With
COVID-19 cancelling most group activities, writer-friend Lydia and I made plans
to drive to Eureka Springs and spend a week as residents at the Writers Colony
at Dairy Hollow, a first for her, but a return for me. She has one novel to
wrap up and another to continue. I have this column to compose and a slew of
MFA assignments/ requirements to work on.
October
is always a good time to travel north and this year was no exception. Yellows, reds,
and oranges interspersed with pines and cedars provided many “oohs and aahs”
especially as we drove through Clinton, then into Marshall where we gassed up,
stood in line, social distanced for the restroom, then bought a sweet snack to
take us the rest of the way. It was early afternoon. I was impressed enough to
pen a poem: “The men/ at Marshall’s gas/station all wore their masks/ which
surprised me in this mountain/ county.” The forests became more colorful the
farther we traveled.
I was
the passenger this trip. Lydia was a careful driver. A little after three p. m.
we pulled in to the Colony and were greeted by the new-to-me director,
Michelle. We were all masked as was Jana in the kitchen. Packets and keys in
hand, we headed to the door of 505 Spring Street to unload. Afterward, Lydia
moved the car across the street to the lay-by. Her suite is downstairs; mine is
right inside the front door next to the communal kitchen/ dining area. I’ve
stayed in this suite since this building opened. Originally, it was Muse 1;
now, with all five of the suites having been remodeled, mine is the Zeek Taylor
Suite.
By the
time we’d each unpacked and put things away and marveled at our newly-decorated
suites, it was dinner time. Of the four residents, we were the only ones to
choose to eat down in the Main House. We sat at the ends of the long dining
table. Jana (Yahna, of Czech extraction) served a crunchy veggie salad, then brought on
a plate filled with beef chunks covered with (shudder) mushroom gravy and a
mound of rice. (On my pre-sent foods-I-don’t-like list were cooked turnips,
liver ’n onions and tofu. I’d forgotten gravy and mushrooms.) I picked at the
rice and beef, forced to consume gravy with the bites, then dug into the baked
apple dessert, a small fruit topped with a fig, wrapped in a pastry igloo. A
few bites of that, and I decided I’d had enough. Lydia felt the same, although
her gluten-free dessert was a pudding of some kind. We each asked for a to-go
box, and took our uneaten dinners back to our rooms. We ate them the next day
at the 505 dining table.
We
both accomplished some needed work from then until bedtime. I turned out the
light right before ten (I hadn’t had my daily nap), but she stayed up till
midnight, her usual bedtime hour.
That
was Friday. Saturday, we masked up and headed to Sparky’s for a late lunch.
After waiting for twenty minutes, we were seated at a two-fer table by one
wall. We de-masked. She had a burger and I had a Rueben, half of which resided
in the fridge beside the gravy dish. But we are happy we came even though it was
in the low forties, temp-wise. More later.
1 comment:
I am very glad you got away - and hope it was productive for you both. And restorative.
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