As I approached Ubly I saw a few swampy areas and adjoining fields that were wild, not turned into pastures or cornfields, and I got a sense of what the untouched land would be like, sort of a semi-prairie, I guess. Then I noticed the wind turbines. At first I saw maybe five off in the distance, but as I entered Ubly I realized there was a whole wind farm there, spreading out for miles. I was starting to be enchanted by this place. It was not quite as flat anymore, sort of low, rolling hills here and there. The roads and properties were all still in square grids, but I began to understand why people would live here. The ancient wind, and the people who understand it; a Timelessness I could feel.
And they have a drag-racing strip! The people have to have something to do on a Saturday, and this is the ideal terrain. I got to the prem, opened up the box, and within a minute I had the trouble fixed. I went inside and had coffee with the customer, a nice lady, retired teacher. We talked about how bad Education is these days, and about how bad service is at my company--same stuff I hear back home. I asked her about the wind turbines, and she told me a route to take to get some good photos of them, which would also take me by some Native American petroglyphs I had seen signs for. The park was closed, snowed in, so I missed the petroglyphs, but I did see a couple of Amish men driving horse carriages down the road. Here basically was a well-paid sight-seeing tour. I didn't even need the GPS to get back to the hotel, just meet up with Van Dyke and drive seventy five miles.
Sunday I hit another fairly rural town called Croswell, well North of Port Huron. The people were not home. I learned from my contact person that they were at Church. They had statuettes of Jesus and Mary in the yard, also twin black-faced lawn jockeys. A place of stark contrasts. Next I went to nearby Lexington, which took me to the shore of Lake Huron. Amazingly vast. I had seen Lake Ontario years ago during the summer, but to see giant Huron iced over was thrilling. This lake was not placid like iced-covered Lake St. Clair. Even with the cover I could sense the peril of Huron, a fresh water ocean. The frozen dunes around the lake were a wind-blown composite of snow and fine beach sand like you'd see on a sea coast. Another day of easy work, sightseeing, and getting paid good money honestly.
I hope this weekend I get sent to the outer limits again. Back in the usual coverage area during this past week it's just a lot of commercial hustle-bustle and fairly ugly residential areas. Every chain store you can imagine is here, over and over. I have never seen so many Wal-Marts in my life! Two miles South of my hotel on VanDyke there is a Wal-Mart, and a half a mile North is another one. Two Wal-Marts within three miles of each other, on the same road! What is refreshing is that while there are Dunkin Donuts here and there, they are not so numerous, not like in Connecticut where you literally cannot spit without hitting one. Really the only interesting place I saw this past week was a humongous Catholic cemetery. I've never seen anything like this in my life. In Connecticut I've seen cemeteries that may have a little office in the maintenance shed, with a phone/fax machine or a DSL hook-up, but this place actually had a big professional office building with executives and clerical staff and a receptionist. A staff person got in a pickup truck and had me follow him to my job location, about a half mile past countless headstones still covered with Christmas Grave wreaths and snow to the Crypt, It was a large building of polished marble and great bronze statues of the usual cast of characters housing the cremated remains of thousands of people in marble and brass drawers. I was there to repair the emergency telephone line-- for the elevator to the second floor!
Today my goal is to make it to Bad Axe, fingers crossed.
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