Michigan, land of thieves
I hadn’t been to my mother’s house in Michigan for a while. Part of it was probably due to the fact that I work with her, and end up talking to her several times each week. Part of it is because she’s at our house semi-regularly to visit with her grandkids or to attend family events. Part of it is simply that as you get older, you tend to visit a bit less often.
But mostly, we haven’t visited because Michigan is filled with weirdoes and thieves.
Last Friday, we went to visit my mom and stepdad in order to get rid of our children. This was the first time that my daughter, Sydney, would be staying overnight, so we decided to compromise on our usual drop-off-for-the-weekend. Instead of leaving them, we’d stay too, in a small guest house. (Don’t go thinking they’re loaded. While comfortable and technically a guest house, the cabin is closer to “Unabomber shack” than it is to “Butler’s quarters.”) That way if things got ugly, we’d be right there to pretend that we couldn’t hear my mother pounding on the door.
But we still got our alone time. So on Friday night, Robin and I went to the Olive Garden — just the two of us. It was very quiet and we immediately realized we had no idea what to do with ourselves.
“So what are we supposed to talk about?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” Robin replied.
After an extended period of time, the waitress stumbled over, announced that she “needed more wine,” took our drink order, and then stared at us for a while. Then she left. After another extended period of time, she returned with our drinks. Then she stared at us again and left.
One of the people behind Robin was talking about her favorite TV shows.
“Do you watch House? It’s about this doctor who has like a limp and he solves mysteries but nobody likes him but he’s so good that it doesn’t matter and he has like polio or something. And Wife Swap? It’s about these families who trade the mothers and they’re all totally weird like this one lady who was possessed by the devil or something and like ate fire and then there was this kid? Have you seen Heroes?”
The waitress returned. “Can I get you something to drink?” she asked.
“We already have drinks.”
She stood in place and stared at us. So we decided to start ordering food in her general direction and hope that in some part of her mind, she would recognize our verbalizations as valid inquiries for food.
I decided to call my mother to see how Sydney was doing. I could hear her in the background, screaming.
“She’s playing,” my mom announced.
But really, all I cared about was that she wasn’t “playing” with us for a change. It was nice to have a meal without being interrupted. However, halfway through my plate, the waitress arrived with a to-go box and attempted to shovel my food into it.
“I’m still eating that,” I told her.
She stared at me, then left.
Later, while we were sitting at the local Borders book store and reading, a woman walked up to the endtable between our chairs, moved our coffees, picked up one of Robin’s magazines, appraised it briefly, and walked off with it.
You can’t blame Michigan, though. They live so close to those shifty Canadians that descent into lives of thievery was almost a given.
My mom works with a Canadian man named Greg. I once spent a weekend in a Canadian lake house with a group that included Greg and his wife. Greg did not like the lake house. He was bored and didn’t enjoy the beach. He didn’t care much for quiet, or tranquility. He was too busy complaining about the slow cellular internet service.
“There’s a way you can get satellite high-speed for free, you know,” he chided my mother. “It’s the same with DirecTV. You used to be able to get Dish Network TV here, and you could rig it so that it’s free, but then they changed the way it was broadcast and so we had to switch to stealing DirecTV instead.”
I was intrigued. ” ‘We?’ ”
“You know, Canadians.”
Greg tapped a key angrily, mumbling. “The setup I have at home is so fast that you can get full DVDs in no time at all,” he said.
“I can’t figure out how to burn them,” I told him.
“It’s complicated because sometimes they put copyright protection on them. You have to find the programs to break the protection. It can take a long time. There are times that I really want a DVD or CD and I have to search for hours to find it for free somewhere, and then I end up having to get through some copyright bullshit. It’s really annoying.” He tapped a key angrily again.
“Why don’t you just… I don’t know… buy the DVD?”
Greg shook his head. “I can’t. It’s part of being Canadian. We always want to get stuff for free.” He gestured out the window. “Hell, most of these houses have satellite dishes on them. But look around; most are for services we don’t have in Canada. They’re stealing American signals.”
You learn something new every day. Apparently Canadians steal. It’s like that Seinfeld episode where Jerry learns that all old people steal. I wonder what it’s like to be an old Canadian? Museums in Calgary and Toronto must have dozens of safeguards to hold back the onslaught of geriatric catburglars. Like maybe staircases, or low toilets.
The rest of my time in Canada, I walked around with my hands in my pockets.
Back in Michigan, I called my mom again. In the background I could hear the sound of my daughter screaming.
“She’s listening to Boppa play the guitar,” she told me.
I visited the Borders bathroom. When I returned, Robin told me that several people had tried to steal my clearly-marked seat. Later, she went to the bathroom and more people did the same for her seat. It was like they were circling, looking for weakness. I wondered if they could smell fear.
When we returned to my mother’s house, my mom announced that Sydney had cried so much that she had exhausted herself and collapsed into hypoxia. The house was quiet. Satisfied, we headed out to the cabin for our first night of uninterrupted sleep in approximately sixteen thousand years, and it was good.
When we awoke, we had another 36 hours ahead of us in Michigan. Near Detroit, just a stone’s throw from Canada. I decided it would be prudent to put my wallet in my sock and hang my food from a high branch. You never know, and better safe than sorry. Thieves and bears are everywhere.