Once more in the Ozarks to write

by Pat Laster

As I type this on a Wednesday evening in Dairy Hollow’s Spring Garden Suite, I haven’t yet investigated Little Switzerland--as Eureka Springs is often called--for its fall foliage.
However, the trip up Highway 65 afforded many sightings of yellow hickory, red sumac and sweet gum’s still-muted variegated colors. I determined to stop somewhere on the way home and buy a hickory and some sumac to go with the sassafras and crape myrtle already growing on Couchwood.
The wind and the change in temperature brought on another bout of sneezing and nasal drip as I drove through Clinton, Marshall, Dennard, Leslie, St. Joe, Bellefonte, Harrison and Alpena. At Green Forest, traffic was stopped across from the cattle-sale barn for ten or twelve minutes while some road overlay happened.
I arrived at the Writers Colony to find a new director, Mary Jo, with bad news: the toilet in my suite was acting ugly. A plumber had been called and was supposed to be on site that afternoon. If possible.
IF POSSIBLE??? But the stars were aligned as some folks describe it. I drove around the curve to the parking space as Mr. Plumber pulled up to my front door. While the young man worked, I carried in case after case (clothes and writing materials/books) and placed them out of the way.
I held the door while he brought in a “John-in-a-box.” I piddled around in the work space/kitchenette—the mini-fridge had not been turned up—and the microwave was uneven on its platform.
Soon, I heard the man say, “This isn’t gonna work,” or maybe he said “ain’t,” and traipsed back through the suite lugging the “cheap—one-hundred dollar,” er, john. “I’ll have to go back to the shop and get another one.”
“Where’s the shop?” I asked in alarm. “Rogers? Bentonville?”
“No, it’s in town,” and away he flew--as fast as anyone can fly while negotiating a hairpin curve and a steep climb from the valley.
While he was gone, I jury-rigged the crippled microwave with a 3 by 5 note card bent six ways to Sunday. It worked, but I added the situation to my evaluation form. The next writer will have the same problem if it’s not corrected.
Soon, the plumber, bald as an unwigged mannequin, returned with a “more expensive, but in these old houses, the only solution” toilet. Installed quickly. Problem solved.
Given my recent experiences, I asked him about recycling. “All but the porcelain—it’s clay—and the plastic.” About once a month, he loads his trailer, he said, and takes everything else to a salvage yard. The proceeds he splits with his boss. “About $200 a month,” he allowed. “Good pay for the likes of me.”
Now, it is Friday evening. Though there are two more residents here—one from Seattle; one from New York--they ate out, so I dined alone at the big table in the Main House. Vegetable-bean soup, tossed salad, cornbread and chocolate pudding left by the cook who leaves as early as she can—the economy has hit the non-profits hard—but not before placing sticky notes to “turn off the stove,” and “salad in the fridge; have a great weekend.”
I’m sure I’ll have a great weekend: no organ to play, no choir rehearsal to attend, no cats to feed, no pears to peel. I can sit on this front porch not six feet from the street, watch and listen as the bikers roar by this curve, the sound lingering, lingering as they maneuver the hairpin and the incline.
Maybe tomorrow night I’ll hear the clip-clop of the horse-drawn carriage rides.

c 2011 by Pat Laster dba lovepat press