Idiosynchrosies

My sons and I departed Montana a week into smoke season for a back-east family reunion. The kids were going to meet grandparents and cousins, aunts and uncles they'd never known.

As a Montanan, I don't get back east anymore. The last time I'd gone, my ten year old was four, and my youngest son was just a blastocyst.

This time, they were coming along: extant, independent, armed with game boys and Encyclopedia Brown. I was excited.

My brother had rented a "cottage on a lake." At least that's what the brochure told us. I was immediately suspicious, as the lake was also a river, the river a part of the Erie Canal.

"Okay, whatever," I thought. It'll be green, there'll be fireflies, and we can swim.

So off we flew.

We got to the cottage late Saturday afternoon. The road is unmarked.
Miraculously, my brother and his wife, who live about an hour south, found us just in time. It was they who were lost.

They'd been tooling around for a couple hours, wondering where to go in the maze of driveways, gravel paths and river accesses. They were just turning onto the two-lane highway when we passed them. Talk about synchronicity!

Our introduction to the cottage was typical: Hi, how are you? etc. with the owner.
But then we were told: there is no stove. An electric hot plate was provided, but no stove? A week of Polish family gathering and no where to cook??

The owners set off. "Call if you need anything!" they chimed. Turns out, the wall phone provided couldn't call anyone but them.

My brother put the kielbasa on the grill, while my sister-in-law and I went to set the table. We pulled plates from the cupboard to discover the previous tenants had not washed them. Disgusted, we next discovered there were no clean sponges - none - with which to do the dishes. We both groaned, and grimaced, and shuddered.

Surely, for $1000 a week, one could expect cooking oil, a clean sponge, and pre-washed dishes? Surely, we were wrong.

The cottage itself was quaint and solid, built to resemble a hundred year old house. It abutts a murky slough covered in lily pads and milfoil. Fish rose to nibble myriad flying things - there were remarkably few mosquitoes.

After dinner, we set about choosing sleeping rooms. My sons and I got the king bed, where all three of us could sleep but use only one bedrooms. With four families expected plus one single brother, that arrangement made sense.

I sank to the gargantuan bed, and practically fell off! The mattress may have been king-sized, but the bedframe beneath it was not. A good six inches of mattress just hung in midair. Not the most appealing to a sore-backed sleeper, I moved to the other side, and sheepishly told my five-year-old he was to have that end.

new day, new surprises

Morning rose brilliantly blue, sun upon the thick greenery surrounding us.
Ah! I antipated a quick shower before a quiet canoe ride down the slack water slough.

My shampoo foamed richly in the local well water, but as I set to rinse, the shower suddenly went to ice- then stopped. Two seconds, no warning.

I stood lathered, dumbfounded.

In the dawn stillness I heard a sink downstairs. Haven't these people heard of water righs, I thought? Who was here first, should at least get to finish! I just waited.

By noon, I was settling into the realization this was a low-budget retreat.

The decorating style of the cottage-holders was beyond me. Feather-edged pillows of royal blue satin, bright blood red bathroom, and clutter of kitsch of no discernable theme: I'm sure it was someone's idea of Btter Homes and Gardens.

Too, I was in electronic exile: no phone, no internet, no laptop to write on. It unsettled me, and I knew it was going to be a long week.