Another County, Far, Far Away

It should be noted, if unnecessarily, that No Country For Old Men is not the best movie to watch when you’re with your wife on a midweek getaway to a county far to the North and a ways to the East of here. It isn’t that the cinematography isn’t nice, because it is, but there’s something about a large murderous man hunting down pretty much anyone for anything that isn’t conducive to a pleasant evening at a lodge of sorts named after a bird. The movie was only in black and white, which vexed me for quite some time, and caused me to unplug many wires and then plug them back in again, only to see the black and white remain. The movie isn’t one that cries for color.

In this room at the bird place, it’s nice. There is wallpaper, lots and lots of it, but once you’re introduced to the loud paper in the stairwell, by the time you’ve made it to your room you’re already numb to it. There was a nice balcony, though it stormed so much on that night with the movie that no one would sit out on that deck then, no one except that guy from the movie. He’d sit out there. The storm was really something, all sorts of wind and rain and thunder and lightening, but the wind and the rain is something that I’m already used to when up in this county. It’s always windy here.

The lodgey place where we ate pizza earlier that night was fine, not fancy but fancy wasn’t what was expected. The pizza was good enough, the waitress mostly pleasant, the Diet RC in place of Diet Coke was a bit upsetting, but I got over it and switched to water. We ordered a small pizza and that was enough on that night, though had I been alone with my Diet RC that night I would have eaten the entire pizza in that one sitting. With my wife around, I only ate as much as a moderately obese person, so there were two slices left over. We asked the nice waitress to put it in a box for us, she did, and we left. I was thirsty.

There isn’t a whole lot to do in this county in the evening, which should come as no surprise to anyone, because there isn’t a whole lot to do during the day there either. Before the movie and before the pizza and well before the Diet RC we stopped in at the house with the goats on the roof. That’s fun, the goats on the roof. But I grew suspicious because the grass was vibrantly green and upon close inspection it looked as though there were lines in the grass- lawn mower lines. So perhaps this natural idea of having goats mow down your grass roof is all contrived. Perhaps there’s just fertilized sod up there that some guy cuts late at night, which he can get away with because late at night in this county there are no people to be found.

We didn’t eat at the place with the goats, but we did walk in. We found a room that reminded me of Millie’s, if only not nearly as hip and exciting. There were buses outside, buses that must have shipped people from a long distance away to this place, to the place with the goats, and I imagine the people sit in that bus impatiently along the way. Are we there yet, they all would ask, often. Someone up front would always tell them to be quiet, and some other people would sleep. And when they did get close, maybe just down the road, someone would shout as a sailor aboard a ship might when he first spots land after a long and scurvy blighted journey. The bus riders would then gather their things and straighten their hair, all a mess with anticipation.

I didn’t feel this way, but I did walk in and look at the shop and consider buying something that asked everyone if they’ve hugged and/or kissed a Norwegian today. As I am Norwegian I thought it might be a nice idea, but I couldn’t decide between the bumper sticker, the shirt, or the mug. So we left, and I eyed the grass one more time and thought that for certain it was too green and too evenly trimmed. The goats are for show, I thought, but I thought it quietly so as not to upset those bused in people who were busy taking pictures of the goats and the grass, their hands clutching mugs and bumper stickers and t-shirts.

I craved coffee that afternoon, long before the pizza and the movie and the goats, I just wanted some coffee. I had filled up at Boatyard Bagel upon departure, but that smooth coffee was but a distant memory by the time I had driven one million miles and wandered through this county a bit. There are coffee shops, but they are not coffee shops in the way that Boatyard Bagel is, or in the way Mill Creek, or Tickled Pink are, and most obviously not in the way that Starbucks or Caribou or Panera may be. These are coffee shops that are really diners, and the coffee brewed is neither strong or memorable, it just is. We drove a bit, passing stores and diners that we thought about stopping and then walking into, but instead we just drove. We had to get to the goat place.

I was thirsty too, so when I finally tied into those Diet RC’s I was happy. When I realized that I didn’t like Diet RC, not in a pizza place in that county, not in a turf-roofed place in that county, not anywhere in that county, I was still sort of thirsty. When I turned the movie jacket in to the hotel lobby lady and then walked into the wallpapered entrance and up the wallpapered stairs and into my wallpapered room, and then after I fussed with the wires and finally settled in to think about the violent storm outside and watch the movie with the violent guy inside, I was still thirsty. It was around 9:40 pm.

My wife quickly realized this movie held no redemption, and I quickly realized that my growing thirst would need to be tended to. The rain outside teased me, the movie upset me, the wallpaper laughed at me. So I got up and dressed and stumbled down the stairs to go see what the hotel lobby might have by way of bottled water, or a drinking fountain, or an outside spigot with a hose left unattended. What I found was nothing but darkness, no people milling about, no light on at the inn. It was as if I was Truman, starring in my own show, and the production cast had left for the evening quite certain that I wouldn’t leave my room until morning.

This inn, during the day, is surrounded by goings on. There are people walking and eating and lots of shops open wishing to sell those people just about anything, as long as that anything is either a shirt or a shirt. But when the clock is close to to 10 pm, and there is wind blowing down the trees and rain falling from they sky, the same street that felt alive in the daylight now looks more like a scene from The Road. My thirst was on my mind, my car key in my pocket, and with no notice I found myself driving down the road, scanning the shops for signs of life, hoping that I might find some way to quench my growing thirst.

This town must have been named after a creek, which is misleading. Creeks are filled with water, and when it was only water that I was in search of, in a town with a name like this it shouldn’t have been this difficult to find. But it was. And so I drove, heading what felt like North and East, and I drove until I was through this one town and into another. Down the streets with my eyes peeled for any light that might be on the side of a building that might mean that building is open and willing to sell me but a bottle of water. If there was a woman by a well I would have paid serious money for a ladle full of water.

But there was no woman and there was no well, and there were no lights, not in the creek town or in the next one, and so I drove. And then I drove some more. Twisting down slick roads, my tires crunching branches that had been blown down by the storm. Into another town, this one with also appearing abandoned, but this one offered hope. I remembered many years ago buying a frozen pizza at a small gas station in one of these small towns, on a night much like this one after a storm just like the one that had just passed. I pushed through the town, speeding happily and aware that the one cop that must patrol this county was likely sound asleep just like everyone else. The light from the gas station was dim, so dim that as I approached I assumed it too was closed, the owner or the shop worker also at home in bed, sound asleep like the cop and the neighbors and the people on that bus that were probably still a long ways away from home.

The shop, though barely open, was open. There was water, bottles and bottles of it, and for a moment I thought about buying two or three bottles, one to drink and one to stash away so that I might never again have to drive as many as 20 miles in one direction here just to find some more water. I bought the water and headed home, back to the inn with the wallpaper and the scary movie and my wife. If you ever find yourself in this county, just remember it’s BYOW.