AirVenture, Day Last +1

Driving south on 41 from the Super 8, I took my last look for the year at the few remaining bits of AirVenture detritus that are left at the airport. Most of what used to be camp grounds, beer gardens, parking lots, chair rentals, even a movie theater is quickly resurfacing as the rolling green grass that is roughly my 17th favorite thing about the Badger State.

Just as the airport came into view, the Who’s classic Baba O’Riley came over the rented van’s stereo. Normally, this drive is quiet and nostalgic, and I look to the big bands to get me through it. This morning, though, after a week of (a) hard labor of love, the lyrics struck me as fitting:

Out here in the fields
I fight for my meals
I get my back into my living.

I don’t need to fight
To prove I’m right
I don’t need to be forgiven

The relevance stumbles a bit in the next few lines – the area is a bit of a wasteland, but it’s hardly teenage, and I don’t know anyone named Sally …

Don’t cry
Don’t raise your eye
It’s only teenage wasteland

Sally take my hand
We’ll travel south cross land
Put out the fire and
Don’t look past my shoulder

The exodus is here
The happy ones are near
Let’s get together
Before we get much older

The exodus is here, indeed, though I can’t say that I was quite ready to flee the Pharaohs of the EAA.