Today was a study in contrasts. Fargo and I left Akron fairly early, after finding out what the weather would be like, and I decided I wanted to see what the rest of America was doing today. That required... a mall.
We found one. I drove up toward Cleveland, and found a gigantic mall called the Randall Mall. I guess when it was built it was one of the biggest in the country. Now, it's merely huge. We parked far, far out at the edge of the parking lot, where it took at least ten minutes to walk to the mall itself. People were parked everywhere. On the grass. In the fire lanes. In the handicap spots. People blocking traffic for five minutes, waiting for people to finish putting stuff in their minivan, only to find the owner walking back to the mall to get more loot.
Fargo settled down in the back of the Honda. I took just a small purse and waded into the middle of the mass of people. It was a lot like trying to walk against the current of the Colorado River. People surged past the watch-battery place, seethed in circles near Penneys and crashed like waves up against the Hickory Farms stands. There was no point in actually trying to go anywhere, so I just sort of bobbed along in the flow.
People seemed cheerful enough, but it was sort of a manic cheer, people on the verge of choas, driven by the need to procure Tamigotchis, Hallmark ornaments, Sony PlayStations and Hanson CDs. The kid wants it, I gotta find it! Get out of my way!
I actually wandered around for about an hour and a half until I realized that the only possible place for me to sit down was in the Honda. All the benches were occupied by patient-looking older people, obviously waiting for the younger, more energetic members of their families to emerge from whatever store they had gotten sucked into by the throng.
I didn't even get anything as simple as a hot pretzel. There were absurd lines everywhere. The line for Santa pictures wasn't even the longest one. I got a glimpse of their Santa. I think he was taking Prozac.
I bailed out of the supermall around noon or so, and got back out to the Honda to see Fargo asleep in the back window. There was another car parked next to me, and in it there was one of those little yappy dogs, barking like a fool at Fargo, who was completely unaware the dog existed. The dog was probably too representative of the whole mall. Fargo represented much more what I was feeling.
We got out on the highway (I-90) and started west, but after a few minutes I realized I had no idea where we were going. I pulled off at an exit, pulled into a parking lot, got Fargo and the atlas, and let them do their work. Fargo walked around the map of Ohio, then sniffed at a spot that seemd for a moment to be somewhere in Lake Erie. It wasn't. I looked at the map, and it was a place called Sandusky, about an hour from where we were. It was on a bay of some sort that opened into Lake Erie. There were some islands shown on the map.
It wasn't a bad drive up here, but this part of Ohio is really, really, really... flat. A gray table, with us on it.
Here we are, then, in the Lakeland Motel in fabulous downtown Port Clinton, Ohio. I can look out over some docks which I imagine during "the season" would have boats alongside. Right now there's a whole lot of nothing, and beyond that, a lake.
I'm puzzled by the big deal they seem to make about the fishing here. I thought Lake Erie was completely dead and that all you'd be likely to catch would be diseases and old shopping carts. It appears, from looking at the many glossy brochures around this place and around town, that they've cleaned up their act. I remember when I was young, any time we drove near Toledo or Cleveland on our way somewhere in the East, my parents never failed to mention how polluted Lake Erie was. They also told me a river near Cleveland once caught fire and burned (I later found out this was true, though at the time I thought they were putting me on).
There are some populated islands out in Lake Erie. I've tried to find out how to get out there, but it seems that the ferries don't really run much this time of year and it'd be a lot of hassle to go out there. They have some historical things and a lighthouse out in Put-in-Bay, the big town out there. I'll save that for some future -- summer -- trip. I asked around to find out what there might be to do around here, other than sit here and watch the Weather Channel on television. The motel person said that there's some sort of Christmas festival in a small "historic" town a little ways from this village, a place called Oak Harbor. That might be worth checking out. It's this evening. I'll occupy myself until then by playing with Fargo and writing. Maybe I'll walk around and see whatever isn't closed for the season.
It's a little later now. I walked around Port Clinton, and aside of a couple of small artsy gift shops that appear to have reopened in the off season just to meet whatever demand there might be for vaguely nautical gifts, the entire village seems pretty much asleep. It shows signs of being one of those places that lives for the Cleveland and Detroit summer tourists from Memorial Day to Labor Day and not a moment before or after. I passed a Burger King out on 163, which is called Perry Street here after Commodore Perry who won the Battle of Lake Erie in the War of 1812. I won't starve. Fargo won't, either, though if he expects more pocketfuls of turkey he'll be disappointed.
I have to mention that the first big event I was told about when I asked at this one shop was apparently an appearance by some country singer named Pat Dailey at a club in Port Clinton. Have you heard of Pat Dailey? I haven't. I asked what else was going on, and thus found out about the Christmas celebration in Oak Harbor. I've learned it's good to ask.
It's now much later, around 11:30. I left Fargo here sleeping in the center of the bed, changed, and drove out to this place, Oak Harbor. The village is pretty neat, all little restored-looking houses and shops and things. They had sort of a roving outdoor festival tonight. There were musicians, and things you could do, and of course the evening couldn't be complete without Santa showing up. This Santa didn't seem at all Prozac'ed, and again, it was nice to just be anonymous me, surrounded by a whole bunch of people I didn't know and who didn't know me. I got to sing carols with some people, and listen to chilly musicians play cheerful music.
It was a good evening, and alas, there are no good old movies on the cable here. Time to just pull up the blankets and listen to Fargo purr and snore.