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Can I See Some ID?


Film can't do it justice. Roasting the tires of a high-horsepower '70s era sedan represents the very pinnacle of after school activities at many a rural high school in America.

I was digging through my files the other day and came across a stack of old ID cards. I've been a resident of WA, WY, ID, and AK. I've attended 5 colleges and been on the faculty at 2 others. Here are a few ID cards that made me laugh.

Freshman year in college. I spent that year dodging fraternity-recruiting parties, refereeing intermural sports, wasting entire weekends playing 2-on-2 grass court volleyball on the Quad, and slogging through hundreds of rounds of disc golf. I passed my second semester of chemistry for pre-meds with a D+. Did I mention I was really good with a frisbee? Oh ya, I was on the varsity baseball team, too.

Senior year in college. By the end of my junior year, I was fully engaged in my major studies, I had won an award for my performance mapping geology in the field, spent a summer doing research, was running the Outing Program with Karl, was teaching telemark skiing at night at Spout Springs, and had secured entrance to UWyo G&G for graduate work. My frisbee scores had suffered.

Sophomore in high school. Drove the 1974 baby blue Plymouth Valiant like a maniac, regularly hitting 110 mph on Bayview-Edison Road. No flats, no tickets, no wrecks. Well, the Home-Ec teacher t-boned us in the parking lot, but that was her fault.

A 1974 Valiant will do 115 mph with a tailwind.

Freshman year in high school. This was my first real ID card. I remember that our football coach made us run into the cafeteria between two-a-day practices to get registered for classes. At BEHS, sports came first, second, and third. In the rush to get the players through the line, mistakes were made. Schools were run differently in those days before computers and the Internet. And yes, I am wearing three t-shirts in late August.

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