Salazar Offers Road Trip

Sen. Ken Salazar doesn't like mayonnaise. And his parents didn't have to eat pumpkin when they asked his future in-laws whether he could marry their daughter.

These are the type of tidbits you learn about someone when you spend three hours together in a car.

Salazar today rolled out a bill dealing with energy drilling on Colorado's Western Slope, an issue he focused on recently as he spent a day driving through the northwest part of the state.

I dove into old notes to find something he said during that trip. While I was there, I thought I'd share what else I found.

I spent the day with the Democratic senator as he traveled on the West Slope during the Easter congressional recess. It provided a view of Salazar I don’t see much of when he’s in the Senate.

Peer in as I roll down the window.

I'd planned to follow the senator and his posse for the day, and had rented a car. His brother, Rep. John Salazar, came on the trip as well.

After the first stop in Steamboat Springs, I spied a cowboy hat and jeans-wearing Sen. Salazar walking toward me. He asked for the keys to my car and offered to drive me to the next stop, a coal mine in Moffat County.

Salazar’s staff looked slightly confused. Then panicked. Senator alone with journalist apparantly not good.

His spokeswoman Stephanie Valencia raced toward my car. She climbed in the back seat. I grabbed shotgun. Salazar got behind the wheel of the Geo Metro and zoomed off.

Valencia quickly proved she was the most valuable person as she spoke to another aide and coordinated the pick-up of sandwiches for lunch. (We couldn’t eat them for hours, but that’s getting ahead.)

Salazar requested roast beef and swiss, no mayo. I had just placed the same order. Which spurred a brief conversation in Spanish.

Mayonnaise “no me cae bien,’’ I told Salazar, using pigeon Spanish that he had to correct. I explained that I learned this phase in Spanish immersion school, during a lesson on idiomatic expressions. My favorite, I told him, was one that means a significant other has just kicked you to the curb. “me dio la calabaza grande.” He gave me the big pumpkin. Salazar hadn’t heard the expression, but said it makes sense. Then I found out he believes in traditions. Or at least his family does.

“When parents go ask for a woman’s hand in marriage, like when I was getting married, when I was proposing to get married my mother and father went to Hope’s home,’’ Salazar said, referring to his wife Hope, “and asked her parents if it was OK for them for their daughter to marry me.

“Whenever you do that, if the parents of the bride to be do not want her to marry you, what they will do is they serve you calabasas,’’ he said. “So then you get the hint. Then you know that you shouldn’t make the ask, because the answer is going to be no. And that way you’re not offended. So that’s the tie-in.’’

Salazar’s been married more than 25 years, so I’m guessing his parents didn’t get pumpkin that day.

As he powered west on US-40, Salazar rattled off factoids about this part of the state. He knows the names of some of the residents who live out there and how long they’ve been there.

He knows the man who made the Spanish tiles on his ranch rooftop.

Salazar wanted to interview me. How do I decide what stories to write? Do I pick them or do editors assign? Does his press staff do a good job? Don't worry, I tell him. The Salazar press shop hands down wins the award for the most press releases issued every day. They practically shut down my mailbox.

Salazar's known as a moderate guy politically. Sometimes he votes left, sometimes right. As a driver, he's pretty moderate too. I didn’t check the speed limit, but speeds there for the most part were fast and faster. His speeds seemed about right for a highway that winds between mountains.

At one point, however, Valencia didn’t think he was driving fast enough.

After a stop in Meeker, she offered to take over driving. Salazar was running about 40 minutes behind after packing too much into one day.

“He drives like my grandmother,’’ Valencia told me.

After Salazar got behind the wheel in the car, Valencia asked him, “you don’t want me to drive, sir?’’

Salazar asked whether she had really wanted to drive.

“She thinks you drive like her grandmother,’’ I told Salazar, ratting her out. Then I tell Valencia, “You didn’t 'say off the record.'’’

Before the day was over, Salazar drove me on three legs of the trip, each about an hour long. I’ll add further parts of my travel journal as time and your interest permits.

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