That�s right, my yellow ribbon says I�m a coward. Because I don�t have one on my car. I don�t have one because the ribbon movement was �started by the Christian Coalition� (I heard this somewhere, so therefore it �must be true�), and no matter what the ribbon says, it�s still supporting something that I ultimately wouldn�t want to support. I mean, me? Support Ralph Reed? Hah!

I also don�t have any bumper stickers on my car. When I was a teenager, my car was plastered with bumper stickers. Clinton/Gore, Depeche Mode, Nine Inch Nails, Z100, Fight AIDS, whatever the reason, I had a sticker. I even remember running out of space on my bumper. Then I moved to New York City, and nobody owns a car in New York City.

Fast forward ten years, and suddenly, I don�t do bumper stickers anymore. The first election comes along when I�m driving a car, and I don�t even think twice about putting a bumper sticker on my car. Then again, during that election, nobody else did either � who really wanted to publicly support Grey Davis? We were just sort of forced to support him, weren�t we.

Then the ribbon campaign started. And once again, I didn�t even think twice, it just wasn�t for me. You can be sure, though, that I had a ribbon on my car during the first Gulf War � does anyone else remember tying yellow ribbons around your car�s antenna? Around trees too. Yup. I did that…then.

I moved from California to Virginia, and my surrounding political climate changed. The country may have been changing then as well, but I can�t tell if it had changed already, or was changing along with me. I went from liberal Northern California, to Republican Northern Virginia.

According to Time Power by Brian Tracy, the average American spends between 500 and 1000 hours per year behind the wheel of a car. The change in my daily scenery was undeniable � suddenly I was seeing a sea of ribbons saying everything from the usual �Support Our Troops,� to sad �Keep My Soldier Safe,� to the random �I Support My Ribbon,� to the common, �God Bless America.�

There were also the bumper stickers. Bush/Cheney was everywhere. And for this New York-raised liberal who was moving to Virginia from California � it was stunning. While I�d known I was moving into a �red� state, I was still shocked. Bush/Cheney, the proud Republican Party stickers, they really were everywhere. There would be the occasional Kerry/Edwards sticker, or a proud Democratic Party line, but they were rare. Even rarer would be alternative party stickers, which I�d seen more of in California.

Most overwhelming, though, was the sheer volume of it all. Virginians spoke their mind. True, they were mostly Republican Virginians, but they still put it out there for the world to see, on ribbons, and on bumper stickers.

This past weekend, I saw a license plate (I won�t say what state � NOT Virginia) in my garage with the plate �GOP Girl.�

Once again, I was absolutely stunned. How does someone find the courage to do that � to not only get a plate like that, but park their car in a garage in Arlington (probably one of the more liberal areas in Virginia) with that plate?

Then it hit me. I am a coward. And I didn�t know it.

I am a strong person. I know what I believe in, and will argue my beliefs until the death. I donate like a good little girl to my favorite causes, but I also believe that talk is cheap � if you believe in something get out and do something about it. I volunteered for the Kerry campaign, and I occasionally entertain the fantasy that I�ll have the time to reup my EMT certification and start riding with a volunteer ambulance corps again.

But I won�t put a bumper sticker on my car, or a ribbon, or anything else that makes a real statement. That bumper sticker, or that ribbon (the whole supposed Christian Coalition thing aside) would need defending, in my eyes, and my poor little Saturn can�t defend itself.

It was different when I was 16. Not only �because I was 16.� Because the world was different, because I lived in New York. Because I was driving a car that was falling apart anyway, that wasn�t mine, because I wasn�t driving anywhere other than to school, to friends� houses, and home, and because I just didn�t notice what anyone else ever thought. I didn�t feel this constant restlessness at the sheer concept of putting something like that on my car � like I�d have a big huge target on my back that I wouldn�t be able to get off. I hadn�t become a conformist.

Conformist – somebody who behaves or thinks in a socially acceptable or expected way.

Yes. That would be me. And in Virginia, in 2006, having a ribbon or a bumper sticker on my car that expresses what I truly believe would prevent me from behaving in the expected way.

When I�m not on the roads, or in a parking lot, I am who I am. I act as I do � I could provide many a witness to swear that I�m more than inappropriate on many an occasion (I so shouldn�t brag about that, should I). But if it�s because my car can�t fight back, or because the great sea of parkway seems to need to be uniform, I want to conform.

This has been a strange realization to come to, that as self-aware as I think I am, I fool myself so completely. I wasn�t avoiding the ribbons because of the Christian Coalition. I never even tried to come up with an excuse for the Kerry campaign; I just never got my hands on a bumper sticker.

Now that I�ve had this realization, I still don�t think I�m going to put a ribbon or a bumper sticker on my car � at least not until I can teach my car karate so it can defend itself. And I don�t think that�s going to happen anytime soon.

So on the roads, anyway, I�ll live with being a conformist. It�s everywhere else that really counts anyway, right?