step into your car that world is DEAD TO YOU. In accordance to state law, on encountering a cyclist:

• Honk your horn loudly and repeatedly
• Gesture in anger
• Try to squeeze the biker off the road

California State Law assures you that you will not get into trouble, as cyclists are all skinny students and hipsters, none who posses the financial strength, or literal strength, to fight you.

PARKING:

You will get a ticket no matter where you park. Are you parked right now? You’re in the wrong spot. Annnnnnd…NOW you have a ticket.

SECRET CALIFORNIA LAWS:

• If you drive fast enough, red-light cameras cannot detect you and you may break the law. This is know as the “Romulan Cloaking Rule“
• You can park for free for years at the Oakwoods
• You can park for free for years in the parking lot behind my old apartment
• The existence of protected left turn lanes is on par with the existence of elves, or jobs
• Hybrids make less noise than regular cars. Not a law, just something neat we learned writing this handbook
• You can get a “Grilled Cheese” at In ‘N Out

THANK YOU AND DRIVE SAFE! –California

Current Mood:  amused