August 15, 2011--Midcoast: No Gas

"I think we should stop there and fill up.” Rona was pointing at a gas station, shrouded in fog and dust that looked like something out of Grapes of Wrath.

“I never heard of Irving gas,” I said, not eager to pull in. “I’m sure we’ll find some real gas in a few miles. We still have a quarter of a tank.” I was nervous about the look of the proprietor who was standing in the hazy sun leaning against one of the pumps and spewing a steady stream of what looked like tobacco juice.

“Let’s stop anyway. I could use a pit stop and some cold water.” It was an unusually hot day for coastal Maine and we had been driving around for a couple of hours exploring, and both of us were parched.

“I dunno,” I whispered as if he could hear me, “Take a look at that grizzly-looking guy by the pump.”

“I see him. What’s the issue?”

“Doesn’t he look . . . ,” I was hesitant to say what I was really fearing, “Well, a little peculiar?”

Rona twisted around in her seat to get a better look as I slowed the car enough to allow us, without a fuss, to turn into the station or, without making it obvious that we had opted to drive on, give me face-saving cover to accelerate and pass by as if that was what we had all along intended to do.

“Stop being such a priss. I have to pee and we don’t know how far it is to the next gas station or general store. What’s he going to do to us? Hold us hostage? Murder us? This is Maine, not rural Alabama.”

With my manhood thus challenged, I swung the car hard to the left and swerved up to the pump at which he was planted. I thought that by doing so so aggressively he would know we were people to be reckoned with. But he didn’t flinch, glaring at us as he continued his ritualistic spitting.

In as deep a voice as I could muster I grunted “Hello.” He didn’t even nod.

Rona popped out of the car before it had come to a complete stop and raced to the back of the tattered variety store where she was hoping to find a bathroom. I could only imagine what it would be like. Though I also needed to use a facility I had already decided it would not be this one, that I would hold out for as long as necessary to find a place that would be more sanitary.

So I sat in the car up by the pump, humming to myself, and hoped Rona would be quick about her business.

The owner-sentinel detached himself the pump and wiped the hairless top of his head with a grease-stained rag that he had extracted from his coveralls. It left a scar of grease on his sweating forehead. He continued to chew on his plug of tobacco and, after a conclusive spit, leaned toward me and peered in the car window, especially surveying the back seat. An Igloo ice chest was all that we had there and I could see he thought of it and, likely us, contemptuously—clear evidence to him that we were weekenders or at most in the area for some of the summer. The very opposite of true Mainers.

I was hoping that Rona would hurry up.

“Wanna fill-up?”

“Are you talking to me?” I managed to stammer.

“Don’t see no one else around.”

“Well, maybe a bottle of water, if you have that inside.” I gestured in the direction of the store.

“No gas 'tween here and the next town which by my measure is 'bout 22 miles. So if you need some, this is pretty much your last chance for quite a while.”

“We have plenty of gas,” I lied, still wondering what Irving gas was. I was glad he couldn’t see the gas gauge from where he was positioned. “But, as I said, we could use some water of you have any.”

“You don’t have some in that fancy chest?” He gestured dismissively at our big Igloo. “Guess you don’t,” he spat not waiting for me to answer, “otherwise why’d you be lookin' to buy some more. Not that I can figure why anyone would want to pay for somethin' like water. It sure beats me. It’s one of them few free things we have left. Though if you’re hooked up to town water they make you pay a pretty damned penny for it. Sheeet.”

“Can’t say I disagree,” I muttered.

“Good, though, you don’t need no gas.”

“Why’s that?” I ventured. Still no sign of Rona.

“Don’t got any anyway. Though I got a little diesel. You can’t use any of that, can you?” He glanced at our car and shook his head at either it (it’s unusual in Maine with all its dirt roads for any car to still be shining from its last waxing) or the fact that it uses regular gas.

It was good, I thought, that we still had a quarter of a tank. “Take a look at that sign.” He pointed to the glass window on the pump taped to which was a torn off sheet of paper that said, in magic marker, No Gas. From the look of the sign it appeared that it had been duct-taped there for some time.

So I took the chance to say, “Looks like you haven’t had any for quite awhile.”

“True enough,” he said, turning away from me to spit, “You could say I’m in the no-gas business.” He liked his own joke, laughing and coughing and spitting all at the same time. Some tobacco juice sprayed on the hood of our car. I was now glad for the coat of Simonize we had applied earlier in the week.

I hadn’t noticed that Rona had come up behind him. “That’s pretty funny,” she said, “The no-gas business. How then, if I can ask, do you manage to stay in business?”

I had calmed down enough, having spoken civilly with him while Rona was preoccupied, and so actually had some interest in what he might say.

“I don’t need much to get by,” he had turned to face Rona and was clearly ignoring me. “That’s one of the good things livin’ in a cabin over there in the woods. I pretty much have what I need. Don’t have to pay for water,” he chuckled and looked back over his shoulder toward me, “And I eat pretty simple. Mostly stuff out of cans and what I can grow. Nothing too fancy for me. So I’m ready for ‘bout anything. I heat things on my wood stove which also goes a long way winters to make things comfortable ‘nough. A few folks like you stop here to buy a little this, a little that. Postcards. Cigarettes. This time of year I have some local apples. I do pretty good with them. 'Nough to keep me going. And I even have some of them Trojans.” I assumed he was smiling at Rona.

I saw Rona avert her eyes. “But no gas?” she again asked.

“Nope. Don’t need it and even if I did couldn’t get none.”

“Because?”

“’Cause the Irving folks wouldn’t let me have none anyway.” Rona looked at him quizzically. “Got no credit. Got not cash.” He shrugged and explained, “Then, get no gas.”

“I get it,” she said softly, looking a little embarrassed.

“I think we’d better be going,” I offered in an attempt to extract us from the situation. “We have to be home in time for . . .”

“Really in time for nothing,” Rona admitted. With me caught not telling the truth I was again concerned where things might next be headed.

“Looks like he’s in a big hurry,” he said sounding edgy, again without turning he pointed toward me. “Hurry, hurry, hurry,” he spat then snorted, “Hurrying with nowhere to go.” Rona nodded. “Got your car all shined up,” he said to me while still facing Rona, “And a beautiful girlfriend.”

“Wife,” I said under my breath.

“Girlfriend, wife, makes no difference to me,” he said, equally sotto voce. “Ever spend a night in the woods?” I recalled it was many decades ago, not since Boy Scout camp. As if reading my thought, he said, “Ought to try it some time. Would help reorder things for you. Make you ’preciate what you got. So you know what’s important. Get in touch better. Mind you, I’m no hippy or tree hugger. Just a guy who grew up right and has his head more-less screwed on straight. Might sound boastful to you.” In truth it had started to. “But don’t come to any conclusions till you’ve tried it out.”

“You know,” Rona broke in, “I’ve been saying, now that we’re spending half a year here, that we need to get out on the water more and into the woods. Like you.” She again turned to him.

“I don’t mean to insult you ma’am, you seem very nice to me, but I wasn’t meaning ‘getting into the woods more.’ I’m sayin’ really gettin’ into the woods and lettin’ it take hold of you. I’m not talkin’ a little trail walkin’. I mean spendin’ some time in a cabin with no plumbin', no electric. That’s what I’m sayin’.

“And,” he repositioned himself so he was now facing both of us, “one thing you can bring along with you—like I do—is your music.”

As a musician Rona smiled broadly at that. He continued, “I don’t know what you like, but I . . .”

“I am curious,” Rona interrupted, “to know what you listen to. That is, if you don’t mind.”

“Not at all.” He swiped at himself again with his rag, making more of a mess of the top of his head. “I’m sure you think you got me all figured out and . . .”

“We don’t,” Rona assured him.

“Just the way you think I got you folks all figured out—New York license plates, a shiny station wagon, an Igloo cooler in the back seat, and I saw your husband gettin’ nervous,” he winked, “when he first spotted me.”

I gestured to Rona it was time to get back in the car.

“I do have my prejudices, that I’ll admit, but I try my best to put them down. The way I live up here, and see things, you gotta deal with as much truth as you can. And bein’ too quick to come to conclusions about people doesn’t fit that philosophy.”

Rona had edged her way to the car.

“You asked me about my music,” he returned to that, “And, just as you probably are suspectin’, I do like my classic rock. I am of that era. But mostly,” he paused, “I take my quartets out there with me.”

I couldn’t help from exclaiming, “Your quartets? String ones?”

“Those very kind.” He was grinning ear-to-ear. “Can’t beat ‘em when the wind’s howlin’ or it’s about to rain.”

Rona by then had opened the car door. She was smiling sweetly at him, as by then was I.

“Now you folks have a nice rest of the day.” He spat and placed another plug of tobacco in his cheek.