Route 153

Camel Poser July 26, 2011

Camel. Photo grabbed from the Internet.

For someone who loves camels as much as I do, I find it sad that I may never master the camel pose in yoga. My editor neck and shoulders seem to be forever locked in an impossible tightness only slightly and temporarily loosened by massage and chiropractic. Of course, if I would regularly practice yoga, instead of taking a class once a week, I might get there in a year or two.

Why couldn’t savasana be called camel?

Savasana. Photo grabbed from the Internet.

Friendly Graffiti July 13, 2011

I went to the movies today. Hit the restroom before the show. There was graffiti on the back wall of my stall. It said, “I think you look lovely today.”

Why, thank you.

After the film, I went back. The complimentary stall was occupied, but another positive-energy woman had apparently visited two doors down. A downer-meant message exclaimed “Hey, it’s me, your period! Sucks to be you!” But someone had drawn a line through “Sucks to be you!” and replaced it with “Congrats on not being preggo! xoxo!”

The Forces for Good will not be ignored. At least not in that restroom.

Studio July 13, 2011

On Saturday, Tim nearly emptied his studio—the room at the front of the house that once served as a parlor, no doubt, but now is his painting place, music practice space, and office—so that it could be painted in our absence. Over the winter, the ice dams did a number on the walls. There are water stains everywhere.

The heaviest stuff (with wheels) got moved to the center of the room. The rest fills the living room and the mudroom. Books, shelves, filing cabinet. Paintings. Music. Art supplies.

When we first started out, we lived in a space not much bigger than this room.

Just us and our no stuff.

Another Reason I Love Portland July 8, 2011

I dialed the number to the liquor store, asked the guy who answered if Nolan was working. “Hold on,” he said, and put Nolan on the line.

“Nolan, this is Indigo,” I said. “I’m from Vermont, and sometimes I stay at the hotel next door.”

“And you’re looking for Cinquante-Cinq Viognier,” he said.

“That’s right.”

It had been three months.

***

I’m not completely surprised that I could jar Nolan’s memory as to my identity (but wouldn’t have been surprised if I couldn’t, either). He grew up in Vermont, and we’ve talked a couple of times. But I was impressed that he could immediately connect me with that particular bottle. More than impressed. He’d spent some time on it before, but he must spend time looking for lots of things for lots of people.

***

For a few years, there was this nice Viognier I would order by the glass at the bar of one of the better-known upper-end establishments in town. Not too sweet, not too flowery. I would try to find bottles to purchase, but to no avail. No one in Portland had it, and no one in Vermont seemed to be able to get it. I tried to mail order it a couple of times, would put it in my virtual basket, only to be told that they didn’t have it in stock after all.

It turned out that the Portland bartender was pretty much buying all of it from the distributor (he ended up telling me as much). A glass cost almost as much as the retail price of the bottle (an inexpensive bottle, obviously)—would that one could actually purchase a bottle. Which one could not.

A couple of times I walked into that bar and said, “Give me glass of that wine that I can only get here,” and Greg would silently reach for the Pichon and pour.

A few months ago, though, it turned out that the wine was no more. The winery had revamped things, or somesuch, and Greg had a different Viognier (possibly from the same vineyard—I can’t remember the details exactly). I tried it and liked it. He showed me the bottle.

“I saw a bottle of that today,” I said, pleasantly surprised.

“Where?” he asked.

“Oh no,” I said. “I’m not telling you. I’m going to go buy it.”

I was convinced that Greg was going to bogart this wine too.

***

Right after dinner, I went to the liquor store and picked up the bottle. Nolan thought there was more; there wasn’t. He told me he could order a case and get it in before we left town.

But the next day, I got a call, and it turns out there’s none to be had. He said it was very strange.

Mmmm hmmmm.

“Next time you’re coming into town, call about a week in advance,” he told me. “We’ll see what we can do.”

***

OK, so it wasn’t a full week in advance. My bad. I’ve been busy, distracted with other things. If I’d called a week in advance, perhaps things would have turned out differently.

When I called yesterday, Nolan said they had a couple of bottles. He’d check on the case, and if he couldn’t get one, he’d save what they had for me.

Within twenty minutes, he called me back.

“It’s the funniest thing,” he said. “Ever since you left, we’ve been getting regular shipments. Now they don’t have any. We just got a case in last week.”

And he only had one bottle left, which he pulled off the shelf for me.

He said he’d check around to see if anyone else in town had it. Or maybe they could get it next week. Or maybe once they do get it again, he’d set aside a case for me (but of course, it may be months before I go back).

***

So it’s possible that Greg hasn’t bought up all this wine. I tried to find some in April, after my last trip, but again, there were no places claiming to have it that would ship to Vermont (possibly one in Colorado—but the shipping costs nearly equaled the case price).

Maybe this is Bacchus’s way of keeping me in check.

I wonder if the wine’s as good as my memory of it. Perhaps I’m merely obsessed with the hunt.

Blue House July 2, 2011

Back when I moved to Parts West sixteen years ago, there were no house numbers. I got my mail at the post office just down the street (and still do). Tim and I rented a blue house on the corner of Route 153 and a cross street of sorts.

I began working as a freelance editor. In those days, clients still sent me physical manuscripts. Even when I first started editing digitally, they would send disks with a hard copy of the manuscript and/or art dummy. That meant a lot of FedEx and UPS. My address went something like this: Route 153 at Town Highway XX (blue house). Seriously. My clients couldn’t believe they were writing “blue house” on their delivery forms.

Tim and I bought a house across the street in 1999. Eventually, 911 services meant that we were assigned house numbers. This made a lot of things easier.

My propane bill, though—even while sporting my physical address—still also instructs: “yellow house across from her previous blue house.” A tiny Vermont found poem:

yellow house across
from her
previous blue
house

“So,” thinks a delivery guy, glancing across the street, his brain brimming with history, “She used to live over there.”