Journal of a Sabbatical

October 4, 1999

north conway 1

Today's Reading: Danube by Claudio Magris

Claire picked me up at 8:15 for the annual walking buddies trip to North Conway. I was still finishing breakfast and had hardly touched my coffee when she got here as I had not managed to get up early as planned. Fortunately I had packed everything last night. I decanted the coffee into a travel mug and then almost went off without it. I sipped coffee and tried to pretend to be conscious while we picked up Joan-east and Rita. We managed to fit everybody's stuff, plus the groceries, in the trunk. I think that's a first for this expedition.

The predicted rain didn't really start until we were well on our way north. The further north we got, the heavier the rain got. I was glad I wasn't doing the driving, especially in the Land Yacht.

The preferred rainy day activity in Conway is "shop 'til you drop", usually at the outlet malls. The whole notion of people coming from all over to shop for things they could buy closer to home mystifies me. I'm sure there's a Dansk outlet and a Jockey outlet and whatever outlet in every state whose license plates we passed on Rt. 16. This time we skipped the outlet malls, thank goodness.

The shops in downtown Conway can be fun. The old 5 and 10 has the sorts of things you used to be able to buy in a real 5 and 10. Zeb's general store has products made in New England - today I noticed they have the pasta sauces from Rue de L'Espoir in Providence. The rock shop is fun too, although it's so dusty musty that I can't stay in there as long as I'd like. I bought some fossil ammonites for the kids.

While the rest of the gang was looking at lace, I wandered off to a small bookstore that claimed to have new and used books. Coltrane was playing on the sound system and the poetry selection was really good. The used book selection wasn't all that interesting - nothing for my collection of everything ever written about the Merrimack River or my collection of books on sewage treatment, which I don't actually have any of, so it's more of a concept than a collection. I sat down and browsed a book of Amy Clampit poems, which I ended up buying. For a non-shopper I ended up with more booty than the shoppers: two fossil ammonites, one poetry book, and two postcards.

Our custom for this annual outing is to rent a "girl" video, a "chick flick", something that they can't watch at home with their husbands. We picked Message in a Bottle, which is very romantic and a real tear-jerker. There are enough scenes of rolling, tossing waves to make you seasick just watching it though. Everybody figured they'd dream about water tonight. Paul Newman and Kevin Costner are very believable as father and son. The Outer Banks look fabulous in this movie. It made me want to go there, but not in a boat - at least not unless I paid close attention to the weather channel.

I stayed up reading Danube, which Rita now wants to read when I'm done 'cause she grew up in Croatia near the Danube. I had the living room all to myself so wasn't disturbing anybody with my book light. I'm glad I brought my flannel pajamas because it's really cold up here. There's snow on Mt. Washington and there's already skiing at Wildcat.