August 20, 2008--The Way Kids Are These Days

We never did catch his name. I’m not even sure he offered it; and if he did, it’s unlikely that either Rona or I would have caught and remembered it because when he drifted over to us he swept us into such a torrent of conversation--if you can call a monologue a conversation--that specific things like names and facts would have whisked right by us.

That was last Wednesday night at the Creek Diner, just off Route 14 where it bends south across the White River and then swings down into Barnard. At 45 miles per hour, the first two times we passed it I misread “Greek” for “Creek” and kept moving. If I have a craving for Souvlaki I can wait until we get back to New York in a couple of weeks. We’re still up in Vermont and our tastes are still running to more typical country fare like organic veggies, hormone-free free-range chicken, and fresh picked blueberries. So both times before we zipped by, even when hungry, choosing instead to hold out for more local choices which we knew were available down in Woodstock.

But the other night it was nearly eight o’clock and thinking that a half hour later most places on a Wednesday, even in Woodstock, would be closing down, considering the circumstances, Souvlaki was sounding better and better. We had been out all day and were hungry enough to risk a taste of Vermont Greek.

You can imagine our delight, then, when we slowed to glide into the diner’s parking lot that we discovered that one letter when it comes to diner names can make all the difference. At the Creek, with a C, from a closer look at the place, which seemed indigenously authentic, we thought we might be able to scare up some home-cooked blue-plate specials. Fried chicken or an open-face roast turkey dinner, free-range or not, was sounding mighty good.

Though they were scheduled to close in 15 minutes the waitress was nice enough to lead us to a table. We promise that we would order right away and eat fast. She smiled at that and said she appreciated that but still we should relax and enjoy our food. We looked as if we hadn’t eaten all day, which was half true. The food, she told us, was cooked right there and we should be sure to leave some room for their blackberry pie—a specialty this time of year. Settling into the booth, noticing that they had a pretty good list of beers, and catching a whiff of real food smells wafting in from the kitchen, I thought that sometimes you just get lucky.

There were two other couples there just finishing up and, as we swept by the counter, I saw two men bent over their coffees a seat apart, not together and clearly even at a glance decidedly not friends. They had pivoted on their stools so that their backs were to each other. As one might expect way out near Bethel, well off the tourist trail, all appeared to be from the area, were likely regulars, and as is often the case, familiarity and personal history—even if it extends just to daily encounters at a lunch counter—can lead to a lot of animosity. I thought to make sure to twist in my own seat so as not to inadvertently make contact with either of them. I had open-face turkey on my mind, after reading on the menu that it was roasted right there, and didn’t want to get drawn into any rural spats. A friend from New York who has lived in Vermont for almost a decade has from time to time warned me not to be too forward with Vermonters of this kind—they may look charming, he has cautioned, but beneath the flannel and coveralls they can be ornery or worse to Flatlanders and tourists.

The food turned out to be as good as expected and we did make an effort to order and eat quickly. The turkey was indeed special and though we were tempted to linger over a shared slice of blackberry pie, we saw that most of the stools were already up on the counter for the night, just one of the men remained and he was helping to do that, and since the other couples had paid up and left before the food got to us, we thought let’s take a slice to go so they can finish their cleanup and close by nine.

We drifted over to the cash register even before asking for the check so as to expedite our leaving. The waitress we could see was back in the kitchen helping the cook put things in order. The man, who by then had finished settling the stools on the counter where he had been nursing his coffee, saw us up by the register and shuffled over. I felt somewhat ominously since I could hear him panting. He was well into middle age—hard to determine, anywhere between sixty and seventy-five--and was moving slowly either because he was out of breath from wrestling with the stools, he had some kind of respiratory problem—probably from the looks of him he was a heavy smoker—or he was all worked up into a froth at the sight of two unwelcome big city folks in his town. Hopefully the waitress would notice us wanting to pay and come out to take our money. I was audibly clearing my throat to try to catch her attention, but they were running the water so loudly back there that she had no idea we were ready to pay and get out of there.

“What’dya think about guns?” I wasn’t sure this is what he said but I was not inclined to ask him to repeat himself. I didn’t look toward him, not wanting him feel to I was confronting him by doing so though by then he was no more than two feet from me and impossible to ignore. I could hear his raspy breath and feel it on my face. He was clearly about my height. In other words, quite big.

“So, what’dya think about them?” I still said nothing. He had his hands on his hips and was now standing face-to-face with me. I couldn’t help but look up at him. “It’s a simple question, ain’t it now?”

To be continued . . .