Glen Arbor Sun

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November 01, 2002

Ghost Supper

By Grace Dickinson Johnson
Sun contributor

It was a good day for the Ghost Supper in Peshawbestown, Leelanau County. The early evening clouds were leaden and hung low in the sky. The late fall air was crisp and very still. Indian people in this land of the Ottawa and Chippewa were remembering their dead today. The Ghost Supper—Feast of the Dead by tradition falls on All Soul’s Day, usually on the second of November.

I sat by my Indian friend Archie Miller as we made our way up the road through Peshawbestown in his old Chevy sedan. There were campfires glowing red, with smoke curling up through the pine trees around some of the small houses. I thought about what Archie had once told me, that Indians were never lonesome when they were near their fires.

We reached the other end of the village and turned into a dirt road and parked in front of a clapboard house. A young Indian was splitting wood while a few others were gathered around the fire. The woodpile was neatly stacked nearby for winter use. As darkness fell, the beauty of the earth was all around. Many of the plants had pulled in their summer finery and were wearing the starkness of single leafless stems. The damp air was filled with the sweet fragrance of pine pitch. Chickadees, up in the branches of the hardwoods and pines, cheerily sang out their welcome.

Archie explained that it is the custom of this day to enter through the door without knocking. We moved silently into a dimly lit kitchen. The rich aroma of cooking and wood smoke permeated the air. A fire crackled and blazed in a potbellied stove at one end of the kitchen, radiating a comfortable heat. There was a lived-in feeling, with stalks of sweetgrass tied together, black ash baskets of various sizes, and bundled dried plants for medicinal use hanging about, and a cedar bough stuck up by a window: it all represented a culture that has been here for a long time.

The hostess was strikingly attractive, tall, and slender. Her straight black hair hung loosely over her dark print dress. She wore an apron and quietly moved about in her handmade beaded moccasins, worn especially for this day. The table was neatly set and included a birch-bark container of napkins and the ever-present jar of bacon fat called “midah.”

More people entered the room and we all gathered around the table. A prayer of thanksgiving was offered by an Indian elder; some of the words in the native tongue. Another Indian of the Catholic religion offered a prayer, and a few of the Indians made the Sign of the Cross. I thought about the religious conflict brought about when the missionaries came to teach their religion to our first people, who were already profoundly religious with a highly developed sense of the sacred.

It was time for the sharing of food. venison, turkey and dressing, wild rice casseroles, Indian corn relish, fry bread, potatoes, squash, and corn soup—all reflective of native food and cooking. A pretty teenaged girl stood quietly in the shadows of the kitchen. She appeared in her apron, served corn soup, and kept platters filled. I liked her immediately even though we shared few words. Archie sat next to me and spoke quietly of his grandparents and talked about old ways. Across from us sat an elder over ninety years old. She had snow-white hair and sat very straight. Her eyes held a squint as she was slowly going blind. I saw a glow in her eyes, and as she ate her corn soup I wondered to myself if she was thinking of earlier days when corn soup was prepared in a cast iron pot over an open fire.

I had an overwhelming feeling of reverence while sitting among these soft-spoken, kind, and primal people with their sense of being together, of being Indian, sharing food, and carrying on an important tradition.

By tradition, when the last person finishes dinner and leaves the table, the hosts and hostesses leave the dishes of remaining food on the table and reset the table for the departed spirits that might pass by in the night.

Following dinner, Archie and I stood together out on the back porch facing Grand Traverse Bay. A gentle breeze had come up and moved slowly through the trees as if mentioning a quiet message speaking of the departed ones. The remaining dried red leaves fell steadily from the hardwoods. I could hear tiny scraping noises as the leaves touched branches as they journeyed towards the damp earth. The last of the leaves were leaving the trees, fulfilling their cycle for the season.

Archie and I drove away from the clapboard home and headed for his house at the other end of Peshawbestown. As we passed by an occasional campfire and the wandering foot trails that paralleled M-22, I thought about the departed spirits and their early days when they used these fires for heat and cooking and moved about on foot over their trails. Their life must have been harsh, but tuned into the rhythms of nature and it’s sense of time, the completion of each cycle of seasons.

I valued this day for the sharing of a custom that I found beauty in, which is a special part of Indian life in northern Michigan. Archie is gone now, and this Ghost Supper of years ago lives on in my spirit, just as thoughts of my departed loved ones live on—my son Luke, my father Fred Dickinson, and my friend Archie and the old Indian stories he shared with me over his open fire.

Posted by editor at 11:50 PM | Comments (0)

Grape harvest promises rich vintage

By Ian Richardson
Sun contributor

Across the board in the Leelanau Peninsula the 2002 vintage looks like a great one, with all the wineries bringing in great fruit in large quantities. This year’s grape crop benefited from a long, warm growing season with rain falling right when the grapes needed it the most. While late spring frosts damaged several Leelanau fruit crops, grapes were unaffected. According to Chris Guest, winemaker for Raftshol vineyards and Willow Vineyards, the late spring caused a reduction in the number of warming days, the days needed to ripen grapes, but quickly caught up once summer kicked in with an abundance of high temperature days and little rain. I was recently able to spend an afternoon with Chris as he went from Raftshol vineyards to Willow vineyards.

At Raftshol Vineyards I spoke with Warren Raftshol, the owner of the winery, about the new vintage and his wines. I watched as Warren plunged the caps (the layer of crushed grape skins that impart color, flavor, and tannin to wine) on bins of merlot. According to Warren his 2002 merlot is inky black and they had a ton of fruit in all varieties this year, including his cabernet sauvignon (yes, it does grow in Michigan). The merlot and cabernet are fermenting in bins and destined to be bottled in his Claret, a Bordeaux blend and in his Raftshol Red. The merlot will also be bottled varietally. Although I think he should bottle his cabernet varietally, because no one else up here does it, he says he will use it only in his blends.

As compared to Raftshol’s 2001 vintage of chardonnay, the 2002 roughly tripled in case production. I tasted the 2000 Chardonnay, his next released vintage of chardonnay and found it had the same full-body as the 1999, and was slightly more complex. While Warren makes several white wines, when I think of Raftshol I think of reds and the 2002 vintage gives us all a reason to be excited because he is going to have a lot of them and they are going to be great. I will be giving reports as to how these 2002 wines progress.

Upon invitation by Chris Guest, I followed him to Willow Vineyard to watch him and owners John and Jo Crampton create some of their wine. I had never been to Willow before and all the hype I’d heard about their beautiful winery setting was well deserved. The massive stones that line the driveway and south sloping vineyards bathed in sunlight overlooking Lake Michigan are stunning.

While I visited with the Cramptons and Chris I was able to watch as they made a baci rose from pinot noir grapes. They produce a chardonnay, pinot noir, and pinot gris and the rose is a new wine for them. While at Willow I was able to taste several wines including their current release 2000 chardonnay and their 2001 chardonnay. The latter is an absolute stunner of a wine, full, rich, and oily with a slightly higher alcohol content than most Michigan wines, an expression of good things to come. I also tasted their pinot noir, which had bright, juicy fruit. Willow doesn’t filter any of their wines, which allows for more of the terroir to come through into the wine (you get a better sense of the soil these wines came from.

It’s a wonderful feeling watching how wine is made, to witness the excitement of the owners and winemakers as they nurture and create what we enjoy when we pop the cork on a bottle of wine. It’s a great feeling to be involved in an industry where so many down to earth and generous people abound. It is people like Warren, John and Jo, Chris Guest and many others that make Leelanau’s wine industry a great one. Congratulations to all the wineries on a great vintage. Cheers!

Posted by editor at 10:53 PM | Comments (0)

Empire Bluffs, A Great Fall Walk

By Jane Greiner
Sun nature correspondent

Last weekend on a gray and windy day a group of us walked the Empire Bluffs trail. We had all been up the bluffs before and we all looked forward to the view waiting for us at the top of the trail. A Park officer was checking vehicles in the parking area. We had our $15.00 annual park pass displayed on our dashboard so we escaped the dishonor of receiving fluttery pink slips on our windshield.

The skies were overcast and the wind was gusty as we donned hiking gear ranging from nothing extra to hats, gloves and backpacks. I carried a small pair of binoculars tucked into a pocket.

There were several roughly fashioned wooden walking staffs left thoughtfully against the trail map post for future hikers, and I selected a sturdy looking stick for myself. I would replace it at the same spot on our return for another hiker to borrow. I had seen this done in the Adirondacks and the idea is a good one. It encourages people to share walking staffs instead of everyone cutting a new one.

As we began our ascent we met an older man in a blue jogging suit with a white stripe down the leg coming down the trail. He was breathing well and was wearing a happy smile on his pink face. “A little windy up there,” he said, “but it’s worth it!” His obvious enjoyment confirmed our faith that even a blustery day is a good day for a walk up the bluff.

Our group walked the mile of hilly trail in a mood of expectation. Kevin commented on the poison ivy that lined the trail in one area. Watching kids running through it in the summer makes him cringe, he commented, “but it’s so pretty, all green and shiny,” he wouldn’t want to see it eradicated. I watched for the first glimpse of the big lake through the trees. Lyn commented on the deep ravine we passed and how she would like to draw it.

The first real view, the one at the bench looking toward the Sleeping Bear Dunes over Empire Village is enough to stir most first-timers to a flurry of picture taking. I know because I was one. Those who have been this way before know that it is only a taste of even better vistas to come.

Nearing the top we found the Park boardwalk had been extended further back along the bluff toward the trail to protect the path along the top of the dunes and handrails had been placed along much of it. Additional benches had also been added at the highest lookout point.

We stood and admired the view for a while, passing around the field glasses among us. There was a small ship down there traveling south between the Bluff and South Manitou Island. To the south the dark cloudy sky was pierced in places by shafts of sunlight and lightened in others with a gauzy blue haze. We marveled and pointed as we huddled in our coats, collars drawn up over our ears. The view is always everything you hoped it would be. We were so high we could see for a great distance both North and South along the shore. There was the Sleeping Bear Dune on one side and Frankfort far off down the other way.

The wind was whipping up waves and down along the shore you could see areas where the water was brown from churned up sand. After a few minutes we started down the trail back to the cars. The trip down is always faster than the trip up. Some of that speed is because it is mostly downhill (although there is a steep uphill section). But mostly the difference is in our perception. On the way up we are anxious to get to the top to see the view. On the way down, we savor the experience but no longer charge forward full of expectation and adventure.

The hike up Empire Bluffs is a wonderful event. It is short but invigorating. Ordinary people and children have no problem walking the 2 mile round trip trail which is tended by the Park and has step-like improvements in places for better footing and less erosion. It takes less than an hour to walk up, enjoy the view, and walk back down. But what an hour! Even on a gray autumn day, Empire Bluffs offers a refreshing experience with nature.

The trail head is off Wilco Road just south of the village of Empire.

Posted by editor at 09:55 PM | Comments (0)

The Lowly Stringer

By Linda Jo Scott
Sun staff writer

Consider the lowly stringer (or, as they now say, "correspondent"). We're the little guys who work in the rural trenches writing those small bits that glue a newspaper together.

Our work is minor, we realize. In fact, our superiors never even help us figure out what to write.

What's more, the "bureau chiefs" don't even seem to want to deal with us directly. We call in our story suggestions by phone and e-mail the stories themselves, so they sometimes don't even meet us till we've worked there for a few months -- or even years.

And we're out here in the little boroughs, working alone. We don't know each other and thus feel as though we're involved in a "divide and conquer" game. We're all afraid to do stories about other stringers' territories, a little like waitresses not daring to take other waitress's tables.

Being human, we would like to get a little recognition, a bit of glory. But they don't even put our names on our stories unless they are long ones, with pictures.

What's more, there's no job security in this business. We feel a bit like W.H. Auden, who said that each time he finished a poem, he became convinced that he would never be able to write another one.

Ever sit down with a map of Michigan and try to figure out how many small towns there are? How many struggling little stringers out there suffering alone in the hinterlands, just so you can read those little bits of news: who poured punch for the ladies' aid meeting in Maple City? Who read the treasurer's report, who moved to accept it, and who seconded the motion in a Benzie County meeting?

But you know, working as a stringer -- whoops, correspondent -- has been just about the most enjoyable job I've ever had. Over the past four years, I have had the privilege of interviewing and writing feature stories about

-- a 74 year-old lady who lost her memory at 54 and never got it back
-- a man who had polio as a child and turned to horse breeding and training when he couldn't compete in sports —- and won half a million dollars last year with one horse -- six sisters born and then separated in the 40s and 50s who finally met each other after many years of searching

-- a lady who sends notices of 50th anniversaries and special birthdays to the White House so that these people will get cards from the president, and never even tells the people that she did it

-- a man who built and lives in an authentic 19th century log cabin without electricity, and who entertains like a rich landowner in a Jane Austen novel.

--a lady who had a double lung transplant

I've made new friends at my small-town city halls and in the local businesses and post offices. I have people come up to me regularly at the grocery or pharmacy or the bank or at church to compliment me on various stories I've written or to ask me to write about their grandchildren's curious hobbies or their neighbors' trophies.

It's a whole new life for this people person, this incurable letter and e-mail writer, this retired English professor who doesn't want to lose brain cells any faster than she has to.

Yes, by all means consider the lowly stringer. Consider her lucky.

Posted by editor at 08:56 PM | Comments (0)

Milkman’s daughter

By Mary Sharry
Sun staff writer

Milk was our conspiracy. We would meet at the refrigerator for swigs right from the bottle, which he could do neatly. It was difficult for a seven-year-old. The milk dribbled down my chin or ran from the corners of my mouth.

My father had a milk delivery route. In his blue striped overalls and dairyman’s cap he could carry six one-quart milk bottles at one time, three in each hand. He would make his way from truck to doorstep and back carrying full bottles and returning with the empties. None of my friends’ fathers could perform such a feat. Dressed in gabardine suits they rode the bus downtown to their jobs as office clerks or bookkeepers.

My parents had no compunction about letting me stay home from school to ride his milk route with him. He would overturn a milk carton thereby making a little seat for me on the floor beside where he stood. From my vantage point on the floor I saw nothing but trees and utility wires as we geared through the city streets.

My father drove his truck while standing. If there was a seat for him in the truck, I don’t remember it. The truck smelled of milk and axle grease. The gear shift, a black rod with a knob on the end, came out of the floor and rattled and vibrated, or stuck. The truck would lurch. The wooden milk cases rattled.

There were two things I liked best about the milk route. One was the wealthy neighborhood where the giant elms lining the streets towered over stately mansions. At one such home the owner delighted in having me come into his kitchen while my father put the man’s dairy order—cottage cheese, butter, and milk—directly into the refrigerator. The kitchen was tiled in a pale shade of green, and on one counter there was a malted milk machine. My weakness! Malted milk. I could drink one down in about two minutes, and didn’t mind the consequence of an ice cream headache every time.

The other part of the route that delighted me, but always got my father in trouble with my mother, happened after our return to the dairy. He’d unload his truck. The empty bottles were carted to the conveyer system for washing. Inside the building the air smelled warm and sweet. The floor had been hosed down with a spray of steamy water. We splashed our way to the dairy bar at the front of the bottling plant. There we were served the best cheeseburgers and malted milks. Well, after a day of riding and bouncing in the truck, my appetite was enormous. My father could down two cheeseburgers and drink a malt and then go home to our more humble dinner of, say, cream chipped beef on mashed potatoes, or baked beans and brown bread. I would pick my way around the beans, flattening them with a spoon or use my fork to draw pictures in my potatoes. My mother would glare at my father. “You let her drink a malt before supper, didn’t you?” He’d grin and explain how healthy those malts were.

His milk route brought him down our street, and sometimes he would stop in front of our house to run in to use the bathroom. The thing was, our street was also served by another dairy, one that still used a horse to pull the milk wagon. The driver of this wagon was an old man named Orville. His timing was such that he would have passed through our neighborhood before my father came along. Orville would halt his horse and wagon right alongside our curb to make a delivery to the other side of the street. The animal usually chose that time and location to deposit his horses d’oeuvres, as my mother would say.

My father would drive up shortly after Orville had gone. There was the pile of manure. Even if I were playing out in our backyard I could hear him holler, “Stinks to high heaven,” and “Orville,” followed by “damned horse.” My father had bounded from his truck unmindful of the droppings. If he caught up with Orville and complained, Orville would snap right back and tell my father where he should park his truck.

Aside from the grace it took of him to enliven his work shoes, my father was truly athletic. He could make a delivery on the run from truck to porch and back again while his truck, in gear, rolled down the street. To my knowledge he neither missed a doorstep nor failed to catch up with the truck. I never saw a broken milk bottle.

Today, thanks to a certain dairy, I can again pour milk from a bottle. I savor the taste, and though the little cardboard cover has been replaced by a foil cap, the experience is rewarding. I still have not mastered the art of the swig. My milk moustache attests to that.

Posted by editor at 07:59 PM | Comments (0)

White Gull comes home to roost, and TnT under new management!

By Norm Wheeler
Sun editor

Dottie and Bill Thompson are starting a new chapter – again. Cousin Gene and his wife Joan Thompson have taken over TnT Video, the video rental shop, and the White Gull Inn is closing. No more B&B for B&D. However, “Grandpa’s Place,” (as Bill calls it), the small house behind TnT, will be a year round rental. Why the change? “My big mouth!” says Bill. “When we came up here to run the Dairy Bar, I said we’d quit after ten years. Dottie remembered!!” The Thompson’s ran the Dairy Bar as a 50’s style burgers, fries, and ice cream parlor with an Elvis motif for several years before taking over both the White Gull Inn and TnT Video.

“So this will be our first summer vacation,” says an elated Dottie.

“We’ll have lots more time for doing fun stuff with our kids and grandkids,” adds Bill.

“We’ll be able to see what the beach looks like from May to September,” Dottie grins.

So two always cheerful folks just got happier.

But, TnT still means Thompson and Thompson! On September 1, Gene and Joan Thompson, recently of Bakersfield, California, took over the video rental shop. Gene was the distributor of the Bakersfield Californian newspaper. “With a population of 250,000, it’s hard to believe there was only one local paper,” Gene says. Joan worked as a food demonstrator at Costco, “like Sam’s Club” she says. These two Thompsons came to Glen Arbor to be with mother Pat Littleford and closer to Bill and Dottie. “We grew up in Downers Grove and went to school with them both,” Joan explains. (“Gene is just a little bit older than Bill, who has a birthday coming up Dec. 6. But don’t tell!”) Gene and Joan plan to keep things pretty much the same at the video store. We welcome them to the community. Winter hours will be: M-Th 1-9:30, F 1-10, Sat 11-10, Sun 11-9:30.

Posted by editor at 06:00 PM | Comments (0)

Fall and Changing Woman

By Jane Greiner
Sun nature correspondent

The Navaho Indians have an important god named Changing Woman, who some say was the daughter of the sky and the earth. As a non-native I had a hard time comprehending the importance of this god until I began to understand that she is named for the cycle of life.

In a book called “Talking to the Ground,” by Douglas Preston, several Navahos tell the story of how Changing Woman was named. She was found as a baby and grew and then died and disappeared and then came back again. She is called Changing Woman because she lives and dies and disappears and then comes back over and over again. She doesn’t just represent the cycle of life; she is the cycle of life.

Changing Woman reminds me of the way all things on earth are a part of an ever-changing cycle. From mountains to butterflies, all things follow the pattern of birth, life, death, and re-birth. The individual may disappear but that which it is a part of continues onward. Even mountains, for example, rise up, and then slowly wear down, only to be followed by new mountains rising up again somewhere else. Their cycles take millions of years but are never-ending. A flower grows, blooms, and then dies away, only to reappear the very next season. Not the same individual flower, but the same flowers come back over and over again.

Fall is upon us here in our little piece of Paradise. I respond to the seasons in the same way I imagine humans have since time began. I am both invigorated and saddened by the cool winds blowing lightly through the trees. I mourn the end of hot summer afternoons spent playing in the waves of Lake Michigan. I miss the flowers that bloomed in such profusion. It sometimes felt as if I was undeservedly blessed simply to witness such color and life. I miss the simple pleasure of wearing shorts and sandals, and the assurance of an endless supply of long warm days.

But the cooler fall air invigorates and inspires me to activity unthinkable in the heat of summer. I look around the house for odd jobs that need doing and I actually do them! I go outside with a saw and a wheelbarrow and trim trees, gather kindling, and stack firewood. I pull up the garden, leaving the plants on top to leach into the ground for next year’s tilling. I drain and roll up the hoses and find storage for them in the garage. A part of me rejoices looking forward to winter, the time of nesting-in, cozying up, and slowing down. I start planning winter woodworking and craft projects to keep me busy when it is too dark and too cold to spend much time outside in the long months of January, February and March.

Another part of me feels a sadness welling up inside for days and life gone by, lost now forever, never to be seen again. Thinking of Changing Woman I realize it is fitting and right, and I remind myself that, in the end, it is just the way it is. Fall is the part of the Changing Woman that is the going away. I am finally being forced to deal personally with death. My mother is slowly dying in a nursing home in Kalamazoo. I force myself to see her fading away as part of Changing Woman.

As part of the overall cycle, she is not alone; everyone will die someday. I too will follow my mother back to the earth one day, inevitably. But her passing seems imminent and as I contemplate it, the sadness clutches at my throat. When I can, I resolutely bring Changing Woman to mind and tell myself that we are all involved in this cycle; this living and dying and new life again. Whether good, or acceptable to me, or desirable, it is at least beautiful in its symmetry and absoluteness. To balance the inevitability of death, there is also the promise of new and continuing life. I draw consolation from that, and even at times, a sense of rightness and wellbeing.

Fall leads from summer to winter. In winter there is much dying back and clearing away and making room. And then spring will lead the way back out.

Posted by editor at 05:02 PM | Comments (0)