In Reedsport
If you equate every aspect of your life to 80s power ballads (and let’s face it – who doesn’t?) my neighbor and future roommate Josh is Journey’s proverbial “small town girl” (livin’ in a lonely world), while I’m more of the “city boy” (born and raised in South Detroit), because…
No, no, no, no.
My friend and future roommate Josh lives in Reedsport, Oregon. I don’t blame you if you’ve never heard of it – neither had I, up until I met Josh, and up until this weekend I was honestly convinced that Josh had been lying about it and was from suburban Portland just like everyone else I know. It was this weekend that Josh proved me wrong by inviting my friend Jeff and I to stay with him in Reedsport for the Memorial Day weekend. I’m here to tell you that yes, Reedsport does exist, and yes, Josh is from there, but it’s arguably the best kept secret in Oregon. Reedsport is two hours outside of Eugene, an hour and a half of which is spent on winding two lane roads that cut through dense, sparsely populated forest – I shit you not, I’m pretty sure I spotted some Hobbits on the way in here. At the end of the road lay Reedsport, a town of 4500 people within spitting distance of the coast (provided that you can spit for two miles).
I’ve never been in a town this small before. Salem, technically speaking, was a small town in that it had no culture or nightlife, but it had crime and urban sprawl on big city levels, thereby sacrificing any potential quaintness. Reedsport, though, has proven to be everything I expected a little town to be. Everyone here knows everyone, and everyone knows what everyone else is doing, so it’s sort of like a 4500 person high school with its own volunteer fire department. Listening to Josh and his parents talk is like listening to two people discussing the events of a TV show you’ve never watched. “Mike and Wendy are having a barbecue tomorrow night, and Kim is going even though she’s a vegetarian but she hasn’t told Frank yet, and Paul isn’t going because he’s got to take Cheryl- No, not that Cheryl, the other Cheryl, to a dance recital in Coos Bay, but Jack Bauer is in town and he’s probably going to crash his car into Paul’s and make them tell him where their Cousin Abdullah is with the nukes.”
Josh drove us around town yesterday (there isn’t much town to drive around, so it took about 15 minutes) and pointed out where all of Reedsport’s movers and shakers live. He showed us the house of the high school history teacher, Mr. Tymchuck (I’m not even kidding, that’s actually his name), who also happens to be the mayor (I didn’t believe it at first either, but mark my words: Tim-Chuck), and along the way waved to one of Reedsport’s six policemen, Officer Funk* (I am so not making this up).
*“In a world where evil deeds go unpunished, one thing is certain – WE NEED THE FUNK! Coming this November to a theater near you.”
Also, I’ve never been in a town this close to nature before. On the first night, as Jeff and I were getting settled on the floor of Josh’s room, his mother came in to see if we needed anything. We told her that we were fine, and the following conversation ensued:
Josh’s Mom: “Well, alright, we’re right upstairs if you need anything. Oh, and if the dog starts barking, don’t worry about it. She gets spooked pretty easily if a bear or some deer come through the neighborhood.”
Truman: “Excuse me… Bears?”
I guess every town has its problems. Salem has meth, Eugene has hobos, and Reedsport has bears. And let me just say, Salem and Eugene’s problems don’t seem all that bad when you put them up against wayward bears tramping through your yard while you sleep. Sure, I don’t like it when hobos press me for change outside Quiznos – I feel guilty for not giving them any of the spare change I’ve got on hand. However, I’d much rather run into a hobo outside Quiznos than a bear. A hobo you can reason with. A hobo shuts up when you give him change. A hobo doesn’t maul you and drag you back to its den (at least, not before sunset).
There are no movie theaters in Reedsport – for that, you have to drive 25 miles to a theater in North Bend.** There is no shopping center – for that, you have to drive 100 miles to Eugene. There is, however, a bowling alley, and since it was Saturday night, Jeff and Josh and I went bowling, along with the rest of the town. Now, as I’ve mentioned before, bowling is little more to me than a $10 reminder that I’m embarrassingly incompetent in every field that doesn’t involve cheap jokes or the Internet. However, in a small town it’s unspeakably worse, because every single person in that bowling alley had been going there for entertainment a few times a week since they learned how to walk and throw heavy objects. There was a 7-year-old girl in the lane next to ours, and she was toddling around rolling strikes like nobody’s business, whereas the high point of my evening was singing along with “Cum On Feel The Noize” when it came on the stereo. Women have always made me feel foolish and inadequate, but they’ve never started this young.
**Might I add, there’s something about that theater that just isn’t right. I can’t put my finger on quite what – the smell that’s borderline unpleasant without actually being unpleasant, the desolation in the eyes of the employees, the senior citizens making out in the ticket line (I regret to inform you that I am not kidding). I might just be overly critical of the theater because that’s where I’m ashamed to say I spent money – real, valuable, currency – to see Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, which is quite simply one of the worst things in human history. It’s no Holocaust, sure, but I’d put it above Chernobyl and Larry the Cable Guy on the tragedy scale.
I’m going to go on the record and say that I like Reedsport a lot. I like not hearing sirens all the time and I like how everybody smiles at me despite the stifling aura of despair that I do my best to bring with me no matter where I go. In the past 36 hours, I have eaten fresh fish and chips, pancakes and bacon, and homemade steak, baked potato, corn on the cob, baked beans, etc. When word got around Reedsport (and it gets around fast) that I had my trumpet with me, the Marine Band, in town for a concert and parade later this weekend, invited me to their rehearsal on Sunday – you probably don’t find this terribly interesting unless you’re my Mom and Dad, and yeah, Mom and Dad, I’m pretty excited too.
Despite the atmosphere and the friendly servicemen and the delicious food that is, as we speak, building a hydroelectric dam of cholesterol in my arteries, it will be nice to get back to school in a couple days. I was talking with Josh’s Dad earlier and we both agreed that we didn’t like Eugene much – he thinks it’s too big, and I think it’s too small. The peace and quiet of Reedsport is nice for a little while, but when all is said and done I need to be someplace bigger, a place with at least two movie theaters and more entertainment options than bowling. I like the big – or at least mid-sized – city for its anonymity and bustle, such as they are in Oregon. Reedsport’s charm and isolation are a great draw for a few days, but they’re also the main reasons I could never stay in a place like this.
Also, I don’t want to get eaten by bears.
Truman Capps urges you not to reply if all you’re going to say is, “Hey! I liked Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull Soiree for the following reasons!”, because he will not respect you afterwards.