Going
to the Boundary Line Drive-in
by
Robert LaFrance
Oh, but it’s hot today, and muggy.
It takes all my moral courage to remember my vow during the winter when we were
having twelve snowstorms a week: “I promise not to complain about the hot weather
this coming summer (if it ever arrives) if you’ll just get us out of this
never-ending snowstorm season.”
Sure enough, I went outside at about
8:00 am today and was struck in the face by Sahara-like heat. I opened my mouth
to practise my cursing, but then remembered my promise. Next time I make a
promise why don’t I just not make any promises?
That brings me to a recent PBS-TV
show about drive-ins and THAT brought me to remember the Boundary Line Drive-in
at Fort Fairfield, Maine. Just beyond that, a mile (as we used to say in our
old style of speaking), there was a “grocery” store called Puddle-dock. I never
did learn how to spell it, but I certainly knew where the Pabst Blue Ribbon
beer was kept – the big cooler at the back on the right. Although the store had
groceries, I never saw anyone buy anything but beer, any of us New Brunswickers
anyway.
That was the Saturday night activity
of many of the hoodlums I hung out with, especially when it was hot and humid
like today. Go to Puddle-dock first, then to the drive-in and drink the
groceries one had purchased at Puddle-dock. Maybe the next Saturday we would go
see a movie or two at the Capitol Theatre, which used to be located in Andover,
right at the end of the car bridge - yes, we also had a train bridge then!
We would see a Roy Rogers movie,
maybe a Doc and Kitty Williams live show, but the only thing about the Capitol
Theatre was that they didn't have Pabst Blue Ribbon to tie up the evening.
*****************************
Yesterday my friend Flug stopped by
for a lemonade and to help me fold the laundry (otherwise no lemonade). Before
he folded his tenth towel, he started hacking and coughing and a rash broke out
on his large face. “Oh, no!” he said. “I've become allergic to lemonade. This
is the end of my life as I know it!”
I thought that was a bit dramatic,
but I suppose it was possible. “Have you ever had allergy tests?” I asked, and
he said that he had had many and the only thing he was allergic to was caraway.
He said that when he was a barber on Parliament Hill (“quite a temptation,
those razors next to those throats!”) he had taken to sneezing one day and
couldn’t stop and had had the same type of rash. It had never happened since.
You know how the light bulb goes on
over the cartoon character’s head? I remembered that when I had been hanging
out the towels the long ones had hung down into the long grass – the legal kind
I mean. “I’ll be right back,” I said thoughtfully, or at least as close to
thoughtfully as this old brain will now allow.
Checking under the clothesline I saw –
sure enough! – half a dozen caraway plants. Never let it be said that I am not
a great detective. As to Flug and his rash, more lemonade seemed to alleviate
his symptoms.
*****************************
When I lived in the Northwest
Territories, part of which swanned off to become Nunavut, I noticed that there
was the odd blackfly in the spring – and summer, and fall. We’ll say that at
any given moment there were two hundred of them trying to find my flesh. Here in
New Brunswick there are fewer, like 26 at a time.
True, they have a family too
(Simuliidae) but I feel that it’s rather unfair to have their family try to
chew up my family, namely me. Although Romeo’s and Juliet’s families (Montagues
and Capulets) were always feuding, that is no reason for the Simuliidae crowd
to think it’s okay to torture LaFrances.
So, my friends, I have come to a
decision. From now on it’s war against blackflies which, it has been recently
discovered, are of that family I mentioned, the same as the wolverine, I think.
It has been known for years that
wolverines carry malaria germs and we have to watch out for them, but the gist
of this part of the column is to warn you about moose flies. They sting, but
also actually cut into your flesh and drink your blood.
You will notice that I keep saying
YOU and YOUR. I have no intention of going outside until October, when it’s
time to start shoveling snow again. Speaking of shoveling, I have found out
why there aren't any flower beds around the legislature; too much wind. It
dries out the plants.
-end-
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