I was sitting in the Bluesmobile, looking up the slight rise from the barn to the circular drive next to the fence around the farmhouse. “I am a Michigan-trained driver,” I said. “Why did you do this to yourself?”
I had been driving around the property to put tire tracks in the pristine snow to demonstrate that the place was indeed occupied, and got to the lowest stretch of gravel by the barn when I did a three-point and started back up, only to have the no-track light come on the dashboard. I had fun racing the engine, and rocked and rolled for a while before I realized that there was not enough traction in Christendom to get the hulking police cruiser up the mild slope.
Stuck until it melts, I thought, and then sighed and got the shovel out of the trunk and started the long dig upslope to expose gravel at the bottom of the ruts created by my previous blissful downhill passage.
The exercise convinced me that taking a pass on St. Patrick’s Day and letting the snow recede a bit was the right decision. Listening to the traffic reports the next morning- hung over drivers from the holiday were crashing all over and flattening tires in the potholes created by the snow- I knew that waiting it out was the right thing to do. The problem was that I had a hankering for a plate of Tracy O’Grady’s Irish celebration- corned beef, cabbage and vegetables, with Kate Jansen’s Irish soda bread on the side.
Since I was not going to be there for the real observation, I hoped there would be some off-menu leftovers I could get as a sandwich. That thought carried me up the 29 miles and 14 stoplights to the interstate, and then the thirty-two miles into the Imperial City. The radio was yammering about the usual- politics non-stop, the latest tid-bits on the missing jet, connecting the bitter cold to climate change, which, if anything, is chillier than any almost Spring in my recollection.
I slid into Big Pink at mid-day, and got to work on several lingering projects. First, I stopped in the lobby to collect my daily hug from Rhonda the Chief Concierge. “I thought you had gone back to the Keys,” she said with a smile. “I was afraid I was not going to get one.” She handed me the monthly box that contained two bags of Dazbog Russian Roast coffee that the headquarters in Denver mails me each month.
“I may have to drop this luxury,” I said, smelling the box. “Time to tighten up on expenses.”
She nodded ruefully and gestured at the sequined snowflake on her ample bosom. “My four dollar top from Macy’s,” she said. “All sorts of great prices for a Spring that doesn’t seem to be coming.”
We laughed and I walked back to the apartment where the Exterminators reported no evidence of mouse infestation, a minor triumph in the ultimately unsuccessful battle with entropy. I was thinking about luxury when the clock on the upper right of the computer signaled it was time for the daily extravagance at Willow. I took the police car over to Ballston and found a free place in the loading zone across from the restaurant, a savings of nearly $1.25 in parking fees from the rapacious County.
Old Jim was in his usual place at the apex of the Amen Corner and Jasper was serving the early happy Hour shift. I said hello to Jim and presented Jasper with a non-negotiable demand. “I want a corned beef sandwich. There have to be leftovers from yesterday, right?”
Jasper said he would ask, and then it was off to the races. I had not seen Jim in three days. A Navy buddy showed up, and we talked about port visits of decades ago. Katya the White Russian who used to bartend showed up with her almost-boss at Homeland Security, and we got off on Crimea and what was likely to happen in Mr. Putin’s march to restored glory, and then the missing 777. Chanteuse Mary came in to join the party, and though the crowd was a little thinner than usual, the company was superb and the conversation far-ranging.
We talked about moving someplace warm in exactly 22 months and five days, thought Mary said “Who is counting,” and then Jim said: “I heard there were deleted files on the Captain’s computer flight simulator they confiscated from his house. Maybe a clue.”
“I don’t trust anything I hear about anything anymore,” I said darkly. “I mean, it has been eleven days and we have zip-nada.”
Jasper topped off my white wine and said, apologetically, that there was not a shred of corned beef left and the kitchen was deeply sorry. My shoulders slumped. “I guess I will have to accept a non-negotiable response,” I said. “That seems to be the way things are going today.”
Tracy’s husband Brian happened to be walking by to get his laptop that lives down at the end of the bar and he heard what Jasper said, and he saw the resignation on my face. “There there, Vic. Where there is a will, there is a way. Trust Willow.”
He bustled off and I turned to Jim. “Maybe things will be all right, you know?”
Mary said brightly that Spring was coming, and the rebound in temperatures made the snow a just a minor inconvenience.
“I was not thinking that when I was shoveling out at the barn,” I said. “But I guess you are right.” I sipped my wine, and near the replenishment point Dante appeared from the kitchen with a square plate and a magnificent sandwich in the middle with a little ceramic container of Thousand Island sauce on the side for dipping.
“OMG,” I said reverently, examining the generous portion of the savory beef morsels between the perfectly browned toasting of the wheat bread, the simplicity and elegance of the presentation. Jim reached across and grabbed one side of it. Mary protested, but I said it was exactly the right thing to do with a sandwich donated by management for the Usual Suspects. And then we demolished it.
Spring is coming, sooner or later. It has to. It is after St. Patrick’s Day, right?
Copyright 2014 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
Twitter: @jayare303