Research Part 2 - Another Craig, the Marines, Skinning Moose, and Eating Grasshoppers.

To cut to it, I met an older guy in a bar and we talked about Marines, streets of Detroit, and eating grasshoppers in Cambodia. Just another Thursday night.

I'd decided to find one last bar to sit and observe in - well, have a beer and eat wings really. So I went into a place called W___ Pub... who knows, I don't want to advertise here, besides there was stuff I am supposed to keep on the QT. And I don't mean that in a snide way.

So I'm sipping my local brew, in a place full of locals (always a bit of an odd feeling) - mostly 30somethings it seems, maybe a couple of seniors. The beer is damn fine, some sort of local spicy brew (I've been told there is coriander in it... go figure.) And in walks this guy, who saddles up to me, and the bartender asks is he wants a 7 and Water. It strikes me that this was my father's drink, though any rye would do. He is grizzled, missing a few front teeth, but looking sharp in his clothes and his dark blue baseball cap with stitching that reads Marines, and more that says "Recon" on the side. I figure the hat looks pretty new and this guy is pretty old (I find out later he is 69, though he could easily be ten years older than that.)

I didn't want to be the bothersome tourist (or worse yet, the writer tourist). So I gave him some space and drank my beer.

"You ever work for the Forestry Dept?"

That was his opener. Turns out I was a dead ringer for a friend who use to work in Forestry, and he hadn't seen him in years. I said nope, and then we drank some more. Eventually I asked him if he grew up in Manistique - partly to be friendly, but yeah, I came here to research and I wanted to know about the place. He'd been there since '72 - came from Dee-troit. His wife and kids, brought them along too. Pretty hairy times out there, he could tell me about (but I didn't think he was going to.) Kids moved on, one lives near by, one got killed (it happens, he told me), the wife had enough of him and let out a number of years back. He now owned the hotel up the street. I'd driven by, it was in pretty rough shape.

So I am sitting there taking this all in - realizing that I am being let into someone's life. I want to treat it with respect, my curiosity of course is on fire to learn more about him, and those hairy times - so it is a balancing act. He begins to tell me more stories. First about Manistique, and how it was booming when he got here in the 70's. Lots of jobs, fishery was happening, lumber - now all you could get was minimum wage, so half the town left.

He was a hunter and a fisher - deer, moose, salmon, and his favorite: perch. Some big mothers. He laughed and asked again if I was sure I didn't know him. I looked so familiar. (I think I have that sort of face.) I asked what kind of people were youpers (he was a self-professed one now that he left Dee-troit all those years ago.) 

Digression: I knew the term, travelling here before, the Upper Peninsula, the U.P., hence: youpies, or youpers.

He said they were just good people - 99.9 percent of them he trusted. Trusted them enough that if he handed over his gun to one of them right now (he made the motion), he would be okay with that. At that point, i realized my new friend was packing. And he told me this is a quiet town - not like Dee-troit.

I asked why there was a Sheriff, and State Police? And he corrected me, and local police too! Made it pretty quiet. What kind of crime is around here? Oh, just piddlly shit. Break and enter? Yeah, or ripping up someone's flower bed.

No organized crime then, I said.

Hah! No, I'd know about that. People would just start disappearing. Back in Dee-troit, hell they had that there. I got in some situations. Got shot a couple times, right in the wrist here. A helluva lot quieter here.

Somewhere in this conversation, he introduced himself as, Craig. I said, Craig. He thought I'd misheard and said again. I'd say, yeah, that's my name too. No shit, he said. I guess we won't forget each other's name then.

Also in the conversation, he had mentioned he was a Marine, and also did some time with the National Guard - he was a reservist in Manistique. And he had a great time with those guys. Sure, he had tasks, but when they weren't working... parteee! I admit, I grinned when he gave a broad toothless smile. And also want to say, the guy wasn't a drunk. He'd been nursing a tall 7 and water all through the conversation (while I'd finished my pint and was considering another.)

He had alluded to maybe being overseas, but he let it slip by real fast. I repeated, so you were a Marine from '65-'71? That was Vietnam. His eyes' lit up. Oh yeah, it was. So were you overseas? We landed in Vietnam, but no one knew we were there. We were observing the Ho Chi Ming trail - just observing. I was a radio man. Studying them, any structures, or movements, that sort of shit. But this is on the QT, no one knew we were there. No records of us being there.

Were you in a plane? A helicopter?

We came in on a helicopter, and repelled down ropes into the jungle. We were there for days, eating crickets and grasshoppers. You couldn't cook anything. Light a fire, no way. So still, I got no problems eating grasshoppers. With those guys in the National Guard, they'd find a grasshopper, and I'd say give it over. Pull off it's legs and pop it in - they all went, ewww, but no big deal for me.

At this point in the convo, well, let's just say I didn't have much to say.

We drifted away from the VietNam talk and he asked where I was from. I said Canada. Where? Winnipeg. No recollection in his eyes - out west somewhere then? He said he did a lot of hunting up in Canada. Moose. And then told me of shooting moose up by Sault St. Marie, and then bringing them back in his half-ton.

He went outside for a Marlboro, and I finished my beer and wings. He introduced me to the bartender as another Craig. I shook his hand and told him it was a real pleasure (it was). I went out into the dark Michigan night, and the other Craig finished his 7 and water, and most likely wandered down the street to his hotel. He said he had a bunch of real dummies staying there right now.

And that is some real research - or better, just talking and getting to know another human. Cheers, Craig.

Shown above: Manistique at sunset - lighthouse on Lake Michigan.