City Mouse, Country Mouse
(This originally appeared as a second post on Sept. 20 '08. I moved it to its own spot for today.)
I’m a country mouse and never did make the transition to being a city mouse. I think it’s in my DNA or something. Or maybe imprinted from my earliest days.
When I was 7 ½ (to the day), we moved out to what Mother Nature and a glacier had made into an island a half-mile offshore. River silt and the Hand of Man (no women involved) had turned that half-mile into swamp with a causeway and more-or-less solid roadway which the aforementioned Ma Nature on a yearly basis reclaimed just to remind us who was in charge of her makings.
It wasn’t really country, but there weren’t any sidewalks or traffic lights. Two “main” streets; one was perfectly straight, going from the marshes to the lighthouse, and the other went from the marshy causeway, curved, and eventually met the other road that also connected us to civilization.
I lived in another, rural, town. No traffic lights, no sidewalks. My evening bike ride around the block was ten miles long. At least the streets had names; unlike the town next to one place where I lived in Vermont – no house numbers, no street names, no business district, but a stop sign across from the church. My town was a wide spot in the road, where the restaurant/bar owner scooped up money from the till, stuffed it into a bag with a blank deposit slip and asked someone to run it over to the bank. The gas station owner kept a gun stuck in his belt; “you never know,” he said, darkly. His back room was where the local fiddlers met each Monday to make music.
I’m a country mouse and never did make the transition to being a city mouse. I think it’s in my DNA or something. Or maybe imprinted from my earliest days.
When I was 7 ½ (to the day), we moved out to what Mother Nature and a glacier had made into an island a half-mile offshore. River silt and the Hand of Man (no women involved) had turned that half-mile into swamp with a causeway and more-or-less solid roadway which the aforementioned Ma Nature on a yearly basis reclaimed just to remind us who was in charge of her makings.
It wasn’t really country, but there weren’t any sidewalks or traffic lights. Two “main” streets; one was perfectly straight, going from the marshes to the lighthouse, and the other went from the marshy causeway, curved, and eventually met the other road that also connected us to civilization.
I lived in another, rural, town. No traffic lights, no sidewalks. My evening bike ride around the block was ten miles long. At least the streets had names; unlike the town next to one place where I lived in Vermont – no house numbers, no street names, no business district, but a stop sign across from the church. My town was a wide spot in the road, where the restaurant/bar owner scooped up money from the till, stuffed it into a bag with a blank deposit slip and asked someone to run it over to the bank. The gas station owner kept a gun stuck in his belt; “you never know,” he said, darkly. His back room was where the local fiddlers met each Monday to make music.
posted by Tom Carten at 11:39 PM
3 Comments:
My kind of mouse!
Where I live and hangout you don't see many No Trespasing signs, and if you do it is a sign of a city mouse, recently retired, who doesn't understand country mouses' way of life and unwritten laws. We gather berries, mushrooms and the like, snowshoe through the woods, hike around and all, but never ask permission BUT we never leave tracks.
Those ?&%%$ city mouses? Hey, they better not get stuck in the snow, they'll be there 'til Easter.
(Ask Exit 318, he knows sumpin')
CJV
You are way ahead of your time! (Date)
Well, I had this double post for September and decided to move it up, but I didn't want to mess with New Year's Eve or Day.
So I stuck it on January 2, instead.
*Don't drink and drive; you might spill the drink.
*Gasoline and alcohol don't mix. Well, they do mix, but they taste terrible.
Post a Comment
<< Home