Here and there

It seems like it's been far more than 6 days since we left Ottawa in our rented Ford Focus, but alas, that's all the time that has passed. I haven't written anything yet because I've been waiting for something worth documenting--something I just can't wait to share--and as yet, it hasn't really happpened.

Well, OK, so we've had a bit of fun here and there, but I'm used to more fun than this (remember California? And the UK? It only took a matter of minutes in each place before crazy things started happening to us!). In any case, here's the Reader's Digest version of this first week of our trip, only you don't have to go to the doctor's office or your grandma's bathroom to read it. 

We got up early Saturday morning, picked up our car from Budget--a 4-door, black, Ford Focus with Satellite Radio (good) and all kinds of little things wrong with it (a.k.a. Ford)--and hit the road. Well, we almost hit the road, except that I brought the sleeve my passport usually travels in, only my passport was still mingling in a drawer with the underpants that didn't make the suitcase cut (wedgie-makers and ripped cotton numbers are for local use only). So, we turned around and I talked a blue streak until my passport was secured and we were going in the right direction on the 417. We crossed through Cornwall and got the full search from a surly young woman who kept calling Brian's dissertation a "paper" (to which Brian would softly retort 'It's a book. A book.'). We ate a packed lunch on the road--fresh French Baker croissants, procured that morning, stuffed with ham and provolone and washed down with Fresca--and arrived in Burlington, Vermont around 2:30pm. It was a really cute, lively town and it didn't take us long to decide we liked it, could live there if pressed, and were reminded a bit of Santa Cruz. 

We dropped our things at the hotel and headed downtown. We parked the car in a garage and were pulled by some force of nature into Ben & Jerry's, where I found oatmeal cookie dough ice cream, which is the supreme combination of two of my favourite foods in the whole world: oatmeal and ice cream. 

Cones in hand, we just walked around, shopped and explored until we were hungry again, and we stopped for a late dinner at American Flatbread Company. The meal was delicious--one flatbread (a pizza, really) was topped with pickled grapes, baby spinach, shallots, mild blue cheese, fennel, and pollen-infused honey. It was to die for, especially alongside a New Vermont sausage flatbread and paired with a half pint of beer brewed on the spot. 

We returned to the hotel and tried to go swimming, a must-do for me at every hotel... ever... but the pool was full of rowdy little boys, apparently there for a soccer tournament and whose parents had understandably dumped them in the water for some personal respite. We decided to come back in an hour, but once we holed up in the hotel room, I conked out at 8pm. As a result, I woke up at 5:30am. Bored, I hit up the gym, came back for Brian at 7, and we both took a dip in the pool and hot tub. Ready for the next leg of the trip, we packed up and went out for coffee.

We continued to Brattleboro (cute little artist town, but kinda boring if you're just passing through) for lunch, and drove through Springfield, Massachusetts just to check it out. It was SO depressing. It was just row upon row of old, empty factories, shitty houses and big, beautiful buildings that are now abandoned. This happens to so many cities in the U.S.--the local industries collapse, the city empties out, people move to the suburbs, and all the amazing buildings go to waste.Poor people stay in the city, the urban area's tax base is depleted, and the place can't even pay to have grass on the meridians or get the crosswalks freshly painted. It's just such a bummer. Both of us felt like we'd been punched in the face as we pulled back onto the highway. 

We kept going and hit New Haven around 5pm. Taylor, the guy whose apartment we're staying in, left us by 5:15. He had his car packed up and ready to go, so he just took off after doing that thing we all do before a trip, pacing around and clapping your hands and talking to yourself about things you might have forgotten and things you definitely have packed. He'd left us a bottle of wine. 

We were starving and couldn't deal with finding a nice restaurant (nor paying for one... it is us after all), so instead of settling in right away, we grabbed Subway around the corner. Once we were fed, we drove out to Trader Joe's (a supermarket we loved in California, but here it kinda sucks), and then to Shop Rite for groceries. It was... different. There is just SO much processed food in these stores! Some of it was exciting (like the peanut butter Puffins cereal I found) but some of it was disturbing (like the 10-ft-long deli case of different kinds of hotdogs). Much to my disappointment, fresh pitas are nowhere to be found. They do, however, have 1L containers of Fluff (the marshmallow miracle summoned from heaven just a little bit away in Massachussetts), and soda (not POP, you crazy Canucks) in flavours I can't even comprehend.

After that first night, things got a little boring. Brian went to the archives all day and I sat and transcribed interviews or worked on proposal stuff. To keep busy and active, I've been walking Brian to the archives in the morning and then going for a little jog, and twice I've walked over to East Rock Park and climbed to the summit. One way of doing this is up "Giant Steps", which are, literally, giant steps to the top. Another is scrambling up a winding trail. It's a very short hike, but the views are nice and it made for a good hour of recreation before work. 

For the rest of this week, that's pretty much what we did, except that on Thursday we started a new routine: I'll work in the mornings, meet Brian after lunch at the archives, and then help him research for the afternoon. I'm privy to his research enough that I can scan all of the old letters, memos and other documents for the information he needs. For the last little while I've been snooping in this guy's affairs: 

As a result, I've been thinking about his life constantly, imagining him riding the train, sitting around at Yale, using the same chairs and tables and door handles and lamps, walking on the same floor tiles, peering through the same windows and never imagining we'd have guys walking on the moon, restless leg syndrome, or reality TV. He would, however, have been alive to experience Marshmallow Fluff, and I'm amused by the thought of it getting stuck in his moustache.