Terroir in the Lutefisk Capital of the US

[mallorys_camera]

Jump: Madison, MN → Wheaton, MN – Traverse County Fairgrounds: 70 miles
Right out of the lot onto HWY 75 North
HWY 75 North all the way to Wheaton
Arrows to the lot…
Shows at 5pm/7:30pm

If you want to fire someone from a circus, you take him to a McDonalds twenty miles from the lot. Hand him a twenty-dollar bill. “I want a plain fish sandwich,” you say. “A fish sandwich with nothing on it. No lettuce. No tomatoes. No tartar sauce. Nothing. Think you can handle that?”

“Sure,” he says.

You wait two minutes till he’s safe inside and then you drive away.

It’ll take him ten minutes at least to negotiate the plain fish sandwich. And when he comes out and finds you’re gone, he’ll have something to eat while he figures it all out plus fifteen bucks to get himself wherever he’s going next.

Win/win…

###

Yesterday’s Town, Madison, Minnesota, is the lutefisk capital of the US. Lutefisk is a kind of jello made from pouring lye on codfish. There’s a very fine line between soap and lutefisk, so I’m really not sure what the touristo pay-off is here, why any town would advertise its prominence in this particular supply chain. The stuff tastes vile. Plus you figure if the Chamber of Commerce were really serious, you’d see a quaint 19th century Broadway block lined with gift shoppes offering the undiscriminating buyer an opportunity to purchase carbonated lutefisk, lutefisk infused olive oils, lutefisk scented body butters.

And you don’t.

Madison’s also got some connection to the poet Robert Bly whose study – an airy, pleasant book-lined cabin smelling of ancient incense – rests on the grounds of the Lac Qui Parle Historical Society, otherwise home to a most impressive collection of Dionne Quintuplet dolls. (Eat your hearts out Jon and Kate!)

Afore-mentioned Madison Chamber of Commerce hosted the circus. They did almost no pre-sales. Their rep was very apologetic. “Wouldn’t ya know it,” she said. “Nothing ever happens here. But the one day the circus comes to town, they let this guy out…”

“This guy” is a local who was locked up for five years for sexually molesting an underage relative for whom he was baby-sitting – he was 23, she was 12. Now he’s being released back into the community and the community is pissed, big meeting scheduled. Nothing in the world could lure me back under those circumstances but I suppose the Iron John you know is better than the lutefisk you don’t…

Anyway shows were very sparsely attended.

I’ve been finding it almost impossible to work on the memoir since I’ve been back. That means I’m finding it impossible to do anything since I have no other projects, nothing else that could remotely be described as useful work.

Result of all this unstructured leisure? Can’t seem to focus. When I do focus it veers off into strange little OCD episodes. Example: Day before yesterday I finally did get back into the rhythm of writing, wrote so rapidly and well that it was hard to break off. All evening long the aftershocks trailed me, messages from the interior, thoughts and phrases I just had to incorporate into the chapter. Scribbled them all down on a piece of yellow paper and then yesterday morning promptly lost the yellow piece of paper, so instead of writing yesterday I spent 8 hours reading a bad Fannie Flagg novel, obsessing about the missing piece of yellow paper, making Jack Kerouac my mantra – accept loss forever, accept loss forever.

Odd thing about these tiny, self-effacing Minnesota towns – Madison, population: 1,768; Clara City, population: 1,393; Wheaton, population 1,619: they all have a very strong sense of place, what I have taken to calling inside my own head terroir, a term stolen from oenology where it’s used to describe the effects of soil minerals, weather conditions, grade of the vineyard etc on the experience of tasting the wine. The towns are all quite different from one another. I feel as though I’m channeling something entirely unfamiliar when I inhale the air of each.

I can barely remember the names of the towns from day to day. But the sensory imagery barrages me non-stop. Images of lakes. Images of downtowns. Images of people I see on the street.

Very strange.

Comments

[bandicoot.livejournal.com]

I can barely remember the names of the towns from day to day. But the sensory imagery barrages me non-stop. Images of lakes. Images of downtowns. Images of people I see on the street.

Sounds like you have the material for a good book right there. With the circus as your hook ;)

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

Ya think? Really?