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Our gal Temporary Sal’s visor problem

I can understand Sarah Palin blacking out McCain’s name on her visor in order to achieve some privacy on vacation. What I can’t understand is why someone who just made millions on a book she almost wrote didn’t just buy a new visor. Seriously, how much would that have set her back?

As I pondered this dilemma, it occurred to me that the problem here was not any stinginess on the part of our gal Temporary Sal. No, the problem here is that Sal lived in Alaska too long to throw anything out. And I’m not sure there is anyway in the world to explain to people from outside just how strong the Alaska thrifty gene really is.

Anyone who claims to be an Alaskan and hopes for credibility to that claim knows exactly what I’m referring to. Alaskans never throw anything out for fear they will wake up tomorrow and find out that, gosh darn, they did need that carburetor from their ’69 Chevy now that they finally tossed it out. If they’d just left it one more day under that pile of snow, they wouldn’t be trudging out to beg one from a neighbor who was Alaskan enough to never clean out his yard.

So Sarah was merely recycling that visor in much the same way that Alaska has consistently led the nation in recycling. OK, not necessarily recycling in the way that the lower ’48 might understand it – but recycling nonetheless. That’s why the yard of every true Alaskan contains at least one car and/or snowmobile and/or four-wheeler up on cement blocks waiting to be harvested for parts. It’s why Alaskan yards contain piles of lumber that seem to have no rhyme or reason to them but that someday may be needed to shore up the roof. It’s why we don’t even blink when we see the old sink lying on its side near the shed or piles of pallets that may or may not be needed to create a walkway during breakup.

If you think about it, it’s kind of refreshing to think that Sal still retains some of Alaska in her blood. For a while there, looking at those fancy outfits and perfect make up and… is it just me or does she look like she’s become Hollywood thin suddenly? … I was worried that we’d lost her completely to the outside.

But for so long as she wears visors with blacked out lettering, we’ll know she’s still ours.  Alaska’s recycling gene trumps millions of dollars every time.