Fun car ride....

I'm leaving Kansas City, Kansas City here I leave... They got some crazy little traffic there and I'm gonna get me gone.

Shopping at Target (152 Hwy... KCMO.. West of I-35 where a kajillion dollars was spent attaining/building new businesses whilst 'we' argued over a Triangle, couldn't agree to whatinthehell to do)...

Left onto 152 (toward Liberty), brief tummy-twinge. “Redlight Row”.. Back in the day, ya honked and waived at damn near every other car.. Now, we're three lanes deep, everyone in a hurry, u have no idea if the person infronta you, beside you, all around u, is from Holt, Kearney, The Big E, Faucett, Smithville, Turney.. who knows..

I live in Liberty, work 30 miles away in Grandview. Takes me damn near as long to simply GET ONTO INTERSTATE as it does to get to G-view once I'm on it. Same thing with this path back into Liberty.. Usually can hear four songs on 101 the Fox, a traffic report, the weather, and 7 ads before I'm back in city limits.

Not this day. Both hands on the wheel... WE'RE OFF! For whatever reason, the drive was timed so I made it past I-35, past the “duh, we better do something” Triangle, the HS, 291.. the little shopping center.. ALL THE WAY to the Jr. High without stop. A miracle.

Soooooo... after I dropped my beautiful granddaughter's beautiful mommy off at her abode – I decided to take my own “Fun Car Ride” (Hint hint) around the ole Eastern part of Liberty – still virtually untouched since back in the day.

Stopped at the Square, mems of everything there.. the parades.. the meals.. the bargains.. the fads.. the pimply jr high nights at The Plaza Theater.. Heard the wonderful Bells from The Hill announce “it's nine am” with nine 'chongs'...

Up around WJC.. wow, the mems there.. watching older sister's buddies play FB.. playing there later myself.. and watching many more over the years.. The Chiefs.. The sight of my hound dog Brownie gnawing on EJ Holub's butt as he rammed the blocking sled. (EJ didn't even turn around, he just kept swatting to get him off, continued blocking.)

The low road, where assuredly some 30-somethings walking around today were 'created'.

Down Miller Street.. The house I grew up in, next door to the Flanigans with 9, count 'em, we can start any damn kinda game we want, there are 9 of us kids. (Later purchased the home I grew up in from my folks.. and it was perty damn cool seeing kid go/do same things I did in the neighborhood.)

Past St. James Church where the old B-Ball court was.. where us kids, black/white/whatever met up, all got along, wasn't 'us against them”.. Us WAS us, all of us. A transitional era we were in back then to correct the wrongs of our forefathers. I think, proudly, we in Liberty, were aheada the game.

Up one stately one way street, down another... ne'er a change in looks from “Ask not what your country can do for you... I have a dream... My fellow Americans.. We have liftoff.”

Toward the High School.. It will always be “the High School” in my heart. (Speakinowhich, the hell is a Middle School... what's an Explorer? A Knight?)... the trees now kinda block the view up to it.. still, in my mind I see it.

So, so many fun times there.. from the first day tummy churning Freshman walk into the door (FRESHMAN? FRESHMAN at the High School?).. Yes, Freshman.. And somehow we survived it.

The games, the fads, the faces, the teachers, the important non-teachers there.. The walks, the locker combos.. the crushes.. the hands held.. the breakups..the notes.. stupid stuff we'd write/have written in our yearbooks.. Detention.. Senior Skip Day.. The “new” building.. Shop.. Ag.. We were all different, yet alike as hell. Co-existed, and quite nicely.

I could ramble on and on about the town I grew up in, and still call home. (Victor, ahm, we noticed the rambling, we GET IT, you love (and loved) Liberty.

Yes, yes I did. And yes I do.

If you'd like to take this same ride... only in a fancified Fun Bus.. Friday, 9/9 (The Big Celebration is Saturday, I'll be back in town Friday.. the hell do we do then?).. you join us, that's what you do. We'll depart close to the Old Pub House (Price Chopper's parking lot) at 5:30pm.. and for two hours “we'll go back to 19-fitty something, 60-something. (It escapes me now, but some movie long ago, they gave the old folks in the nursing home some euphoric concoction that made 'em feel/act like 17 again.)

That's what I'd love for this Fun Bus Tour to be for us. Dial me up at Sterling-1.. no that ain't it... Ahm, Thornwall-7.. oh shoot.. send me an email to reserve your spot.. $20 or less, dependent upon numbers.. we're right around 20 heads now. vicschultze@hotmail.com (Don't forget the “E” damnit.. speakinowhich.. the hell is this ABCDF crap?

ESMIF, love, Victurd.