Tales from the Christensen Cruiser

            I rolled east towards Lower and Upper Red Lake, wondering if I should wait in some town to find out if the hornet that was having a bad day and stung me was going to send me into shock out in the middle of nowhere. I hadn’t ever had a bad reaction to a sting, so I figured what the heck. Red Lake is the largest lake in Minnesota, lower lake being the home of the Red Lake band of the Chippewa Indians. Red Lake is the largest lake in Minnesota, which is sayin’ something in the land of 10,000.

I was in the groove at this point and worked at slowing way down. I was doing forty or forty-five atound the lake and in no hurry. I was already way off of Hwy 2 and ventured farther afield, picking very obscure roads. I ended up on dirt roads way out there. I still had some of my coffee from the junkyard, and in honor of Mr. Steinbeck, added some ”authority” to it. So arrest me, a healthy splash of fine bourbon was just the ticket. If a guy can’t have a small tincture of whiskey out in the sticks, when can he. So now I’m down to twenty-five or thirty. Ambling along at a leasurely pace, figuring my spot for the night would appear. I overtook a porcupine travelling a bit slower than me on the road. It was getting dark, and as I got back to pavement, there it was; Hillman’s Store and Tavern in Washkish. I went into the tavern where Larry Hillman was tending bar. There were a couple of guys there, and Larry said he had a spot with power and showed me to it. Just a beautiful spot, right by the river. By the time I got leveled and raised the camper , everyone was gone from the tavern so I turned around and bunked down for the night. With power, I could settle in and watch an old Perry Mason or Naked City DVD, Fun stuff. You get to see things like Duston Hoffman playing a minor role as a two-bit hood long before The Graduate. Lots of people before they hit it big, and some plain journeyman actors who slugged it out for years and later in life got juicy roles on things like Law and Order – stuff like that.

I had decided to stay a couple of nights to regroup and change the aforementioned exhaust manifold. I was still finding places for everything – just like the boat that Scuppers sailed on. I had a hook for my hat and a hook for my coat, a hook for my pants, etc. etc. etc. Scuppers the Sailor Dog was my absolute favorite book when I was little. Dad would read me a story every night and I always wanted to hear that one. It got so he could be thinking about all sorts of other stuff because he pretty much had it memorized. This cool little dog gets shipwrecked, finds a toolbox, builds a comfy little shack, repairs his ship, and lives happily ever after. Is it any wonder I love to work on stuff? Not to mention that I grew up in a house that dad and mom were remodeling one two by four at a time because that’s about all they could afford. My first memory of a television was a big square black and white job that sat on two cement blocks left over from the foundation. I tell ya, this fixing stuff is in my blood.

Next morning I got up and did the manifold switch. Since I had had the other one off in Whitefish, it was a piece of pie. It went together nicely. I then went for a nice walk to the state park just up the road. Really cool park with an honest-to-goodness fire watch tower that was open to climb. It was really tall and at the top there was a great view of the lake. It just amazed me that this humoungous lake was just sixteen feet deep at its deepest.

As an aside, (and I guess this whole thing is an aside, the way I ramble from one thing to another), when my daughter Casey was very small, I was in a bookstore with my dad and they had reprinted the book. I have a video I took as dad read that story to Casey. Now she could have cared less about the story, but it was a highpoint for me to hear him read that to my child,(and anyone who remotely knew my dad knows how rare being in a bookstore was – not a bookstore sort of guy – Mom yes – Dad no.)

Anyway. It freezes hard there in Northern Minnesota. Lots of ice fishing for Walleye. Big suckers – some over forty inches in length. I talked to Larry about it and he told me that his brother creates an ice road every winter that goes for miles and miles. He developed techniques that his dad taught him and the ice ends up being thicker where the road is because he plows it and leaves the snowdrifts on the downwind side. Where there is no snow to insulate the ice, it freezes thicker. That night I was looking forward to hanging in the tavern and talking to some of the locals. I arrived at five or so to find it closed for the night. Nobody home at all.

That was fine and I got rested up and hit the road north towards International Falls the next morning. The radio said that this particular day was going to be unseasonably warm, so I drove for a while and pulled off on a “minimally maintained” county dead-end road. It went straight for a mile or so and ended. I did about a fifteen point turn-around to get headed back where I came from and settled in to enjoy the sun. Beautiful day. That’s where I did the drawing of the truck. I filled up the Sun Shower with water, had some lunch, did the drawing, and ended the rest stop with a nice warm shower in the sun. Great stuff.

            I got to the border at International Falls and spent quite some time getting through. They were very nice, buy very thorough. And these were the nice guys! I had nothing to hide, but being checked out that thoroughly would make anyone a bit nervous. I just couldn’t wait to come through and talk to our very own Homeland Security boys upon my return.