Wishing for Quiet Waters

Chapter 1

A Useta Town

Think small lakes. Rushing streams. Waterfalls deep in a forest. We have that. Fresh water everywhere you look. There’s a small lake not a quarter mile from my home. I used to take my girls there when they were small. It always brought smiles. Water does that, right? We love to sit near still waters.

But we also need to pay the bills. And in tiny Amberg, Wisconsin, that’s not easy. Not that it justified all that happened last year, but it might help explain why the town went to war – with itself. Over water. People actually took shots at each other. Over water.

Give me five minutes to explain my tiny town.

For starters, if you get into a conversation with any of the geezers here in town, it only takes two sentences before you get to useta. Things like We useta have the largest hotel north of Milwaukee. Or We useta have the largest granite cutting shed in the world. Give them half an hour, and they will give you a local history that is mostly accurate, all of it describing what useta be here.

All of that was before my time. But if you want the short version, the town has basically collapsed three times. The first time was the most dramatic. The town is surrounded by granite outcroppings and there was a time when people used granite in building. So a guy named Bill Amberg came to town, started a quarry west of town, and then built a cutting shed next to the tracks you can see across from my bar. Was it the biggest shed in the world? How would anyone know? Do you see people taking measurements of sheds? But it was big, and it and the quarry attracted hundreds of men in the early 1900s (yes, the town is that old). Moving the blocks required rail lines, so there was also a lot of railroad men in town, so I have no doubt about there being a large hotel for all of them. You also hear stories of monster brawls between the two groups, boys being boys. So that’s the town for a few years.

Then some guy invents a new way to build buildings, and granite is no longer important. OK, these things happen, but then the local boys make things worse. They go on strike. Who knows any more what they wanted – money, shorter hours, safer conditions? A hundred years later it hardly matters. Old Bill Amberg watches this go on for a few days and then says, OK, goodbye. He clears out his office, gets on a train, and goes off to start another business somewhere else. Some claim Canada, some claim California. Who cares?

A month goes by, and people realize he ain’t coming back, and the business is really closed. Most people just move away (folks from here are good at that), but a few folks decide they have a plan to make the world great again. They hold a vote to rename the town from Pike to Amberg. Surely with a town named after him, Bill will come back and all will be good. Nope. Never heard from the guy again. You would think they would eventually get around to changing the name back to Pike, but they don’t. Don’t ask me why. Eventually the hotel and cutting shed burn down. The quarry is still west of town if you want to see it. Just a hole filled with water now.

The second collapse comes about twenty years later. There were massive pine forests here, but eventually it was all cut. So now what? Why not sell the land to farmers? They say the sales pitch began with If it will grow trees, it will grow corn. It didn’t. But people tried. Lots of farmers moved up here, spent their lives blowing up stumps and planting crops only to find that the land was poor, and the growing season short. They were barely hanging on when 1930 rolled along with the Great Depression. That ended farming.

The third collapse is going on now. Paper mills were built in Green Bay and Appleton, and it turns out the jack pines and poplars planted on that old farmland work pretty well for creating paper pulp. So the local boys would turn sixteen or eighteen, buy a chain saw, and cut pulpwood for a living. It’s not an easy living. I went out with my first husband a few times to help trim the wood he cut. If you go in the summer, the mosquitoes are grateful for the feast, and if you go out in the winter, you spend all day tripping over stumps and roots you can’t see under the snow.

But people used to make a living at it. A few still do, but many of the paper mills are closing. Who needs them? We have e-everything now. All the newspapers up here have closed, as has the local post office. Who uses paper when you can use electrons? There are still men out in the woods cutting pulp wood, but probably half as many as there were just ten years ago.

So there you have it – a useta town. We are down to maybe a hundred people in a dozen or so homes, a block-long Main Street -- and that is only occupied on one side. What’s left is this bar, a small restaurant that changes hands every year or two, a tiny grocery store that is mostly just open in the summer and during deer season, and a post office building they closed two years ago. Welcome to Amberg. It useta be more.

What do people do now? Some men still work in the woods. Women mostly work retail or restaurant jobs in Wausaukee. Old people collect social security and visit their doctors. The young go off to college or join the army. And the young never come back.

None of this excuses the nastiness that happened last year. It wasn’t right. But in a useta town, sometimes people useta have better sense.

What about me? I useta be pretty dumb. I don’t claim to be brilliant now, but I think I am at least less dumb. When was I my dumbest? When my hormones went into overdrive. In other words – high school. Tiny. We started dating when I was fifteen and he was seventeen. He had just made varsity on the football team – lineman, hence the joke about him being tiny. We both had a bad case of high school hormones, and I was pregnant before the end of my sophomore year. Tiffany came just after my sixteenth birthday. Tiny was still seventeen.

My mother insisted we get married. You can guess how long that lasted. Tiny worked the woods for a few months after high school and then joined the Army. A couple months after he got to Germany, he found his true love. He never told me her name. I think of her as Brunhilda and imagine her as six one and two hundred pounds. Not that it matters. It turns out the Army is pretty good about managing such marriages. They made sure all the paperwork was done right and guaranteed I would get money every month for Tiffany. So that’s that for Tiny.

Husband number one almost directly caused husband number two. The Army made sure I got child support. It had to be direct deposited into a bank account. I’m barely seventeen, never had a job, never had a bank account, never dealt with any of that. Now I have to learn about such stuff. I needed three trips to the bank to have all the ID they wanted. Who knew you needed a social security card? Anyway, I’m running all around, Tiffany on my hip, learning to be an adult, when someone asks me if I have insurance. For the car? Yes, and for the trailer. Oops. I am pretty sure we have nothing on either. Turns out I am right. Now that I have determined to act like an adult, I decide to get insurance. Where do I go? Richard Larson Insurance Agency, Wausaukee.

Rick is all of twenty-two, just out of college, loans up to his eyeballs to buy the one agency he could afford in a place he vaguely remembered driving through once on vacation. He is young and lonely. I am young and none too bright. I get the insurance policies, he invites me out, we are an item for about three months, long enough to create Britney. He takes me down to Sheboygan to meet his family, the weekend ends up being maybe an hour before he drives me back to Amberg, me crying all the way.

Family objections notwithstanding, he decides to do the right thing. We get married. Britney is born, and Rick starts looking for a wife more suitable to his family, namely one who finished high school and is not living in a trailer with a drunken mother. He finds a teacher at Wausaukee High, and his life is all straightened out. I get another set of divorce papers to sign and a monthly child support check. Life moves on.

I understand at this point a number of women would be pretty angry. Basically, I have been a starter wife for two men who decided to trade up pretty fast after giving me a kid. And when I was eighteen, nineteen, and twenty you probably did not want to meet me when I was in one of my moods. But it turned out my mother was a much better grandmother than mother, so I had more help than I expected, and the girls… well the girls were marvels. Sweet, smart, helpful. Sure they had bad days, but there were so many good days when I look back on those times I can only smile.

They are both in Green Bay now. They went down for nursing school. Tiffany first, then Britney two years later. Lots of science classes but always As and Bs. Tiffany is already an RN working for a hospital down there. Britney will follow in another year. Two sweet, successful young women. I get down to see them about once a month, and we have a great time out shopping or trying a new restaurant. They may have started life in a trailer, but they will not end there.

Enough about me. Time to describe the bar. Lots of this story takes place in my bar. When the girls were small, I waitressed. After my mother died, I started bartending at the Amberg Bar – still minimum wage, but no more five a.m. shifts. I was around to get the girls breakfast and put them on the bus. Bars up here close at nine or ten, so I was home to check their homework and kiss them goodnight.

The Amberg Bar was the last surviving business on town, and it was barely going. Afternoons I would clean the place, call the distributor in Peshtigo with my weekly orders, and pour exactly two glasses of wine for the Kaminski Twins, two really old ladies who would sit at the one table in the bar, play cribbage, and slowly sip their wine while ignoring me. Fine. That left me free to clean and restock. Around three the men would start coming in. Loggers, mostly. Winter they would be in early – it gets dark here around four, and it’s cold as hell. They’d want one-dollar draft beers, and bad pizza. We’d talk, watch whatever game was on TV, and the evenings would pass.

It’s really no more complicated than that. The pay sucked and the tips were laughable, but Clark (the owner) left me alone to run the place, and when your education stops at sixteen, it’s not like Wall Street is calling. The bar was warm, I had known some of these guys since grade school, evenings went by faster than you might think.

So, got the basics? Tiny town in the northeast corner of Wisconsin. Only business left – my bar. Me – twice divorced mother of two grown (and successful) daughters. I pour beer five nights a week and visit my daughters on my day off. Not exactly the fast lane, but I’ve got no complaints.

Chapter 2

I Get a Second Job – and Meet a Man

But then there was an event that ultimately turned my life around. Some guy bought the abandoned fishing lodge on Town Corner Lake. The new owner had a history of success as a fishing guide to the rich and famous, and he was going to give this place a try. Why he would be more successful than past owners was unknown, but at least for a season or two a few more people would be passing through town, and maybe they would eat a burger at one place and have a beer at another. Who knew?

Anyway, in late June I got a phone call from Mrs. Swanson. She and her husband were former cooks at a local super club and were now catering for people, although you have to wonder how often their skills were needed, given the small size of Amberg and the few major social events that happened around here. But it turned out they were now catering for the fishing lodge. She and the new owner of the lodge, a Mark Baker, had been talking about doing something special on Saturday nights, the final night of the weekly charters. She had recommended a nicer meal and a hostess. He asked if she had anyone in mind. She did, and that’s why I was getting this call.

We talked for over an hour about what I would do, what I should wear, and when I would do all this. She said I would be paid $200, which meant my answer was yes of course, but I did need to clear it with Clark. Clark agreed instantly, both because he thought Morgan would bring in more business on Saturday than me since she was a hottie (in other words ten years younger – and easy (yes, just like I was at that age)). And Clark was as curious as anyone else about how this new lodge owner was going to run his business. I would be his inside source.

So Saturday, a little after three I drove over to the Swanson residence. She would fill me in on details as we drove over to the lodge. Mr. Swanson was capable of speech, but it was an activity he generally left to Mrs. Swanson. First things first, trying to think of what a hostess wears, I had selected a floor-length red satin gown. It had half-sleeves, a looser skirt that would be good for walking around the room, and an off-the-shoulder neckline, which this evening would be not very off-the-shoulder. I had acquired the dress to impress husband number two (not that it made a damn bit of difference. He just stayed with me until our baby was born). But I digress. All that mattered at the moment was that Mrs. Swanson saw my dress and declared it perfect.

The plan, once we got to the fishing lodge, was simple. I was to go to the bar and make drinks for the men, then I would sit with them at dinner, and later I would make drinks again. After eight years of tending bar, this was all simple. And the fact that I would be doing it for just five men meant I would be doing far less this evening and getting paid far more than I would have back at the Amberg bar.

And that is pretty much how things went for the evening. We arrived at the lodge around five. I helped the Swansons carry things from their car into the kitchen, and then I went to see what shape the bar was in. Short summary? It was amazing. The lodge was built around a great room – a huge open space with leather furniture, a massive stone fireplace, a vaulted ceiling, and a wall of windows looking out over the lake. The furniture was high quality leather and very comfortable. And, since it was a fishing lodge, fish hung from all the walls. If it had fins and could be stuffed, it was on one wall or another. I thought it was silly, but it wasn’t my home – or my business.

There was a beautiful bar at one end of the room, and I checked to see if it had all the mixers and ice that would be needed, but I should have known Mr. Swanson would have taken care of that. He did bring out a new bottle of scotch while I stood there, but everything else was ready. So I took up my position near the bar, and waited for one of the men to come down from the rooms on the second floor. I had been told there were four customers, plus the owner. That level of business I could handle easily.

Finally, near six the first two men came down the open staircase at the other end of the room. I stood with my hands folded in front of me as they crossed the room. Hi, I’m Jessica was my opening line. I took their drink orders, asked their names – Dave and Bryan – and learned they were from Minnesota while I mixed their drinks – Scotch for one, a local beer for the other. This was going to be simple. I encouraged them to sit in the leather chairs while I got their drinks, I brought the drinks over, and we carried on a conversation like we were old friends. Craig arrived a little later, I introduced myself, brought him his drink, and we were rolling. When I wasn’t getting their drinks, I sat on the arm of a chair near them, and we just kept talking – their week of fishing, their lost lures and the ones that got away –basically the same conversation I would be having back in the Amberg bar, but at a slower pace with less background noise.

Mark, the owner, came in next and sat with the others. He just wanted bottled water, so I got a glass, filled it with ice, and opened the bottle for him. He spent a little time adding to the introductions of the three customers, explaining which kind of fishing they had liked best, and there was some banter back and forth about who had landed – and who had lost – the biggest fish of the week. Basically they all had fun, and they enjoyed each other’s company. The fourth customer – Zachery – didn’t arrive until nearly seven, explaining he had trouble packing, at which time I was told by all that Zachery had been late for everything this week, one more thing to laugh about. In short, the people and the occasion were pleasant, I monitored their drinks and brought more when needed, and the time passed like lightening.

A little past seven I noticed Mrs. Swanson standing at the far edge of the room – my signal that dinner was ready. I deferred to Mark on this one. I just asked him directly – it appears dinner is ready, should we go in? He said we should, I offered to refill any drinks, and we all walked to the dining room. I was a little afraid of how many fish I would now find dangling from everywhere, but it wasn’t too bad. This room was oak paneled with massive beams across the ceiling. Lighting was a huge chandelier and wall sconces, none of which I had ever seen in a local store. One more feature? A huge musky hung on the far wall. When Mark sat down at the head of the table, it was essentially hanging just behind and above his head, so I saw it every time I looked at him. Maybe that was the point.

Since Mark becomes important in this story, maybe I should describe him. He was about five ten. I noticed in my heels, I was about the same height. He had a fairly square face, not bad looking, with dark hair now going gray. But there were two main features to the man. First, he had obviously spent many years in the sun. His skin was deeply – and I would guess permanently – tanned. It made it hard to be sure of his age. I would guess mid-forties, but he could be ten years either side of that. His other feature was his shoulders. Are fish really that heavy? He looked like he had spent a lifetime pulling whales from the depths. It was not a bad look, actually. His shoulders were covered in a pale-yellow polo shirt. All the men had gone with polos in various colors, two of them had also worn blue blazers for the occasion, and all of them had worn good pants – no jeans. As Mrs. Swanson had explained to me, they had felt they wanted something nicer on their final night, so they had showered, shaved, and put on the best clothing from the bottom of their suitcases.

Dinner went very well. The Swansons served a three-course meal – salad, then a nice steak with potatoes, then desert. Red wine was set in front of the men, white for me, food pairings be damned. As hostess I decided the pace of the meal. Mrs. Swanson watched from the hallway, standing behind my left shoulder. When I noticed that everyone was done, I lifted my left hand a few inches, and she and Mr. Swanson cleared and brought the next course.

Table conversation started around fish, but early on someone asked if I was from Amberg, and then it was endless questions about the place. I was most comfortable talking about the early days, so I told story after story about the quarry, the strike that had ended work there, Bill Amberg, and some of the characters that had lived in the town back when it was in its prime. I was a little concerned I was talking too much, so periodically I would pause and look to Mark. Did he want to jump in and talk more about fishing or something? No, he had questions about the old days too. So I pretty much talked nonstop for two hours, long after the desserts were gone and the brandy had been poured.

Finally I decided not to press my luck. I mentioned I had heard they normally had a drink in the library after dinner, and I offered to bring them anything they wanted. They walked across the hallway. I walked back to the bar and got a tray of drinks. For the next two hours I sat in the room with them and got drinks as needed, and added to the conversation while they sat around the table and played cards. When not fetching drinks, I sat with my back straight and my hands in my lap, feeling very good about my hostessing skills.

About midnight the card game broke up. The men walked back to their rooms, all of them first stopping to shake my hand and thank me for a great evening. Only when they were gone did it occur to me the Swansons had left hours earlier. Mark walked with me upstairs, apologized for not being clear on how long things might go. He had a spare room for me, and as we stood outside it, he told me I had done a perfect job. He hoped I might come down around seven, when we would join the men for breakfast and see them off. I agreed of course and went in to bed.

I set my phone alarm for six and got up feeling pretty good. I discovered that my room had a great shower, and I stayed in it longer than I might have, but if felt good. I had no change of clothes, but at least I felt fresh. I did what I could with my hair and my makeup and was downstairs just before seven. The Swansons were already in, and a large coffee pot was working on the sideboard of the great room. I stationed myself by it and prepared coffee as men came down. Rather than sit, they stood with me by the sideboard, and we talked more about the town and they thanked me for the stories I had told. By seven thirty all the men were down sipping coffee. I saw Mrs. Swanson standing in the hallway near the dining room, so I announced – this time without checking with Mark first – that breakfast was ready.

There’s not much to say about the next couple hours. Breakfast was sausage and eggs in a pie crust. The men finished the meal and then finished packing. They brought a large SUV up and filled it with fishing rods in long cylindrical cases, plus tackle boxes. Fortunately, being men, they hadn’t brought much clothing, so it all fit. They finished with pictures of them, and of them and Mark, and of them and me, there were handshakes and a couple hugs, and they were off.

The Swansons finished about the same time and offered to take me home, but Mark said he would take me home after we had talked. He also asked Mrs. Swanson to take a picture of me and him. Later, that was the picture that ended up on his website.

Once they were gone, he motioned me to a glider on the porch facing