Eleven minutes
Behind the cash register…
She sat timelessly, as worn out and tired as most of the items in this store that progress passed by. The shop sat on the edge of a two lane road one up from main street, which was only main because at one point a town existed here. With the railroad gone and tourists asking only for gas and directions, the dust in her shop never moved and the spiders in the corners were the most fascinating thing happening. She ate her sunflower seeds on a stool, with her feet in boots kicked up on the counter, and an open magazine in her lap. Rusty the dog was often taken for dead as little as he moved so she would spray his coat with the empty seeds she chewed. The sun was warm and reflected the webs in the windows and lit the filmy cans of spam on the first shelf. She had nothing to but get old and was making her sweet time. John Russell strolled in needing another tin, as regular as clockwork, John needed a new can every third day, making his way into town in a beat up Chevy always needing gas and belching out the back like a drunk redneck. He smiled, paid, tipped his ball cap and left. Two minutes of excitement and she had about worn herself out.
Fourteen minutes
It was a dark and stormy night…
When they finally had their shit together enough to pull out of the boat harbor. The sky had dropped over the mountains and settled onto the small town, closing down the lights and pushing everybody inside. It was supposed to be a fishing charter but Charley the cook knew better. He had tied down coolers, stuffed refrigerators, locked and stored the foc’s’le in preparation for a bumpy ride the next few hours. On board were friends, and friends of friends, some paying and some freebies, and the mood was light despite the foulness raising outside. Captain had his glasses up on his forehead, never a good sign, and was peeling out of his rain gear when the first wave came over the bow showering the wheelhouse in saltwater. Looks like a long night, he muttered, staring into the endless darkness. The lights in the salon were on and cards were already being dealt amidst beer bottles and rocks glasses, laughter echoing around the cozy windowed room. Peaceful inside, raging out, swells rocked the old boat port to starboard as we crossed one of the many fjords leading from this channel. We were heading to the southwest corner, near where the fleet had been a month or so ago, hoping to pick up where they left off and drag some fresh fish aboard to take home. Late September is late almost everywhere to be fishing, but the forecast promised better things to come as this low was pushing fast and hard and expected to pass by morning.
Ten minutes
Drinking my tea…
Is a ritual. A ritual performed over two weeks twice a year, otherwise I drink coffee. Tea is reserved for when I am fasting, it becomes my meals, my home away from home, my comfort zone and I line up multiple boxes on the counter (up to six or seven varieties, all decaffeinated) and abuse the same mug over and over again. I’m not a tea drinker for a number of reasons, but I think the biggest is that it is false advertising. That vanilla ginger chai that smells divine? Tastes nothing like it smells. A weakly flavored hot water with that distinct leafy grass smell, but I drink it while fasting because plain water is boring, caffeine (ergo, coffee) is off limits, as is booze and soda. When my dad shunned coffee due to his blood pressure, he switched to having a cup of hot water with his toast and sports page in the morning. I’m preparing myself then for the inevitability of quitting coffee when I’m older and rueing the day already. Tea just doesn’t have the body, the strength, the robust character coffee has. Tea is like the ninth batter in an American league lineup, the weakest of hitters, but required because the rules say you have to have nine.
Eight minutes
The greyhound station in Provo…
Is strewn with the bodies of people looking for the exit. Out of Provo, out of Utah and away from the suffocating oppression of Mormonism. I had stalled here on my way to Colorado for a summer of hitchhiking around the west. Being dropped off after an all night push through the desert by a young Mormon rebel who had driven out of the state to buy dope and beer, I found myself on an early Sunday morning high as a cloud in the sky with a nice buzz tagging along for good measure. The next bus away from here wasn’t for another three hours and it was going to Cheyenne. I hadn’t thought about Wyoming, or anything else for that matter lately, but it seemed as good a place as any to check out. I bought my ticket from an old white guy behind a plate glass window with a speaker hole. I slid my money into the slot and received change and a stub that would permit me to leave.
