ICE FISHING
by
Norbert Blei
The previous NBCoop News piece, #59, “Ice-In,” described the annual winter event of our bays here in Door County slowly, suddenly turning to ice, followed soon after by the fishermen moving their shanties upon the frozen landscape, settling in the warmth of their habitats for hours (days, weeks) for as long as the ice holds their frozen world in place.
The very next day after I took the desolate photo that accompanied the “Ice-in” piece (sans shanties), the ice fishermen began to appear.
My friend, artist Charles Peterson ( www.clpetersonstudio.com ) who paints the life and times of this county with such passion, detail, beauty (our visual historian), responded to all this with a small watercolor, 12 x 16 inches, that captures this moment upon the ice the way only an artist of his talent can render into art the everydayness of all seasons here on the peninsula.
Lucky the person who owns an original Peterson drawing, watercolor, oil…or signed and numbered reproduction.
A little piece of Door County for keepsakes.
Ice Fishermen | Painting by Charles Peterson
ICE-IN
It happens sometimes in December, sometimes as early as November.
This non-winter so far, a cold, sunny January morning, it remains a work in progress. Though something is happening as you drive by, catching a glimpse of the shore. You will never “see it” happen in the moment: the ice coming in, into, on the bay, gathering strength and depth so slowly before your very eyes.
Setting itself in place for the winter miracle of water-to-ice…transformation. The blue water disappears…let’s go. It’s…it’s…thin, solid, thick…one foot, two feet…black ice, or grey ice…capped inevitable in waves of snow. The bay, blinding in sunlight. You can see all the way over there…
Given another freeze or two, and you too can walk on water.
Beneath the ice the living world is trapped for weeks to come. (What is all going on in their world, suddenly a ceiling above?)
Get out the cross-country skis, the snowshoes…
Start the snowmobiles, the pick-up trucks…
Soon the shanties arrive…the ice fishermen slowly moving out, into, above it all, with their drills and rods and lines and bait and nets and hooks…the shanties sending small clouds of smoke high above the frozen scene, while inside men sit and eat and drink and talk and laugh and tell stories and are a thousand miles from home…waiting above a small circle of blue water. Which has become their universe.
Anxious to harvest whatever life under ice yields for a winter dinner in a warm house, as night slowly descends, and they await the next day on the ice with joy. — norbert blei
SOME OF THE BEST WRITING
THE CLEARING
September 14, 2012
Editor’s Note: Last month I taught the late Barbara Vroman’s writing workshop, “Rumpelstilskin Writing” (turning straw to gold) at The Clearing, a one-day class from 9 to 4. At the end of the workshop that afternoon, I encouraged students to send me a final version of any of the assignments (the gold from the straw) by the end of the month, and I would post the “best three” on one of my websites in October.
Selections were made by both me and anonymous writer/critic ‘judge’ I have called upon before, with no connection to Wisconsin, The Clearing, my classes, or any of the students.
Once again, this critic and I have settled on the same three works as ‘the best’ or, ‘some of the best’.
“High Honorable Mentions” include work submitted by Carol Doty, Pat Samata, Janet Leahy, Mark Tully, Anne Gimbel, and Roy Swanson. Some of these pieces need a little more thought, another ‘final’ rewrite and, in a couple of instances, fewer words. (“Less is more”– much better.) When and if possible, I will try to post some of these pieces in the near future.
Each of the writers whose work appears below will receive a book from my personal library.
All honorable mentions can be assured of a cup of good coffee (on me) at any one of my favorite coffeeshops in Door County: The Brew (Ellison Bay), Base Camp (Sister Bay) or Leroy’s (Ephraim). Let me know when you’re in the mood and/or in the area. — Norbert Blei
Grief
Grief settles on her soul.
Mixing Sakrete with water,
the grey grains melting into her mouth,
settling into her teeth,
mush filling her throat.
the grey grief descends, gagging her,
the taste of wet goo causing her to gasp for breath.
it slides into her chest, filling the cavity,
this concrete chute of grief.
Susan Flynn
What, Me Date?
So, my friend Ryan calls me up in the afternoon—very weird, usually Joan does the calling. Maybe because she’s gone to California for the week, he wants to have dinner. Men don’t like to eat alone, but then, who does? He is very apologetic: “Errrr, hmm, I feel kind of strange asking this, but . . .” I could hear him figuratively digging his toe in the sand. Turns out he has a new guy friend he thinks highly of and he wants to get us together—“Not like you want the same things you’d want at 19.” (Me to self: why not?) Anyway, the call ends with his plaintive plea that I Google the guy. OMG, we’re all technologically nineteen now. So, I Google and come up with a list of his publications and where he’s taught and all things academic. There’s absolutely nothing personal there but I do like what he writes about—business ethics, even if I always thought that was an oxymoron, and other good stuff I’m still interested in despite being out of the university game for a while. Makes me feel a little smug; I can go mano a mano with academic credentials for an opener.
But, there’s nothing at all here about what his liking for Italian food might be, or vodka martinis with a twist not an olive, or how he spends his leisure time and at seventy, believe me, you’ve got plenty of it. And then, nineteen again, what does he look like and, seventy again, why should I care? In fact, what do I look like and why should anyone care? (Friends keep sending me photos in which I look haggard, wrinkled, and slightly demented.) Why, for god’s sake should looks matter now? But, my lizard brain wakens and nudges me, saying you always only liked the good looking bad boys. What if he’s ugly? Worse—what if he’s a predator? I watch way too much ID TV. Please, God, let him be a bad boy but not too bad.
And that brings me to the real lurking demon in this story: sex. It’s not so much the erotic idea here, it’s the what it is to be a girl and what it is to be a boy. If Ryan’s invitation had been to meet a new female friend, I wouldn’t have been bothered at all, just thought oh good, someone new and interesting to get to know. But a male? All of high school’s hideousness lurks. I used to think that was about being attractive or being able to hold a conversation or dance well but now I think it’s about what the other person thinks I’m expecting of him. Especially in a set-up. God forbid that Ryan told him I have a nice personality.
Then, there is the other kind of sex. The kind that old women who are reading 50 Shades of Gray, now burble on about to their much younger hairdressers, causing major gross out to twenty-something sensibilities. No one ever tells you that you still might have an itch when you’re old. Usually, the idea that someone over 60 is still getting it on, as it were, is merely cute or worse, disgusting, to those not over that hilarious hill. Well, you just wait till you get there and see how cute it is. OK, so we’re very unlikely to jump in, or even shuffle, off to bed, but it’s still possible and the notion confounds and confuses me at the lizard and all other brain levels. It would involve removing clothes, a thought too ghastly to entertain, or maybe Viagra—talk about your unnatural acts.
Despite my jitters, I think I’ll call Ryan today and tell him sure, I’d love to meet the guy despite carrying this awkward burden of trepidation. Maybe I still am nineteen.
Alice Randlett
Old Dula
Some days
I am her:
…gray socks
…toeless shoes
…scattered hair
sitting on the front porch
screaming at the world.
Mariann Ritzer
THREE LOCAL POETS:
Jean Casey, Bill Jacobs, Susan Peterson
by
Norbert Blei
A Gift
I stood transfixed in my kitchen window
which looks toward the east
and a stand of birches in front of woods.
It’s where I see a full moon rising
under a rack of clouds in a navy blue sky,
but yesterday afternoon there was a sun shower
which had caused a perfect rainbow…
a full crescent dipping down, ending in the meadow
near the first stone fence,
the other end concealed by the trees.
Radiantly defined colors, all of them
which I recited like a prayer:
red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet.
The violet was startling, almost fuchsia.
My camera was my eye.
Who deserves such a gift!
Jean Casey
Autumn in Door County
Soft cotton sweatshirt and pants,
sipping that first cup of coffee,
bundle up for a dawn walk
with the dog,
cold air in the lungs,
stars soaring in black
tinged with purple gold sky
and silhouetted trees,
shoe leather crunching down
driveway,
into the damp dew dropped
leaves tugged by the leash
of my invisible friend..
Bill Jacobs
Queen Anne’s Lace
I see that flower all
around me, this summer-
see everywhere its beautiful
intricacies, a close constellation
of stars
….like delicate mandalas
….waiting to be looked at, a language
….to be learned.
Often I lose myself in fields
spread with lavender, the blue
of flax, and again that circle
of antique lace, like a nun’s tatting
silently demanding something of me.
Last night I saw from top of the hill
the half-moon, haloed curve of light,
watched it sink quickly into black, and
again saw, pushing close to where I sat,
white flowers, waiting,
like holy spiderwebs, in the dark.
Susan Peterson
[from: PREPARING THE FIELDS, Spoon River Poetry Press, 1985, $4, illustrated/drawings by Charles Peterson
click the image above to visit the Mr. Helsinki web page.
JENNIFER LEE*
by
Norbert Blei
Though there were few painters of and on the Door peninsula around the time I moved here in 1969 (landscape artist Gerhard Miller of Sturgeon Bay, the most prominent and serious artist at the time), others slowly began settling in through the 1970’s, making it their home, and their subject matter as well: Charles Peterson, Phil Austin, Jack Anderson, Austin Fraser, Flora Langlois, Tom Segard, Bridgette Kozma, Milly Armato, Al Quinlan, Madeline Tourtelot and Jim Ingwersen among them.
For some, Door County was not so much their subject as the right place to be, to work, to exhibit their paintings in their own studios, in local galleries, to grow in this setting. Anyone living here with an interest in art, knew almost all these people, recognized them in the community, were familiar with their art.
Since the late 80’s to the present, it’s almost impossible to keep up with the number of artists living, painting, exhibiting their work here, let alone grasp the wide range of their styles or subject, from traditional to abstract and beyond. While the Door County Advocate did its best in years past to feature many of our painters, what passes for local attention today, often leaves much to be desired.
I have always felt a particular empathy for younger artists here and what they’re up against in light of the history of successful, traditional painters, especially newer artists who do not paint the county, so to speak. How difficult it must be to attract any attention whatsoever, to find a gallery, a business, someone who will give them some wall space, a little publicity. Door County’s coffee shops seem the most open to this, especially Base Camp…Sister Bay; Leroys…Ephraim; and The Brew; Ellison Bay. I’m sure there are others. Danny Peterson’s Viking restaurant in Ellison Bay for one.
And certainly Mr. Helsinki, Restaurant and Wine Bar in Fish Creek, which has been very supportive through the years, and where you are invited to catch the work of Jennifer Lee, from September 6th through the month of September.
Those who frequent The Brew in Ellison Bay may recognize the artist as the dedicated manager (barista-in-residence) who never fails to brew you a great cup of coffee with a smile.
As far as Jennifer’s feelings regarding the present scene: “It seems like the greatest challenge for a younger artist in Door Co.–or anywhere I imagine–is being enthusiastic about your work. Many artists find themselves coming out of a school where their work has been graded, critiqued and/or judged over and over. I feel that the most important opinion about your work is your own. I developed a passion for painting in my early 20’s and never had any formal training. I didn’t have any rules to either follow or break and that has helped me stay excited about what I do. I think I sold a great deal of my early work through sheer enthusiasm perhaps rather than great art.
“I often meet people who wistfully wish they could move to Door County. I tell them that while it may not be easy to make a living, it is worth it for the quality of life. In addition to being an artist I manage a successful coffee shop where I have fun and meet great people. I have met a number of ‘full-time’ artists that struggle to keep painting what “sells.” I enjoy the freedom to paint what I like and what sells….sometimes even both! At some time in the future I might consider taking up the brush full time, but in the meantime I’m sticking with the brush and the latte. Ha!
She describes her personal approach to art as messy “…maybe a better word is spontaneous…I rarely sketch or plan my pieces. I like to lay the paint on the canvas with brushes, knives and fingers. Almost all of my work has several paintings underneath. I’ll live with something for a while, and then flip it upside down and try something else. The process gives the work a richness and sense of history.
“Nearly all of my work is figurative. Painting women comes naturally to me. I like the motion of painting the curvy figures or the dresses as the knife makes a whimsical ‘birch-y’ chiffon texture. I admire and am inspired by women who are strong, courageous, funny and resilient. I like the idea of the maiden, the mother, the warrior and the crone all wrapped up in one package. I think it shows in the work.”
One of Door County’s most celebrated painters today is Franne Dickinson who happens to be Jennifer’s grandmother. What role, one wonders, does an artistic grandmother play in a young artist’s life?
“Franne–or Molly as I call her–has been instrumental in cultivating my love for art. As a child she would take me to museums and galleries around the country; her passion helped me understand much of the art I was seeing. She and I went to Paris when I was 21 where I could barely keep up with her as we took in the city. When I started painting she insisted that I trust my instincts and always encouraged me in anything I was working on. She introduced me to many wonderful and supportive artists and mentors who have helped me stay enthused about the work.
Considering her own development as an artist in a relative short span of time, leading to her present show at Mr. Helsinki:
“When I started painting Molly would host shows for me in her kitchen which was a great experience as I got a chance to talk about the work with others and got a feel for how people responded to it. A while later I was chosen as an “Emerging Artist” for the program with the Peninsula School of Art. That was a wonderful opportunity as it created a lot of recognition in the community as well as support. Also, Charlene Berg of Gallery Ten was a great champion of mine and I had a lot of success at shows in her gallery. My first exhibit at Mr. Helsinki was four years ago and was a great success. I sold almost every painting and people really enjoyed it. The space is perfect and I think there is something to be said for having a ‘captive audience’ amid your artwork during the course of a meal.
“Over these ten years my work has grown from primitive to something snazzier. Now I have a ‘dialogue’ with the work. I like to paint and scratch into, scrape off, paint over and do it again until what remains is something unexpected, unplanned, and beautiful. I want people to feel the strength and tenacity of these women and perhaps recognize it in themselves as well.”
please click the images to enlarge
*Jennifer Lee, Artist
Jennifer Lee moved to Door County in 2003 to pursue an art career after she unexpectedly found her passion for painting. Jennifer’s grandmother, Door County artist Franne Dickinson, jokes that she could hardly get Jennifer to hold a crayon when she was a child because she always had her nose in a book. It was a surprise to both of them when Jennifer found her intrinsic talent. She is primarily self-taught with the help of friends, family and great mentors through Peninsula School of Art. She paints on her surfaces without sketches or an intended outcome-letting the paint have its say first. She often uses unconventional tools and techniques through trial and error to create her unique compositions. In addition to painting, Jennifer manages a popular coffee shop, serves as a volunteer board member for the Wellness Center of Door County, and still has her nose in several books. Jennifer’s work is available at Brew Coffeehouse in downtown Ellison Bay and The Toe Path Studio on Anderson Lane in Ephraim. She currently is painting a body of work for a show at Mr. Helsinki Restaurant and Wine Bar in Fish Creek which will be on display in September.
LABOR DAY WEEKEND:
LAST CALL–THE BEACH & A GOOD READ
A Beached Wail—No Time for That Pile of Books
by Danny Heitman
Hang around literary culture long enough, and you’ll learn about writers colonies—groups of tree-shaded cottages in some pastoral locale, supported by a generous benefactor in which a poet, playwright, novelist can complete his work without the distractions of the outside world.
The premise here is that writing well benefits a lot from peace and quiet. But reading also depends a great deal on long stretches of time unbroken by phone calls, text messages and trips to the grocery store. Which if we want to keep and even increase the audience for the written word, we should probably think about building a few readers colonies, too.
All of this comes to mind with the arrival of another Labor Day weekend, marking the unofficial close of a summer reading season in which very few of us read as much as we thought we would. That’s despite a vacation calendar heavily promoted by the publishing industry as the perfect time to enjoy books at the beach.
Anne Morrow Lindbergh pointed out the problem many years ago. Lindbergh, who frequented the shores of Florida and was something of an expert on the peculiar blessings and complications of coastal living, debunked the beach as a book-lover’s paradise. “The Beach is not the place to work; to read, write or think,” Lindbergh told readers back in 1955, perhaps capitalizing “beach” to underscore its place in our national mythology. “Too warm, too damp, too soft for any real mental discipline or sharp flights of spirit. One never learns. Hopefully, one carries down the faded straw bag, lumpy with books…. The books remain unread . . .”
The passage comes from the opening of Lindbergh’s “Gift from the Sea,” a slender volume that I carried to the beach this summer and did, despite the mental corruptions of sand and surf to which she alluded, manage to finish. I had thrown “Gift from the Sea” in my suitcase because of its brevity, knowing from experience that we must often manage to read despite vacation settings, not because of them.
That’s also why I pitched Rheta Grimsley Johnson’s bite-size memoir, “Enchanted Evening Barbie and the Second Coming,” into my tote bag as I flip-flopped down to a chaise near the Gulf of Mexico. Along with her gift for memorable book titles, Ms. Johnson has a commendable knack for writing stuff brief enough to be savored in a sitting or two.
Other, more physically substantial titles on my summer book list lie on my nightstand still unread, including historian Geoffrey C. Ward’s account of his swindler ancestor, “A Disposition to Be Rich”; Bettany Hughes’s study of Socrates, “The Hemlock Cup”; and film critic Roger Ebert’s memoir, “Life Itself.”
Meanwhile, Robert A. Caro’s 712-page “The Passage of Power,” the latest installment of his LBJ biography, has been circling my summer days like Ahab’s whale, teasing me to conquer it before the season ends.
If we want to encourage reading, so long lamented as on the decline, then clearly we’re going to need something more than summer vacations to sustain an active audience for people of letters. Which makes me hope that somewhere, a wealthy philanthropist like Bill Gates or Warren Buffett is listening.
For this well-meaning donor intent on public good, I have a modest proposal: From coast to coast, endow America with readers colonies where earnest bibliophiles can apply for fellowships that offer retreats to rustic cabins for a week or two with their favorite authors.
There, with nothing to compete for my attention except an occasional wind through tall pines, I just might be able to finish “The Passage of Power” before Christmas.
Mr. Heitman, a columnist for the Baton Rouge Advocate, is the author of “A Summer of Birds: John James Audubon at Oakley House” (LSU Press, 2008).
[from THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, August 31, 2012]
Editor’s Note: “Remembering Tom”
It’s difficult at times to separate a man from a place. I always felt that about Tom Amberg and Sister Bay, where I first met him at the counter of Al Johnson’s many years ago. Summer was not summer without his appearance the last week of July, the first week of August every year.
I would walk into Al’s (newspaper and mail in one hand, briefcase in the other), take up my position at the end of the counter—ready for anything, anybody who came my way, including Al, always within sight and sound, and there one morning would be Tom—occupying my spot, chatting it up with anyone, everyone. The heart of summer had arrived.
Dealing with a host of health problems, Tom was forced to abandon his beloved ‘Sister’ in 2002. No one but his wife, Judith, knows just how deeply he felt this loss of place in his life. He died on May 31, 2011.
I had breakfast this morning with his wife…who continues to return to ‘Sister’ every year. All the simple memories they both shared of just being here, mindful of what Liberty Lodge once was—an old fashioned ‘vacation’…just being here/there, their rental cottage on the shore, the dock, the water, the sunsets…everything perfectly in place.
These days, alone, she retraces many of his rituals, including his quiet early morning drive to Europe Lake, where Tom would always slow down past my coop, pause momentarily, and then proceed to the end of the road, the water’s edge, where he held something like a morning prayer service. Thankful to be alive, back in place.
I wrote a piece about him over twenty years ago (below). And will write another (in memoriam) in the fourth and final book (in progress) of the Door Way series. Rest in peace, my old friend. Rest in peace. – Norbert Blei
TOM AMBERG (1940–2011)
“The Man Who Loves [LOVED] Sister Bay”
The Summer of 1989
by
Norbert Blei
The label ‘tourist’ has both good and bad connotations. But rarely does anyone entertain the idea of an ‘ideal tourist’. I think I have found such a man.
His name is Tom Amberg from Mt. Prospect, Illinois, and the summer of 1989 marks his 40th season as a visitor to Door County, a lover of Sister Bay.
That’s 40 years of summer vacations spent in one particular location Tom Amberg still calls ideal: The Liberty Park Lodge in Sister Bay. That wonderful white frame building, an evocation of Door County past, that sort of gently sits there in all its tranquility as a reminder to us all — tourists, transplants, locals — of the way things were. The way Ephraim (the once white village) used to look. And parts of Fish Creek. The kind of architecture and mood Door County was once famous for, when people left the frenzy of the cities to come here to rest for two weeks. Not shift into a vacation-frenzy mode.
Door County was geared to that kind of re-creation. The white resorts like Liberty Lodge beckoned the tired, the restless, the harried to a two week summer routine of sitting in the shade of long white porches, basking in the breeze off the bay … lemonade, rocking chairs, snoozing time . . . and a view of the sun setting over the waters. What a day. Nothing happened. Simple pleasures.
Simple times. That’s what Tom Amberg recalls ever since his first visit to ‘Sister’ (as he calls it), to Liberty Lodge in 1949.
“I think this is one of the unique places in all of Door I County,” he says from his view of the white porch of Liberty Lodge, with the sun glittering the waters of the bay. “Anybody who comes here sees it. They may think there’s something better, but there’s not. This is ideal for family.
“I remember in those days the most important thing was family. You did not have to do all this hopping around like today. In those days you sat yourself down here and made these wonderful lifelong relationships. Almost from the beginning people became friends. There was no urge to run to restaurants or saloons . . . the feeling of being tired of staying here all day with the kids and wanting to do adult things.
“It was almost like a family reunion. And everyone made a point to make their reservations for the same time of year. Always the same cottage. It was like coming home to a family reunion.
“In the afternoons, the adults would set up their tables for the evening cocktail hour. You forgot you had an automobile. Not like now, where people can’t wait to get dressed and get out. The Beach Road Store was a very important store. The whole triangle … the Lodge for the dining room, the lawn for the get-together, the store for having the food we needed. Each cabin took turns being the host or hostess for providing refreshments. You didn’t feel like you were in a cottage and isolated. In fact, you felt more comfortable, and you spent more time with people than you did with your neighbors back home.
“In those days too, they served meals in the Lodge. Again, the idea — enjoy what you’ve got here. The bell would ring from the front porch, and you could hear it even if you were out on a boat. It was the Liberty Bell. They were ready to serve. And you were greeted by the staff. That absolute comfort of being somewhere special.. . white linen and silverware. One big room, all white — the old, white hotel dining room. Everyone would be attended to at one sitting.
“This was important because it was another event of bringing all the families together for dinner. We would have that second cup of coffee and exchange stories. We were strangers but not strangers, even though there was another home.”
Tom’s boyhood, Door County vacation memories of his family — mother, father, sister, and himself — at the Lodge, go back to 1949, two weeks in July (“The cottages could get cold at times … no heat then”) when he was 9 years old. His first recollection at the age of 7, however, involved a visit to Gordon Lodge with his dad, who helped Phil and Curly Gordon build the dock that still stands near the Top Deck. “That was one of our first stops when we came,” says Tom. “To visit Dad’s dock at Gordon’s.”
His love for Sister Bay through the years is something else again. I have never heard it referred to as “Sister” before, or with as much fondness. “It starts with Liberty Park Lodge, here in Sister Bay. That was the magnet. And as I grew up here summers, I was able to go further and further into town. The real key the past 20 years has been the people, and specifically, Al Johnson. I have absolute admiration for him. I see in him something that has been more than just the Scotch tape that has held northern Door together. I see in him the pure ‘innkeeper’.
“I could live here … I could live here and not see the water, if that makes sense. I could live here and not see the excitement and activity of the tourist season. I’ve been here in December — just for, let’s call it ‘quality time’.
“I do not look at this as a vacation, but as a commute to my other home, where I have the chance to log in some quality time, especially since my bout with cancer. The quality of life is very important to me. I consider this (Sister Bay/Door County) all alive. It’s a living thing. Just as I like to be nurtured, I want it to be nurtured”
I approach this all as cross-fertilization. I want something out of it too — not a material thing. I want to give something, not just take something physically away. I want to add to it.”
Tom’s love affair with this place takes on an added dimension in the fact that he met his wife Judy here on July 24, 1974. (“I was married before. I went through a very difficult thing called divorce.”)
“That’s really one of the reasons we come back here. It’s almost more important. A week ago we celebrated meeting here on the dock 15 years ago. The staff gave us a cake for our ‘anniversary’. This is what we consider our true anniversary.
“I remember there was a lady sitting on the dock and it looked like she was reading or writing. She was actually reading the book, DOOR WAY. How does one strike up a conversation? It had been a long time. I grabbed a bamboo pole and walked down to her. And I made believe I had a worm on the hook and threw it into the water. And I we talked for two hours — me simulating fishing. Later on we laughed how I never once got a nibble. That was 15 | years ago. A year later we were married, and we came back here one year later.
“She changed my life around. Up till then I was a slam-bang businessman. Another different value system I grew out of this relationship.
“We drive around every night up here and pick out the home we will buy. BUT, I don’t want to buy into Door County. I want to buy something that’s already here. If I build on a new lot, then I’m just joining that whole other group I’m not fond of, that just keeps building and building. I don’t have to have land ownership to feel that I’m part of Sister Bay. Lots of people have houses, but not homes.
“I stay at Liberty Park Lodge because it’s one of the last vestiges of the old inn, and I do not want to see that disappear.
“Door County needs to take a nap. To set its perspectives right again. To reflect on who it is. What it’s all about. To give the living nature a breather — from people use. The land itself needs to rest a little bit.
“I’m saying, who cares about the reasons why the season is up or down? Take a look around. Who am I? Why am I here? Do I need the extra 30 rooms I planned to add on? Less business, so what? I’ve been coming here long enough to see that you can still sustain yourself and have a nice life for yourself by building from within, not without. Your quality of service.
“The bigger something gets, the less control you have of the whole business. My dad taught me that. He always kept his business small because he had control — and more profit. You don’t need BIG to be a success. The difference between men and boys is the price of their toys.”
[from CHRONICLES OF A RURAL JOURNALIST IN AMERICA, Samizdat Press, 1990]
Tom and Norb, Liberty Park Lodge, 2002, photo by Judith Amberg
AUGUST NOTEBOOK
Norbert Blei
BACK TO SCHOOL…The words sneak into sunny August like gathering storm clouds. We still heed the prospect of days diminishing until…until we are not the same again, as both the late light of day and the season remind us. “BACK TO SCHOOL” Headlined in newspapers. Seen on television. Heard in the anxious voices of parents. A warning. An attitude. A time for business–clothing and school supplies. A threat to freedom, so ominous in our youth, a realm of foreboding even in our adult life, a shadow in our memory long after we have left the schoolyard, the classroom, the teacher’s desk. Goodbye to a life lived the way we imagined. (Not unlike the artist’s life.) A life without walls, without schedules, without instructions, and few responsibilities. A life lived in mornings of no clocks, of daylight galore to shape to our desires, of afternoons to laze into, and nights of sweet sleep after a day of turning the hour inside out, breathing hard, breathing tired, breathing an ecstasy of exhaustion. A shapeless time of whatever amuses us for the moment: baseball, bicycles, beaches, ice cream, fishing, being oh so alive and perhaps even in love. But BACK TO SCHOOL hangs in the shade of the maple tree, lurks in the clear depths of the fishing hole, hovers over the house in twilight, haunts every fading minute in the month till the bell rings once, twice, and the door is closed. And we return to what we were before, what we are being trained to become, forever aware of what we once were in the short summer of our lives.
THE FIELDS IN ALMOST-AUTUMN AUGUST…fading green to gold, sprinkled in wildflowers and the wings of meadowlarks. Bales and rolls of hay bask in soft light and growing shadows as the sun draws the day to a close. A deserted old hay wagon, filled with bales. An abandoned tractor. All the men have left the field for dinner in the white farmhouse. Silent horses stare over the domain, silhouetted against fragmented light filtering through the far woods. The fields are huge bouquets of lavender weed, tufts of tall Queen Ann’s lace, sprigs of bright goldenrod. To be gathered inside of us.
SO UNEXPECTEDLY…a circle of fallen leaves under the maple tree this morning. August ghost dance.
A MORNING OF UTTER STILLNESS….first felt and glimpsed through the bedroom window, as I lie there trying the read the silence outdoors. Nothing. No one. No sound. Not a single leaf trembles in the air. Overcast. Ominous. Threatening. A heavy day to weigh a man down.
THIS DIFFUSED DAY OF EARLY MORNING GROUND FOG …hovering over the fields. I wrap myself into it…into a day of such soft beauty and wonder till everything disappears. There is not other place in the world now but this moment here, here in a morning of spider webs sparkling in the branches of trees, and light, weaving across the fields, everything caught in silver. A boat on the big lake bellows. A rooster crows. A dog barks. All sound, all light…muted. Transparent. Ephemeral. Silver. Stirring. Coming together, drifting apart
AH, THE PURE JOY IN THE CRY OF THE RECLUSE’S RELEASE…they are gone, gone, gone! The visitors have left the house, the immediate vicinity, the county and I am free! Free to work without the shadowy distraction of others out there somewhere wanting attention, one way or another biting into your time. Phone calls, invitations, “people you just have to meet.” Folks who confess they do not in any way mean to disturb you –and mean it, yet do. Not to mention one’s own disregard of the inevitable: “Oh, it’s quite alright. You won’t cut into my time. We can work something out.” Which you do. Yet, just knowing they are “in the area” for the day, the weekend, the week, the month, affects every waking, working moment. Shouldn’t I be seeing them for lunch, for dinner, for a drink? Should we go to the Players while they’re here? AFT? The Peninsula Music Festival? Meet at Al’s for breakfast? It would be good to see so-and-so for a drink at the Tap or Husby’s or somewhere on Saturday night. We haven’t talked for a long time. They only have (a day? a weekend? a ?) and then they are gone, for another year, back into the simmering heat of August, back to—Chicago, Milwaukee, the Cities. And so on a hot, late August afternoon, the recluse slowly pulls the red rowboat out into the small lake alone, considers the growing silence all around him…and slips soundlessly into the water. Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye. Ahhhhhh…so cold, so clear, so refreshing…all mine. So long. See you next year. Feel the quiet. Float in the freedom. No one. Nowhere. So absolutely perfect. It will be sometime before the visitors are missed. And they will be. And inevitably the recluse will welcome them back with almost open arms. And look forward again to disappearing into August.
THE SUDDEN TINGE OF RED AND GOLD ON MAPLE LEAVES …on a high branch amidst a crown of green, fair warning in August.
THERE IS A TIREDNESS TO GREEN…about the earth come late August. A flatness to ferns and weeds and blades of grass. Everything losing its spine, falling over. Looking down. A sense of exhaustion. The earth, only recently in such a frenzy to put forth, can put forth no more. Snooze time. Nap time. Nature preparing to exhale, expire. The fields, already bronzed, offer mainly milkweed, a little Queen Ann’s Lace, some goldenrod, patches of purple thistles and dry knapweed…a stray daisy or two, late arrivals, lost in the dying of plants fading back to earth.
NEXT TO LAST WEEK IN AUGUST…the first visible end to the summer season as families desert Door County in droves, rushing home to get the children back in school. Monday morning, almost (but not quite) an open, free, solitary winter non-tourist aura to the peninsula. The roads are negotiable once again. Parking a-plenty in towns and villages. The restaurants (their staffs diminished as much of the help return to school or living elsewhere) breathe a sigh of relief as tables-by-the-window or anywhere can be had at the choosing. No waiting, no noise, no arguments, no nothing but good food, fast service, enjoyable surroundings, the county stretching out along the shorelines, in the fields, it hands behind its neck, eyes closed, sloughing off into a Door doze, reminiscent of a time when seasons were just seasons and commerce was at best barter and an honest dollar for an honest day’s work off the land and on water.
MUGGY DAYS & COOL NIGHTS…The perfect dichotomy of a late summer day in Door. Bring on the hot sun. There’s no escape. Suffer the humidity. The body immobile, the sluggishness of the body beaten back by heat. Trudging through the daily grind…the soles of our feet on fire…the muscles in our arms slack. Even the eyeball ache in the too brilliant light. “Perspire”–the perfect word. Our bodies melt away. Our minds blinded in reflections, sun, sun, sun everywhere. Sweat and more sweat. “No relief in sight” the mantra….summer doldrums. Will it never end? Beaches beckon. Frosty glasses tantalize. The heat bears down, settles inside our very bones. An occupying power. Blinded behind closed, burning eyelids on the beach. The screech of gulls. The soft licks of water. Waiting only for the final absolution: the cool of the night to move in.
WHAT IS SO MYSTIFYING ABOUT THE END OF AUGUST…is the silence, so palpable to the day’s beginning and end. Something is stealing its breath. Asphyxiation has set in. The landscape is filled with loss. There is a dying to the light.
IT STEALS UPON YOU FROM THE FIELDS AND ROADSIDE…like the scent of a beautiful woman in passing. You may catch a glimpse of her…but in her wake, you are left with almost nothing but a sweet fragrance that arrests your very steps, leaves you standing in place, head lifting, turning, seeking a deeper pool of the aroma you wish to bathe in, wrap yourself around, lose yourself in a cloud of contentment. I am always surprised by its sudden, scented presence in my walks at this time of year. My old, seductive friend. She’s back again. I close my eyes and pause awhile, August days and nights. Breathe deeply. Take her all in. Sweet clover. I let her have her way with me.
Looking for the Old Door
by
Norbert Blei
This was going to be just another “Good Morning (or Afternoon or Evening) Door County” to send around with a photo of a local image (time and place)…late afternoon, hovering around cocktail hour, almost the end of the day, the sun just right…the character in the picture at rest, contemplating many things, including a possible toast to the moment with a good glass of wine in or near hand.
The old door he sought had just opened. He was back in place again (summer of 2012), a favorite Door County get-away, or more accurately “return to”…another one of those “best kept secrets” he tried to keep to himself. Only now, this moment, he was thinking…there are times, circumstances when he should not, could not be selfish about such disclosures, especially the present times as the county slowly but surely drifts away from what it once was to what its becoming, an upscale suburbia of manicured lawns, paved driveways, stone-pillared entrances, gated communities, lights to chase the night away…a setting no longer real, remote, rural, quiet, with a touch of the wild to the interior, and serenity to no end along its shorelines.
So here he was now where he wanted to be, almost no one around at the beginning of a late summer week, the season dwindling, enjoying the peace and quiet of one of the last of the old Door resorts…trying to keep it all to himself.
Whether he came here for just a drink or dinner, his ritual usually began at the Hof Bar/Pub (which reminded him a little of what the old Top Deck used to be at Gordon Lodge)…with a brandy old fashioned or glass of red wine in hand…and then outside to meander the grounds along the waterfront…then sit in peace and quiet out there a while, just soaking it all in…eventually making his way to the large screened porch and plunking himself into one of the many comfortable rocking chairs, where he could easily rock himself into the sunset or the night.
He still can’t believe, after all these years, (celebrating its 90th season this year!) that this place isn’t better known, more packed with guests, though he is uncertain how many of the rooms, cottages and guest houses may be occupied at the moment or throughout the summer. The prices are certainly reasonable. Plus you have THIS, he says to himself, taking in the incredible view. All THIS plus lodging, plus a restaurant with a good menu, with even a touch of the Germanic–serving sauerbraten and weiner schnitzel…how likely to find THAT anywhere else in Door? Then there’s the music, including an ‘oompha pa, pa’ little band that plays in the dining room most evenings…other music too…and a sand beach, a heated pool, tennis, bikes, fishing and rowboats, basketball and shuffleboard, game room and snack bar…a picnic area…a 36-hole golf course…
He takes his glass of wine and wanders around a little more, from building to building…from restaurant (only a handful of diners) to room after room, each more fascinating than the other, each with its own feeling and brand of the past.
How long can a place like this survive given the onslaught of high-end restaurants in the county, modern and expensive motels, condos, cottages? Not to mention (the real kicker for the man who has kept this place for himself for too many years): the possibility of this place closing…the resort torn town…all the grounds turned into another condos anonymous, unending?
With that foremost in mind, with that disrupting his quiet afternoon of just being there, here, back again in place this summer of 2012, with his glass of wine in hand, relishing the memory of what-used-to-be, but slowly invaded by dark thoughts of what-might-become, he decided now is the moment to let go of another one of Door County’s best kept secrets.
He decided once again, that one of these summers, especially one as crazy, hot, humid, overcrowded as this one…one of these months, July or August, when things get so overwhelming for him…too many phone calls, too many visitors, too many clogged roads, too long a wait in restaurants, too many relatives, old friends, new friends, students, writers, artists…wanting to do breakfast, lunch, dinner, coffee or a drink…day after day (all wonderful and worth every moment of precious time, and he just can’t say no to any of them)…one of these summers he will pick up the phone, dial (920) 868-3000 or 1.888 281.8128…pack a small suitcase, a shopping bag of about a dozen books, his notebooks and laptop…get in his car, drive to 7715 Horseshoe Bay Road, Highway G., Egg Harbor, and rent a room at the Alpine Resort (www.AlpineResort.com) for at least a week–and never once leave the grounds. Just disappear, out of Door, in Door for a week or two.
Where the hell’s Blei?
Nobody knows.
Recent N.B. Coop Comments