It's Okay That I Can't Remember What I Was Just Thinking About

      In 1998 I visited, along with my girlfriend, her brother and his wife.  They lived in Iron Mountain, Michigan.  Henry Ford had something to do with that town.  Her brother and I sat in the front two seats of his family van.  As he drove, he told me about Henry Ford's presence, or at least his business concern, in this area of Upper Michigan, a place of woods, cliffs, owls, and trees.  Fog that day during this drive in the vicinity of Iron Mountain.  I remember what my girlfriend told me one winter day as we walked Iron Mountain's streets on a later trip.  Snow piled high, all sidewalks covered, but the streets had been cleared.  Our boots made sharp crunching sounds in the dry endless blue sky air.  She explained that in Iron Mountain they don't shovel their sidewalks.  Why?  Because, according to her, they get so much snow there's no point in bothering with it.  I happen to know this is only part of it.  The pleasure in their minds at not having to contemplate shoveling, being cold, suffering a backache, sits comfortably with them.  That neighbors and city officials themselves don't have a problem with citizens not clearing off their sidewalks must resonate with everyone who doesn't have to shovel snow due to an agreement arrived at...when?  I didn't ask my girlfriend the answer to the question.  Henry Ford, maybe, got it going.  

     On that drive, her brother passed through Felch Township.  Yes, lovers of dirty slang, you read that right.  Felch Township, population 752.

     I say "Sir" and "Ma'am" a lot in public places because I've worked in the service industry for many years in a few different jobs: grocery store, library, museum, charities phone caller.  Appear polite and attentive to others, selfless, neat, with polished shoes or at least clean new Nikes.  Make sure the tie is on tight against your neck.  No more brilliant policy than making people who must do manual labor wear ties.

Name tags: Hi, I'm Vic! read one I had to wear for a restaurant job.

     I've been through many towns: Salt Lake City, saw the Mormon Tabernacle, quite spectacular at night.  I've been through Felch Township, saw trees, mist, a gas station, houses, cars, wet road.

     Henry Ford chose this area as a place to make cars.  Big snowfalls each winter, cold and damp in other parts of the year, hot and humid in summer sometimes, deer ticks, ants, metal ore under the pine needle-covered ground.  

     I want to travel to Antarctica, step foot there, get it out of the way for obscure places to visit, like Labrador, the remote Canadian province, population 26,000.  Population density very low.  

     Near Iron Mountain, the community of Norway, Michigan features a beautiful tumbling rapids, wet huge rock walls surrounding the mini-canyon as the river blasts through the middle of the town.  Lying in bed, a Norway resident would hear that river, ambient, roaring quietly.

Vic Neptune