May 31st, 2015
Redolencia Coffee, Ludington
Late morning coffee and a journal rest upon a table in a coffeehouse and hour north of home. A few ideas need coaxing into language. What I like about this coffeehouse: the young man who created this space lived in the fish hatchery house in Northville Michigan, a Victorian house on my runs and bike rides.
Shagway Arts Barn, Ludington
I arrived at the Shagway Arts Barn after fumbling through the woods, dunes and lakes north of Ludington. I heard about the arts barn a few weeks ago, thanks to Facebook. As I like arts and as I adore barns, I put the barn on my list for exploration this weekend. I had thought a road from downtown Ludington would take me here, but not so. So I ended up turning around in Ludington State Park.
I also turned around at Barney Road right by a double decker outhouse, unsure if it was functional. The top outhouse labeled politicians, the bottom outhouse was labeled voters. This structure stood at the start of a Harley driving family's long driveway into the woods, as the Harley Davidson signs seemed to indicate.
I turned around because Barney Road dog legged towards Lake Michigan as there was no way to cross the estuary of a stream that opened wide at the juncture with the big lake. So preferred it or not, I had to drive all the way east to Jebavy Road and along it north to Shagway Road. I was rewarded by the spectacle of a field of alfalfa, bright with sun and patrolled by six hawks flying spirals above its updrafts.
Shagway is one of a few roads south of the east west portion of Hamlin Lake, and this old renovated barn might predate the damming of the river, leading to Hamlin Lake's creation. I'm sure there's a grove of shag bark hickories near here as the road predates the Austin Powers movies. North of Hamlin Lake stands a land of woods and dunes that reaches up to Manistee, the only land declared a wilderness in the lower peninsula of Michigan.
A man and woman call themselves the Whiskey Charmers, first in a long line up of summer musical acts booked to appear at the Shagway Arts Barn. When I walked up, crossing a green sward of yard, the young woman was studying a spider that had descended on a long strand of silk before her eyes, as cute as the spider from Charlotte's Web. And then the spider excused itself and vanished.
What word would a spider weave into a web for a woman traveling America with a man and a guitar and a banjo? Strum me? A guitar strung and tuned and a web have similarities.
The Whiskey Charmers have their music on Spotify; Pandora has rejected them. Pandora has gathered a reputation for some behavior that might tarnish its reputation. I am betting the two are in between bigger shows as the music is lovely, a handsome voiced woman singing, playing guitar, accompanied by a man on a steel guitar.
I found a sturdy old chair up in the loft, the loft dedicated to a maker of tee shirt quilts. The quilt-maker had carried up a vanity and a work table. A door once used for laying up hay bales into the loft has been outfitted with a deck. The door flung wide open, the sunlight brightened the quarter-sawn floorboards of the newly refitted loft. That oak had to be aged oak recovered from old beams.
This is hardly my first rodeo with a West Michigan art barn. Last early summer, I attend a trombone concert at an art barn on Lamos Road south of White Lake. The owner had served as an officer in the Navy and he kept his barn ship-shape for its sailing journey over a grassy field onward to the future.
He had installed a complete kitchen under the loft and he insisted on topping off my wine glass with Chardonnay three times, glass beading sweat. He seemed a touch hurt when I asked for a tip cup. And all who had arrived settled into Adirondack chairs, cedar boards, and witnessed a long concert by a trombone choir.
The trombonists, all graduate students from Michigan universities had gathered at the barn for a trombone conference. That kind of musical singularity happens somewhat frequently in the White River Valley, with Blue Lake Fine Arts close-by.
The retired navy man introduced the concert program, telling about dawn that morning on his sandy land of fields and white pine forest. He was awakened not by the crowing of his roosters but the call of trombone answering trombone in bronze tempered calls. The musicians had stationed themselves around the grounds like so many Sandhill Cranes on the lawns, beginning the day with scales and études. Again, hardly a shocker if one understands the White River Valley.
The concert at Shagbark over, I walked back to my car parked on the edge of the freshly mown sward, freshly mown grass edged with white pines and tall Timothy grass. Looking over my dash, I saw a pair a brown ears, and thought, "Rabbit? Too short. Owl? In the stands of Timothy? The creature stirred itself and I saw white spots along the back of brown fur, a fawn bedded down for the day, awaiting a doe's return.
I knew stirring meant fear and I was determined to frighten this fawn no more. So I left my door open, avoiding a startling slam and slid my car into neutral, allowing gravity to back me up ten yards. Turning they key in the ignition, I turned under power and made my way to the exit, not slamming the door until I had reached Shagway Road. I hadn't seen a fawn in the grass since I had turned twelve years old.
Sacred Heart Church, Ludington
I copied these messages from each side of a weathered wooden post: Pillar of Strength; Bless Our Homes; Have Mercy On Us; Protect All Who Come By This Way. 3816 Fountain Boulevard, on the road to Fountain, Michigan, might or might not be for sale although there's a real estate sign in front of the sanctuary. Many listing services declare the property withdrawn.
Sanctuary built in 1901, the roof on the convent, the church and the community hall are each three years old. The water arises from a well, also maintained and re-pointed in anticipation of sale. Buyer must subject themselves to intense scrutiny deeper than a credit check to buy this two acre plot of consecrated land, the grounds of Sacred Heart Church.
The grass is high as it's been at least a week from the last cutting. Devil's Paintbrush, a Michigan native wildflower, and wild strawberries in blossom infest the lawn. The early evening sunshine shines through the church's stained glass from west to east, making the old, colorful glass glow from within the padlocked sanctuary.
I came this way, pillar of strength. I came this way.
Note: The property now serves as the home of Church of Christ, Ludington
The Pillar of Strength posted on the grounds of Sacred Heart Church in 2015
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