By Mark Kneeskern
I am standing in front of a tower covered in brassieres.
My friends drove me here to Green Bay, Wisconsin from Portage, shuttling me part of the way north towards my intended destination: Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. My vision for this adventure is to camp in the woods and make daily expeditions to wild beaches, climbing 300-foot banks to the Great Sable “raised dunes,” swimming naked in the cold surf of the freshwater lake (ocean, really) we call “Superior,” hitchhiking and gathering new stories for my book.
I must now attain the ever elusive First Ride. This challenge is giving me chills of anxiety and shivers of excitement outside one of our modern coliseums, where mock battles are beginning to unfold between warring tribes. The current pseudo-conflict is between the Green Bay Packers and the Cleveland Browns. The Packers got their name from meat canning company who donated money for the first uniforms. Seems an appropriate name for a huge man stuffed into a suit of armor. Outside the football facility, I stand before an extensive display of bras donated by incoming fans to raise breast cancer awareness. I’m holding a sign inspired by my Wisconsinite friend, Dan. It reads: “CHEESEHEAD TO YOOPERLAND.”
The later it gets, the more drunken and belligerent the fanatics entering the game have become. Packers fans are serious tailgaters and have been at it for hours now. I’ve been handed three free tickets by three different people while standing here. With no ride yet and most people inside already, I believe it is time for my initiation into the world of live gladiators. I’m going in to witness the spectacle.
The people inside are frothy with excitement and some are yelling at the players, commanding them to “GO! GO! GO!” as if the ball-carriers can actually hear them. Others scream at the referees when they think a warrior from their tribe had been falsely accused of “Neutral Zone Infraction” which sounds like a city building code violation, or maybe one of their bulking linemen was charged with something called “Holding,” which completely emasculates the man, eliminating the need for an actual penalty in my opinion.
One thing making this all worthwhile is The Wave. I am not referring to the name of a radio station which plays what is called in music industry terms “New Adult Contemporary.” The Wave is a synthesizer of crowds, a beautiful interaction between masses of humanity, a tide of human bodies which is heading my way! One of the most exciting things in life is the feeling that you might be carried away on a ride across that sea of bodies.
After several waves have passed around the arena, my mind is re-focused on the real waves I crave: those of the inland ocean, a great sea of fresh water. The Great Lake Superior. Off I go to fetch my big backpack from my friend’s car, making myself into a human turtle once again. Now I’ve hit the streets, where my friend told me traffic would be crawling and I could walk along the lines of cars where surely someone would see me again and offer me a lift. There ARE lines of cars crawling along, all of them heading South! South! South! South to Milwaukee where they all came from!
A colossal flaw in my plan to get out of this city and into the wild land of the Yoopers is the fact that no one is going in that direction. My nerves are beginning to tighten, along with the trapezius muscles straining against my packstraps. I’ll surely end up a meat packer here in this wasteland, slowly becoming a hunchback and wearing mittens most of the year. Green Bay …*shiver*
NO! I must walk! I can walk out of the city tonight. Hell, I’ll crawl if I have to. I could at least drag my pack to an outlying neighborhood with a clump of trees where I might throw down my bug hut and crash for the night, only to continue walking in the morning. If my legs still work in the morning. I admit it, I am out of shape. I’m unprepared for this heavy load. I should have been training … doing push-ups, sit-ups, and walking around with heavy objects strapped to my wiry frame. Instead, I had become deluded with the idea of an easy ride to … YOOPERLAND.
Mark Kneeskern has learned that all you need is a nice smile to get a ride. Even if you can’t pick up a hitcher, please at least wave. Trust me, it makes all the difference in the world.