photo by Holly
It’s been awhile and I haven’t felt much like sharing much of anything about life as of late. This hasn’t been the most exciting summer of my career by any means as a result of some events early in the season. But Summer could not have ended better, it just got a little rocky coming to it’s beautiful epilogue.
I’d like to thank a couple of guys I met early in the season, Dave and Steve. Great guys, fun guys and bros that have proven that they are good friends. Thanks guys. There’s gonna be a lot more fun to be had. And old friends Bob H., Chris, and Jeff, some of the people I’ve known the longest saw a fucked up situation all the way through the end, and I really am glad that we’ve established a friendship and along that way also worked together on my ol publication.
But some friends don’t make it for the long haul. And one of them was a troubled gal that wandered into my life on a cold Oct night just before Halloween 2000. It was a short lived fling but we remained friends and I was there for her, if only as someone to talk to up till she decided to end her life 1 week ago.
Those of you who know who I’m talking about, may know who I refer to, but many of you do not know that crazy lil chick really went over this time. She’s no longer on this earth as a living breathing life. And on Sept. 8 I received an email telling me what I meant to her, though it really didn’t mean that much to me, I’m glad she believed she had at least one person. She ended that message informing me she was going to overdose. I wrote back, the email went unread. She did it.
I have closure now so I will share he email as it was written without idenifying the person. She signed it off with a single initial of the nickname I had given her:
Sept 8, 2008
In the short time that we were together, I always felt that you loved me. Hindsight is 20/20 naturally, but you, I believe loved me for who I was and not who you wanted me to be not because I looked a certain way etc.
I don’t know how to say goodbye, but I am taking 300 phenbarb tonight. Why? My life simply isnt good enough. It isn’t what I want.
Will love you always.
Z.
That particular weekend I was at a good friends wedding with a lovely “date” for lack of a better word. She was someone that made a big impression on me 13 /2 months prior. Someone that I got in contact with once I was set free from the chains that I permitted to confine me for 18 months. And even though the weather was dreary, dank and damp, we had a really good time that weekend, only to have the bliss end with the message of the passing of my friend.
But it wasn’t just the message that I received. The responsibility was cast upon me to track down her family and deliver the painful news. I did not ask for this job.
All I recalled was the name of a sister and perhaps she was in Hammond Indiana. Holly hung with me and unselfishly blew off her responsibilities to be there for me. She was the only one I let in. I didn’t tell anyone else nor did I want to. A duty had been bestowed upon me and I was indeed going to see it through. She saw it through with me. Something she didn’t ask for.
I hadn’t mentioned her name or existance up till now, because this is really nobody’s business. Too many people like to get involved as I have learned. But I appreciate what she did and I greatly appreciate that she ended the summer with me the same place I began it in May and returned to alone in July, where I was fucking miserable but for my good friend Mich. But that was all in the past as Holly met me early last Friday morning and we packed the car and set off for a new adventure in ol Green County WI.
She’s talented, she’s got it together, she’s smart, well traveled, independent well mannered extremely artistic, and yes she’s attractive. All things that impress me and that I admire highly. And off we were on a day that couldn’t have been more opposite than the weather we had gone through the previous weekend.
DAY ONE
We started with lunch at the saloon at the Wild West Town in Union Il, a fun place I only discovered this summer, which has become my own personal playground.
Then we were off to Camp Sweet Minnihaha where we were set up at site C by 2PM. After getting supplies which included too much food, plenty of booze (she more than holds her own) and firewood, we headed off for Cheese Days www.cheesedays.com in Monroe, WI in search of my pal Mich who we all know and love as the Irish Piper.
Monroe, known as the Swiss Cheese Capital of the USA, is a city in and the county seat of Green County, Wisconsin, United States. The population, mainly Swiss-Germanic, was 10,843 at the 2000 census. The number of violent crimes recorded by the FBI in 2003 was 12. The number of murders and homicides was 0. The violent crime rate was 1.1 per 1,000 people. The first cabin in Monroe was built in 1835, just prior to the designation of Wisconsin as a territory. It developed in two separate areas, one called Monroe and the other New Mexico, the latter centered in the present Lincoln Park area. Monroe was located where Spring Square is now located (the parking lot at 16th Avenue and 12th Street). Rivalry between the two was keen, and both competed for selection as the county seat. Eventually they were consolidated and the village was incorporated in 1839. The official charter as a municipality came in 1882.
Along the way we stopped in a field to shoot some pictures for fun and made our way into this small town with a big party, and LOTS of children. It was right out of Village of the Damned. People walked and tried to eat the food that they had dripping down their hands, arms and bodies. Not to mention the mess on their faces. I never saw so many corn dogs. I never saw so much KETCHUP! And the humor we felt at the site was short lived. And these people loved to stare!
One of our missions was to buy some of the delicious cheese which we did and that alone was worth heading out to the towns big event. It was impressive and the people selling their product were knowledgeable and proud. As they should be.
We bough some beer tickets which we didn’t use up and made our way around to the brewery where we would hope to meet the Piper! The blues concert which was to be held on the brewery poroperty was sponsored by Bergoff Beer at the Joseph Huber Brewing Company.
The Joseph Huber Brewing Company was founded in 1845 in Monroe, Wisconsin. It was originally called The Blumer Brewery, but in 1947 adopted its current name. It is the oldest continually operating brewery in the Midwest and second oldest in the United States.
In 2006, Mountain Crest Brewing Co. of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, announced an agreement to purchase The Joseph Huber Brewing Company, the Huber and Rhinelander brands of beer, and the Blumers brand of soda. Berghoff beer, Huber’s most popular label, will be produced by a new company called Berghoff Brewing Co., which will contract with Mountain Crest to brew the beer at the Monroe plant. The brewery was renamed Minhas Craft Brewery.
They didn’t have drinks available yet so Holly promptly found a pub for us and we went to it’s beer garden for a drink. But after only one round we were a bit creeped out by all the children that we moseyed back over to the brewery in hopes of meeting Mich. We met a cool cop who did some pix w/ us and he had a really good sense of humor unlike Chicago Police.
Well Mich was obviously running late and we were about anxious to get to the campground so we rode off into the night, into a majikal night, with the help of Mortiis and Mead. We would have a long canoe trip the next day and it was time to relax.
Mead is a fermented alcoholic beverage made of honey, water, and yeast. Meadhing is the practice of brewing mead. Mead is also colloquially known as “honey wine”. A brewery that deals specifically in mead is called either a meadery or a mazery.[
The first known description of mead is in the hymns of the Rigveda, one of the sacred books of the historical Vedic religion and (later) Hinduism dated around 1700–1100 BC. During the “Golden Age” of Ancient Greece, mead was said to be the preferred drink. Aristotle (384–322 BC) discussed mead in his Meteorologica and elsewhere, while Pliny the Elder (AD 23–79) called mead militites in his Naturalis Historia and differentiated wine sweetened with honey or “honey-wine” from mead.[8]
Around AD 550, the Cumbric speaking bard Taliesin wrote the Kanu y med or “Song of Mead.” The legendary drinking, feasting and boasting of warriors in the mead hall is echoed in the mead hall Dyn Eidyn (modern day Edinburgh), and in the epic poem Y Gododdin, both dated around AD 700[clarify]. The Heorot in the Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf also was known to host the drinking of mead.
Tuesday Sept 23, 857 PM
I sit here to continue my writ, sipping the last 2 of my New Glarus Spotted Cow brews.
The stars were bright and plenty that Friday night. We drank mead by firelight with the sound of Norwegian/Swedish Black Metal playing from one of my favorite outdoor discs, the imported, “And Even Wolves Hid Their Teeth And Tongue Wherever Shelter Was Given” compilation (Cold Meat Industry 1995). And somehow it was just the appropriate soundtrack given my companion for the weekend.
DAY TWO
We awoke at daybreak, mist covered the campground. The aura of alcohol and euphoria still swimming in my head. Johnny Cash played on the portable. Holly made Bloody Mary’s for breakfast. They were good, and they may have contributed to the remainder of the summer-like Saturday.
We managed to pull everything together to go on our day long canoe excursion the Sugar River, a river I know all too well.
The Sugar River is a tributary of the Pecatonica River, approximately 100 mi (160 km) long, in the U.S. states of Wisconsin and Illinois.
It rises in the hills of southwest Wisconsin, in southwest Dane County, approximately 15 mi (25 km) southwest of Madison. It meanders southeast, past Paoli and Belleville where it is dammed to form Lake Belleview. From there it meanders east of Monticello where it is joined by the Little Sugar River and flows south through Albany, and Brodhead. It crosses into northern Illinois flowing past an extensive area of the Winnebago County Forest Preserve system. These preserves are Sugar River Alder, Colored Sands, and Sugar River. The river joins the Pecatonica River in northern Winnebago County, approximately 5 mi (8 km) south of the state line and approximately 15 mi (25 km) NNE of Rockford.
Our particular trip downstream would only be 15 miles but take 5-8 hours depending on many things. Our journey would be closer to the latter. There were photos to take, accidents to happen and a detour or two en route. heh A nice alcove to phtograph.
We had al of the essential. 2 containers of our own alcoholic concoctions and beer as well as food which mainly consisted of, what we would learn later were uncooked links of hot Italian sausage,. (sorry…. it looked done) So, we weren’t completely as organized as I usually like to be. It was a hazy morning and my mind was distracted in a way it had not been in recent memory, and then some.
Omitting the details of my adventure on the Sugar River w/ Holly, I can only say it was a more enjoyable trip than my last few but also a lot more soggy and water logged of a day as well. Lucky for us the temperatures returned to more of a June, early July type of weather as opposed to the photo negative of the weekend we share previously at Jeff and Melissa’s wedding.
I will say this, the woman is a damned daredevil. I’ve been on this river for 9 seasons, high and low, cluttered with debit and with a crazy drunk Hungarian. But BOY HOWDY, we took a few hits. Her longs legs showing the tell tale signs of our time on that cursed crooked creek, in bruises and cuts and scrape as if she had gotten into a throw-down with non other than Freddy Kruger himself.
It would finally be over. More than half of the booze remained, none of the food had been eaten and the camera survived. VICTORY? Only 2 people know the answer to that question.
Where the hell are my keys? I can’t find my keys!
Dawn wrapped the day and the sky exposed it’s stars for us again, brighter this night, with falling stars and charcoal black clouds against a matte background darkness. We felt the exhaustion kick in. The locals were restless loud and annoying. The rural youth were kicking into high gear this night. In 9 months there is sure to be an underaged spawn baby boom. Oh, the indiscriminate mating rituals of a generation that doesn’t understand that urban is a city related term, and the version the idolize, is not in our reality, a glamorous one.
We called it an early night. And the beast raged within me and would not tame till at least 2 the AM hour.
DAY THREE
Mist and fog again blanketed the campground when we awoke approximately 6 AM . It was chilly, and site C was wrecked. Something I’m getting used to with the company of my fair friend. Clothes and mud and river guck covered much of our clothing. Everything on the site was damp. And we were out of firewood, so was the campground, and as we were to discover so was the local store. DAMMIT CLEATUS!
The soundtrack for once was not Cash as typical of me, but this morning Leonard Cohen seemed more appropriate.
As we did have an early start and the air began to warm, we took our time between the morning and out next stop, the town of New Glarus. Something else about this county of fond of, and in fact, truth be known, my most favorite thing about Green County I am fond of.
I made a big breakfast consisting of asparagus, eggs, w/ Wisconsin cheese, jalapeños, basil that Holly added, and salmon patties. We were revisited by a seemingly stray and/or abandoned male cat that had visited us many times over the weekend. It was hungry as we knew and I suggested the salmon, which the feline lapped up like it’s last supper.
We took our time packing and loading up. Holly made some art in her journal with charcoal from the fire and pen. I played Type O Negative, and the track, a cover of “Angry Inch” which I hope might amuse her. I think it did.
(and she found the keys as promised)
By 130 P we were on our way to the longest Sunday, a long Sunday in “Americas Little Switzerland”, New Glarus, WI. Along the way we stopped to take photos in a field. She took photos of me driving, herslef and her feet. And she was shedding her lovely braids. Rapunzel no more.
The first stop would be the New Glarus hotel, where we would end up having lunch. We had drinks. And it seemed we were running out of time.
Holly went in before I, as I parked her car. I enter the lobby and am asked by the hostess if I’m here to cause trouble, and I reply, of course. We debated on where to go and had decided it’d be nice to have a drink inside.
We were seated in the balcony at the NG Hotel, and once she saw the menu, both of our appetites were revived. Across from me with her braids falling below the table top, she ordered a glass of Kettle One wine. I had a Spotted Cow. Again, this is when I’d really learn how much Miss E enjoyed taking her time. I should have known from our previous dining experiences. It normally turns into a couple hours of banter. However, I was anxious, I wanted to take her around the village. Something I would attempt numerous times to no avail. We would eventually hop from pub to pub, though I did find a rare Jemimah at the shoppe I like to frequent on my visits to New Glarus.
We stopped and drank in the beer garden at Tofflers Bar & Grill, where we sipped for about 2 hours, went around the block an ended up at the Sportsman’s Bar and Grill for a Bloody Mary and some chit chat. The day had escaped us, as had Mich. We decided to stop in the red bar of the Hotel which was vacant and this is where we were left alone, and it was a nice way to end the day. Night fell early and we still had a long drive home. Holly wasn’t feeling well and she was also exhausted. Myself I was alive and well and maybe under the influence of a lil harmless public display of attention, not something I’m likely known for, nonetheless was captured on film and may have sealed my destiny in my favorite lil Wisconsin Village.
We said our farewells to our waitress Courtney and were off on the 3 plus hour drive home in the dark. My road companion fell asleep in my lap an Kid Rock played on the CD changer as it had our entire journey, but one that the return would be interrupted.
Just as I reached the NG Woods I was pulled over by the police. A headlight was out. He gave us a friendly reminder and after running my license, asked if there was anything he could do. He was a nice guy. And just then Mich called, we JUST missed each other again. Holly fell back asleep on my lap as I made my way south on 81 as far as the highway, it was 845 PM, and driving home with one headlight did not appeal to me, especially with the single lane construction ahead.
In my ultimate wisdom, I decided to seek lodging for the night, and chose a Holiday Inn in Beloit just off the expressway. This proved to be a good idea. I had to be at work the next morning, and a good night sleep and a drive in the light was much more appealing to me. And at least I’d have someone to talk to.
And besides the sheer thought of getting into the city, after a near 4 hour haul, and unpacking and taking the gear up 3 flights of steep stairs was futile at this point.
I went in and secured a room on the first floor. The managers name was Stephanie, I asked her kindly for a wake up call tomorrow at 4AM. She replied that 4 M was not tomorrow, it was tonight. Well, I live in the real world honey, and my response was gentle, I really HAVE to be at work tomorrow. Our lady was out like a sack of potatoes across the front seats, I didn’t want to attempt to pursued her to walk up a flight, as it would bring more of an interruption to her slumber than what I feel she deserved. I suppose in hindsight I could have carried her if need be, but that would have proved an interesting sight to the locals, who were held up in their rooms like a swinger convention of 70 proportions. I don’t mean the 1970’s mind you; these folk were in their 70’s! Besides she is someone that shared the same curse of insomnia that I do had no problem sleeping over the weekend. I think the outdoors is what the doctor ordered.
After check in the next challenge was to get Holly to wake up. This was almost funny, she was really sleeping again. So I plied her with “PLEASE” and got her inside, turned on the AC and went back out to the car for the rest of my overnight gear, stopped by Wendy’s where the manger that served me was also named Stephanie. (What is this the uber popular WI name for many born of the fairer sex?)
By 945 PM we were both sound asleep only to be awakened by the call at 4AM and we were on the road by 430AM.
It was a perfect end to an otherwise lousy summer and I think we both had smiles on our faces. As we got off of the expressway and onto Irving Park Road heading back to my flat, I pointed out the massive orange sun directly ahead. She joined me in astonishment and in her true fashion grabbed her camera for the final shot.
By 655 AM we were on my block of the city and the signs were painfully clear that our escape was over. The city were already towing cars that by law had till 7 AM to be moved. We were witnessing illegal acttivity by the city of Chicago. Sometimes 5 minutes makes all of the difference when it comes to having your car towed and impounded. Especially when you only live a 90 second walk from your front door to where you parked your car prior.
Yes it was over. But not forgotten.
By 8AM I was in my office at work. By noon I had received nearly all of the photographs she had downloaded. The choicest of the over 300 shots she performed.
Thank you Holly, thank you so very much. - AZ
September Mourn
Irving Park Road heading east, 650 AM first day of autumn 2008
- photo by Holly