MOONLIGHT IN VERMONT, Part 3

The drive from the Love Nest to the nearest Vermont Village was a quiet one.  Since Google maps hadn't furnished street views for this area, I had no idea what to expect, but a childhood of reading National Geographic magazines had convinced me that our Vermont Village would be a lovely spot with colonial homes lining the streets, a courthouse square shaded by two hundred-year-old hardwood trees, and at least one white clapboard Congregational Church complete with steeple.   

Since this is Part 3, I'm sure you've already guessed that our Vermont Village had never been photographed for National Geographic.   So, just for a moment, imagine the worst small town in western Kansas or Oklahoma that you've ever driven through, take away the grain silos and BINGO!  You've just visited our VV.  From the filling station on the south to the grocery/fishing store on the north, the Village was depressed and depressing.  We had plopped down sizable bucks,  flown 2000+ miles and driven eight hours only to find we'd arrived in the anteroom of hell. 

Fortunately, the grocery/fishing store was still open so we rather tentatively walked in.  It certainly could have been worse and we found, mixed in with the fishing bait, licenses and lures, hardware items, anti-freeze and snow shovels, a pretty decent selection of cleaning items and groceries.  We quickly gathered up every Scrubbing Solution we could fine--the stronger, the better--then milk, bread, orange juice and coffee. As we turned toward the final aisle, we were stunned by an inordinately extensive selection of wine and frozen pizza.  Maybe, just maybe, this would prove to be only purgatory.

It was a fleeting redemptive thought, however, before I remembered we had also included sheets, mattress pad, pillow cases, etc...on our shopping list.  This was not the store nor the Village for those items.  So, downhearted but determined, we soldiered back to the Love Nest with our purchases.  We carefully placed our few items in the refrig avoiding the worst of the mold and began to study the bedding situation.

Much to our surprise, we found sheets tucked away under other items in a storage closet, but imagination or experience made me question their cleanliness.  We balanced the choices...dirty floor?  Dirty bed?  Dirty floor?  Dirty bed?  We gingerly held the sheets by their edges, placed them on the bed, washed our hands, poured the wine, devoured our small horde of SW Airlines peanuts and Plane Crackers and settled in for a long night.