Opinion

It’s just us kids in the bicentennial media car

Friday, September 23, 2016

As I looked ahead to the visit of the Indiana Bicentennial Torch Relay to Putnam County, I was filled with a mix of delight and dread.

Delight at the chance to ride along with the caravan, seeing each runner and the beauty of various parts of the county.

Dread at spending three hours in a car while work went undone at the office and my family ate dinner without me.

Then I was greeted by the car full of college students I would be spending those three hours with and I felt a little worse. Who wants to be the old guy in any group?

With the family farm in the background, Greencastle native Jenna Berry drives a car in the torch relay caravan Thursday.
Banner Graphic/JARED JERNAGAN

But I immediately discovered I had something to talk about with one of them. Jenna Berry, the daughter of Jack and Janae, was the driver of the vehicle.

Now a sophomore at IUPUI, Berry is involved with the program as part of an internship.

She is one of several interns serving as a driver in the program, so it was the luck of the draw to even get her home county.

“When I signed up, I didn’t even know I’d be getting Putnam County,” Berry said, “and as it turns out, it goes right past my house.”

Berry took the opportunity to snap a quick photo of her house as we passed, also greeting family members standing at the end of the lane.

“Hi, family!”

The 2014 Greencastle High School graduate was wide-eyed watching the torch go through her hometown.

“This is really great to see it go through Greencastle,” she said. Later she remarked, somewhat excited, “Oh, did they paint Walmart?”

Small-town chatter is just the best.

It was more than geography I found in common with my mates in the car. Ball State media interns Sadie Lebo and Micah Holtgraves were in the backseat. Apparently I was OK with them too because they offered me snacks.

“It’s kind of an inside joke that if we don’t like the person riding with us, we don’t offer them snacks,” Lebo confessed later.

So I was cool enough for snacks. Good to hear.

The rapport of the road goes beyond granola bars and fruit snacks, though. You have to figure that the people in this caravan are spending 12-14 hours a day on the road together.

That’s enough time to get from here to Dallas. Instead, on Thursday they only made it from a hotel in Terre Haute to a hotel in Brownsburg.

So much time on the road and so little ground covered took its toll, as the weary travelers began to get a bit slap happy as the sun went down.

The communication radio normally reserved for official business gave way to a bit of silliness from one of the state troopers on a motorcycle.

“It warms my heart sharing this sunset with all of you,” he said to chuckles in the various cars.

Even in only three hours on the road, I think it got to your intrepid reporter a little bit too.

How else do you explain a 35-year-old who’s at least that many pounds overweight deciding it’s a good idea to run a mile, uphill on a gravel path?

That’s just what I did, though, as Micah and I ran with Mark and Drew Christy into Fillmore.

I eventually had to make the decision to either injure myself or slow to a walk, possibly needing a ride back to the office. As I neared Bert and Betty’s, though, a friendly face came into view.

“Need a ride?” Community Foundation Director Elaine Peck asked.

It was only another block or so, but my god, yes, I needed a ride.

Getting back into the media car, I saw worry on the face of my fellow travelers.

“Are you OK?”

“Get Jared some water.”

“Do you want a granola bar?”

Two bottles of water and a few coughing fits later, I was OK, although feeling older and perhaps wiser.

My recovery came just in time to see the highlight of the entire trip: Bainbridge.

All along the way we were greeted with cheers, cowbells and smiling faces. You did a great job of getting out to meet the torch, Putnam County.

But none of you did as great of a job as Bainbridge. As we approached Bainbridge Elementary School, we were floored by the number of people there to greet us, most of them elementary aged students.

I figured the whole town was there, leaving no one for the fireworks display and pulled pork dinner at the closing at Baker’s Camp Covered Bridge.

I was wrong, with another packed crowd for the finale.

Well done, Putnam County. Most of us will never have this chance again.

And to those of you who think you will have another chance, see you at the tricentennial. I’ll be the old guy in the media car.