GROW UP!

"NOT GONNA HAPPEN!"

Of course that depends on what you mean by "Grow Up!"

Geanna up top. That's Michaela up there on the piano. She and I have the same piano teacher, Ms. Rogers. I think Michaela might be a little bit ahead of me. She's not grown up, and so why should I have to be.

I'll take responsibility for my actions. I'll try to obey all the adult laws we've agreed to manage ourselves by.

I'll recognize appropriate authority. I'll make a concerted effort to respect and appreciate every human being I meet.

BUT, if growing up means behaving like 98.2 percent of the political candidates this season? Count me out.

Oh, I'll vote because it is one of those grown up things you ought to do. But I really can't feel good about the idiotic way in which we go about picking our political representatives. Please tell me this isn't grown up behavior.

I have my own little parable to share with you what I think of the process.

Tenth grade. Bell High School. 1957. Me and George Dehlmar out by the school gym. We've just finished either football or track practice and with pumped up testosterone levels...we are "friendly like" pushing each other around. Somebody standing nearby shouts something like, "HEY GEORGE you going to let him do that to you?"

"NO!," George says. He looks at me and says, "I'll meet you after school over on Flora. You better be there."

So the stage is set and the whispered announcement explodes through the school.

"Fight after school. Flora! Reinertson and Dehlmar."

Now we have to show up and fight.

[ Just a little personal background. George is tall, thin, very long muscular arms. He's an end (wide receiver) on the football team. He is a pole vaulter back when they used bamboo poles. I'm a few inches shorter and heavier. I'm a lineman (right tackle) on the football team. I'm a very poor shot putter on the track team.]

So I'm thinking about a hundred guys show up after school to see George and I bloody each other. We are in the middle of a cheering angry circle. (You've seen this in the movies fifty times.)

"Hit him. Come on you guys fight."

From the description I gave you above you can imagine George certainly has the reach and coordination on me. And, indeed, it seems like only seconds he has me on ground whaling at my head. Oddly, it is my salvation. With arms that long, he is mostly hitting the ground. And from my position I can occasionally reach up and pop him on the chin. I think the two of us think we've been at it for a half hour. It is likely more like ten minutes.

And to the crowds disappointment, instead of blood?

George: "I'm beat."

Paul: "Yeah, me too!"

George: "Wanna quit?"

Paul: "You?"

George: "I think so."

Paul: "Me too!"

So Paul and George walk off talking about fishing or swimming or something, leaving an angry crowd behind us. They want more. They want blood. They vicariously want somebody to get hurt.

Here's a prediction. Sometime within the next six months? Barack Obama and John Mc Cain will sneak in the back door of some DC hangout, sally up to some adjoining bar stools and sip some beers together. ( I think Mc Cain will insist it be beer.)

Outside the bar, furious picketers who'd lined up behind the two candidates during the campaign, will still be spewing the venom we are all wallowing in as "Vote Day" approaches.

I've been hanging out with young people lately, infants to early teens. They are openly curious about the world, they appear to like each other, they seem to be finding ways to resolve their differences peacefully. They play instruments, they sing, they hug. I REALLY like it that they've let me into their world for a while.

"GROW UP PAUL!"

NOT GONNA HAPPEN.