Shelter (11 page)

In such a small town, the question then was, if not the bars,
where?
I could hang out around portages and put-ins as if just passing by, or frequent the building supply yard, the union hall, or canoe outfitters, trying to look nonchalant (“Have we met?”) Or I could crash a booya dinner at the Jugoslav Hall where I might nab a hottie with his own rolling oxygen. The odds of getting a decent date on this side of the Laurentian Divide were as good as winning Powerball but not as good as being struck by lightning.

While parked to check my cell messages at the one high spot in town, I had a view of a full parking lot and a quiet revelation. Maybe the best read one could get on local bachelors is by simply checking out their vehicles. You are what you drive here. What a man’s truck says about him is as telling as having brunch with his mother: size of gun rack, number of axles, types of load racks and hitches (does he pull an ATV trailer or haul canoes?). What’s in the truck bed? Too clean? Too dirty? Is the radio tuned to AM? What sort of discarded food containers and wrappings litter his dash? Who’s his bobblehead? What’s hanging from his rearview mirror? Is that a teeny
propeller
adorning his trailer hitch? Bumper stickers and magnetic ribbons are almost too easy. Little window decals reveal affiliations to AAA, AARP, DFL, GOP, IBEW, NRA, NPR, PETA, or UMWA. What, or whom, is the little Calvin decal peeing on? License plates offer evidence of whether the driver’s a veteran, a volunteer fireman, or just dweeb enough to have vanity plates. Damage to the rear bumper? Passive. Dents to the sides? Distracted. Front bumper? Aggressive!

During a rainy family reunion, my sisters and I sat in a cabin on Jasper Lake discussing man-catching strategies. I told them my idea for stalking parking lots, which they agreed was a good idea in theory, but a) Who has time?, b) Just how
does
one approach some guy in his truck?, and c) How does one determine if said guy is single?

No matter what, I’d seem like a psycho.

Trips to town suggested that the ratio of males to local females was definitely in my favor. All I’d really need to do was tack up a poster next to the lost dog fliers around town: “Female, breathing.”

“Maybe a
little
more,” suggested Mary, who’d once worked writing ad copy. “You know, ‘height/weight proportional,’ or perhaps a sort of teaser, like ‘must love taxidermy.’”

“Right,” Valerie added. “Things
men
like.”

“What,” I asked, “beer, blowjobs, and
bowling?”

Julie, not fully in, popped her head up, “You’d go bowling?”

I opted for Internet dating, joining one of the hipper online sites where potential dates looked less desperate. I fiddled with writing a profile and cast around for a photo that was an honest enough likeness yet would make my eyes seem less close together. While I was filling in the blank for age limit of potential dates, Sam looked over my shoulder, asking, ”
What
is desirable about fifty-five?”

Note to single mothers: Never ask your teenage son for help with a dating profile. Do not allow him in the same room, and definitely do not ask which photo makes you look datable.

On the other hand, any man I might seriously date would eventually have to pass muster with my child. A newcomer would have to
get
us and would have to accept our many familial quirks, like our habit of speaking in gargled Glaswegian accents
à la Trainspotting.
When we read or told stories, we endeavored to do so in character, shooting for authenticity, and believe me it’s not easy to keep cadence through
A Child’s Christmas in Wales
maintaining a Welsh brogue. Sam was surrounded all day by people with accents, in his Spanish immersion school and at home with Laura, our Spanish exchange student, and Duffer, the lovely Scot who often worked around the house, watched Sam, and occasionally cooked. Sam still waxes nostalgic for her shepherd’s pie, shaking his head over my attempts, asking, “Whay cahn y’nay scrrrape
it op lake our Dahfferr?” He’d also seen more than his share of foreign films of all vintages and was perhaps the only teenage boy alive ever to have claimed, “Maggie Smith is
hot.”
Sam became an adroit mimic, though my favorite of his impressions was accent free
(word
free, actually) and of a Minnesotan, consisting of one very exaggerated, seemingly endless, old-mannish, loooong suck-it-in-inhale through the nose: his Garrison Keillor.

Whatever man if any that might step into our fray would have to be a good sport, prepared to leave the hamming to others. He would have to take us part and parcel, a two-for-one deal. And Sam would have to at least
like
him.

The dating site took in my information, personal desires, and credit card details and within a few days spat out a total of
two
not-quite matches within fifty miles of the Ely zip code. The vaguely interesting one was widely read and self-employed but hinted that what he did was nobody’s business. He lived off the grid in a sort of enclave described in a way that hinted Una-bomber. The other, a therapist transplanted from out east, said he liked to cook, which I thought was a good sign; cooking could mean he was in touch with his inner domestic. Then his e-mail response came back with a smiley emoticon :-) and additional photos that revealed he not only liked to cook but eat—a lot. He wasn’t even close to being HWP though his profile claimed he was. Sure,
once
:-))

At my age, I wasn’t up for much compromise and at least knew what I
wasn’t
looking for. I updated my search to cast a wider net that included the Twin Cities. Within a day my mailbox filled. It seemed there were lots of matches in the metro area. Then I realized most profiles tended to include a shocking amount of
fiction—men portraying themselves not so much as who they are but as whom they would like to see cast as themselves in the film of their dream lives. Over-representing or misrepresenting oneself on a profile seemed so pointless. No matter what the ruse, it was bound to fall flat over the first date.

Bachelor Number One was handsome and interesting, definitely showing promise right up until the bill came. We both had the same meal at dinner, and we each had a beer. When it was time to split the tab, he tallied it to factor the price difference of my bottled beer to his draft beer, making my share seventy-nine cents more. I paid my extra and then covered for his miserly 10 percent tip. Date over.

My second date lasted minutes. Bachelor Number Two somehow knew my identity and had Googled me, even though by then everyone knew it was bad form to
go ogle
somebody before a date. He admitted he wasn’t actually interested in dating but
had
brought along a manuscript he’d written, thinking I might like to look it over. I rose to leave abruptly enough to spill coffee, not quite on his lap but at least on his manuscript.

Bachelor Number Drunk looked so unlike his profile photo he might have stolen it. We met for an early weekend brunch, during which he had to get three Bloody Marys down before his hands stopped shaking. Date over just as he was ordering a fourth, implying to the server that I was a party pooper for not joining in.

Others weren’t much better, more like skits than dates. One I remember absolutely nothing of except a flash of when the man crossed his legs, revealing that he wore sock garters.

I was disheartened but not surprised to discover how many men over forty were rabidly uninterested in women over forty,
one claiming, “I don’t do carbon dating.” The women’s profiles revealed that many of them caved to that mindset, obviously lying about their ages, eager to appear young and hot. Many had telltale boob jobs and brassy foiled hair, and some even posted glamour shots. Of course, they got more responses than those “physically authentic” models like me, but then I wasn’t looking for a guy who would date a self-proclaimed Youthful! Sexy! Fox! Internet dating for women my age seemed like some sort of scramble to beat the expiration of a freshness date. If we didn’t find someone we’d dry up and die alone like some crazy aunt who sleeps under butcher paper with her ferrets.

All I wanted was a decent guy to hang out with, but it began to look like I’d have to build him myself, like Mary Shelley. After more not-quite compelling dates, I had one that I
thought
went well, which led to a second, wherein my radar missed a few subtle warning signs, which led to an unfortunate but brief bout with a lawyer who, like a bad onion, just kept revealing more layers of rotten and worse, turning out to be an alcoholic con artist using his two adorable little girls as props. By the time I came to my senses—a matter of weeks—he had abandoned his immigrant clients, had been disbarred, and was evicted from his apartment. With that misstep under my belt, I was left doubting my judgment and instincts and waving good-bye to the money I’d stupidly lent him.

Suddenly, just determining someone’s intentions seemed like too much bother. Even if I found an honest guy who was smart and funny and cute and didn’t have annoying habits like cocaine or Jack Daniel’s for breakfast, then there was the next phase, during which what is buried roils the surface—the quirks, dislikes,
obsessions, emotional baggage, fart protocol, or that thing he does with his teeth. Surely romance wasn’t always this complex, this conditional?

In 1906, my grandmother Julia was a bright eighteen-year-old approaching pretty and destined for the spinster heap, obviously too choosy given the ample opportunities she had while working in the family catering business. She had a front-and-center seat from which to check out the most eligible men at the many weddings she worked, where all the bachelors were looking their best if not their cleanest.

“Get ‘em good and drunk” was an early dating tip doled out to my sisters and me. With Julia’s vantage point, she’d have been privy to what category of inebriate every bachelor in the region was: volatile, charming, maudlin, clownish, sloppy, harmless, or teetotaler. Such bits of dating wisdom seemed obvious; others were more subtle. One aunt suggested,
“Dance
with them! That way …” —she lowered her voice— “you’ll get an idea of whether he has any rhythm.
You
know,
that
kind of rhythm.” This was in the mid-seventies, and I could hardly bring myself to admit to Auntie that lots of girls determined whether a boy might have any rhythm on the dance floor by getting him into bed
first.

Mother suggested, “Play a game,” something competitive like poker or Monopoly to determine what kind of sport he was, the idea being “If he loses his shit over Candyland or Go Fish, run, don’t walk.” She also recommended tackling some chore or household project to get a bead on a potential mate’s temperament, cooperative abilities, and all-around usefulness. Not her exact words, but the sentiment was that if he missed the nail and nailed his thumb and called the hammer and not you a
“goddamnsonofabitch,” you’re on the right track and might safely advance to the bigger challenges of hanging wallpaper and raising children.

An overlooked bit of wisdom and one that’s only recently occurred to me is to get a meter reading on what is the deal with his mother. He might hate her vehemently or merely endure her with mild dread or teeth-gritting tolerance. Maybe he’s indifferent, or he might admit she’s not so bad. Ideally he has some genuine affection and regard: “Mom? She’s great!” At the scary level, he’s utterly devoted and won’t trim his nose hairs without her go-ahead and stutters when caught in the crosshairs of her gaze.

When I thought about it, dating began to look like too much bother. Being alone in the woods started sounding pretty good.

Lots of people live alone quite happily into their old age, and some even live
very
alone in remote locations, like the Root Beer Lady, Dorothy Molter, who spent fifty-six years by herself on an island in Knife Lake. While I’m not eager to die alone and have my decomposing, vole-chewed corpse pried from a cabin floor, there are alluring aspects of being single—to sleep when tired, eat when hungry (or while in the bath)—but aside from living the physical rhythms of
self,
there’s the freedom, too, to hang my paint-by-number art collection, eat garlic pasta, sing, answer to no one, and speak loudly amongst my selves. Nothing says I’d have to dress like a logger or cut my own hair. On the other hand, when Dorothy Molter died, her obituary led with “The Nation’s Loneliest Woman.”

As I closed down my profile and turned off my laptop, it occurred to me that I’d have plenty of alone time to write my own obituary before someone else could.

A
s Tower’s resident tailor, Joseph Stonich would have outfitted most local grooms and been present at many weddings. Miss Julia Tancig would have attended as well, helping to cater the events. Joe might have tried to catch her narrowed eye with some grin or gesture or by making a show of accepting
hors d’oeuvres
from the tray she proffered in her signature posture. He might have employed some lighthearted boldness to get her attention. She might have given it to him, she might not.

This or some similar scenario is how my grandparents met. Grandpa Joe was born in Ljubljana, Slovenia (“Loo-blee-on-ya,” just like it looks), but raised in Austria with his family, where he apprenticed to a master tailor. His father was a portrait painter and had a wine concession near the Vienna Opera House during the middle of Franz Joseph’s reign. Family lore has it that my wine-peddling/painter great-grandfather also played tuba in the Emperor’s marching band.

When Joe immigrated to Chicago in the mid-1890s, he spent his first years in America working for the House of Kuppen-heimer, clothiers to the elite. Life would have been exciting for a bachelor in such a city; the skyline was just taking shape, giving Chicago its nickname “City of Big Shoulders.” Tailoring wasn’t
particularly taxing work, and Joe was handsome enough, even with one minutely lazy eye. He was young and bright, spit-shining his new language while embarking on a new life. He was most certainly impeccably dressed.