The Old House on Portage Lake Road

     More Letters From Paradise
 The Old House on Portage Lake Road

The events I relate here cannot be confirmed by any camera, as they only exist in my memory.

Portage Lake Road slowly uncoils and  lazily makes its way to end at Portage Point Inn. The narrow two-lane road passes three very large summer homes facing the lake. The first one is red painted and a man is trying to mow down the tall grass. The neighboring house is painted white, while the third house is painted gray.These are the homes of "summer people," my grandmother said. Making a clear distinction between them and the loyal local residents.

The road continues twisting and turning until on the left are clusters of cabins and a sign reading "Little Eden," a Brethern Church camp. Next to the road is a water fountain surrounded by large stones set in cement. The fountain is an  artesian well and as such, never ceases to flow. Cars often stop so their passengers can take a drink.

Directly across the road is the old house.
The driveway is simply two sandy tracks  between tall grass. And when the ignition of the car is turned off, I hear the deep throated sound of gushing water. It is coming from a rusty right-angled pipe with its green algae tongue moving in the water. On a broken branch hangs a glass. Water has been coming from this pipe for years and is probably from the same aquifer as the fountain across the road. And the scene is framed by an over hanging branch from the nearby crab apple tree.

I see grandpa and grandma coming down the hill to greet us. Grandma is  wearing a print dress covered with an apron. She is small,with a hump back, and  her dark hair is in a net, and is wearing wire-rimed glasses. Grandpa Joe is her third husband. Grandpa Joe is from Canada,and a millwright by trade. He used to cook on a lumber schooner, hauling lumber to Chicago.  He is a short, stout man wearing bib overalls and a battered gray felt hat. He too wears wire-rimmed glasses. He has a glass eye, having lost a eye in an accident. His face is covered with white whiskers.
Looking up the hill in the distance is a small building called an apple house. And behind the main house is a long low red building where the outhouse is located. The main house is sided with imitation  yellow brick siding. Climbing the hill to the house I come to the single door and find a section cut from an inner tube nailed to the door,   which covers a pad of paper and a string with a pencil attached.

Inside is a room with a cement floor and bare 2x4's outlying a bathroom when finished. Passing into the kitchen I see a round table under the kitchen windows surrounded by tall flat-backed dining room chairs which grandma had painted bright blue. Another unusual feature was a large mangle against one wall. This is a rotary ironing machine used to iron bed sheets and other cloth. Grandma was a good cook and once cooked at the Portage Point Inn. One thing she did which I always liked was that she would  spread  white frosting on the top crust of pies she had baked.

The large living room contained an oil stove, and in one corner a strange-looking  chair as the focal point of the room. Dark, lathed-turned arms and legs. Uncomfortable to sit in. And directly above a couch, a large 1920's era picture of Cleopatra on a barge.

Off the living room and behind the oil stove is the bed room. Twin beds with two mattresses on grandma's bed with a feather bed on top.  

Leaving the house I see on my right thick patches of sumach and poison ivy. A path between the tall grass leads to the garage and grandpa's wood shop. Next to the path on the right are old neglected apple trees. Three  of the antique varieties are "Grimes Golden,""Wolf River," and "Northern Spy."

Before sliding the door open to the shop, I want first to go over to the apple house.The building has a concrete basement and a room above that is filled with furniture,stacks of fine china dishes, and oil paintings in frames. All these things were received by Grandpa in lieu of cash payment when he was building a cottage for some wealthy clients from Chicago, and the stock market crashed.  Grandpa had built several cottages along the shore of Lake Michigan.

Inside grandpa's shop there were saws and other equipment, and a large number of wood planes. On his lathe grandpa turned bowls and lamps.

Outside again, an abandoned green house attached to the garage wall. And across the driveway a small log shed which once was the home for Patsy, a milk cow. Not far from the log shed is a small log dam spanning a stream. It was here that I caught my first native trout. The flesh of this trout is pink, not white as is seen in planted trout.

Next,I turn and enter a small stand of Poplar and White Birch trees. There is absolutely no sound to be heard. Total silence. The rich small of the poplar trees. I am reminded of the poem "Cool Tombs," by Carl Sandburg. One line of verse reads:" Pocohantas, lovely as a poplar..." Looking across a small field of red raspberries and black berries I see a large log cabin sitting on a rise of ground.
Crossing the field of berries I reach to log cabin, with its empty eyes staring across the tops of the trees to the lake beyond. The large logs are smooth and gray from years of weather. There is no cement between the logs either. I enter the single door and see the start of a stone fireplace, with only three courses cemented in place. The owners of the log house are absent, but their signatures are written in the sand floor. A raccoon and a fox surely, but never a bear.

Sometimes when sleep  fails me I retreat to the small house with its imitation siding, and the many out buildings. The large abandoned log house in particular. Recalling this time in my life, always brings me peace.

        Aloha
        Grant