saving kerosene

I was sitting on the porch reading Blue Highways, William Least Heat Moon's trip across America on the country's backroads. I was in the middle of accompanying William to a three-calendar diner in South Carolina when I heard a voice directed at me.

I looked up. This was yesterday. I was on one of the side porches of the Robbins Hunter Museum in my little town in Ohio. It used to be a house — well, I guess it still is a house — before it was turned into a museum of local history. I think that's what it's for, anyway. In 20 years of calling this town home I have never actually been inside, choosing to venture no father than the shaded porch, perfect for reading on at lunchtime. The grooves on the tall, white columns fit perfectly to the contours of my spine and shoulder blades, which tend to poke out too far from underneath my skin.

The old man was walking into the library, the entrance to which was only a dozen yards or so from my perch. "Was that book so good you couldn't wait to get home?" he cawed at me. People often seem to feel the urge to say something to me whenever I'm sitting here, like it's odd that I should choose this porch, of all places, to have my snack, read, and stay a while. Maybe it is odd. I've never seen anyone else doing it. They must not have heard about the perfect shoulder grooves. 

I laughed, smiled, and waved obligingly at the old man, who tottered through the doors, still chuckling to himself. I turned back to my book and hit the road again. 

Twenty minutes later I went into the building. I craved the air conditioning. As I was sitting at the tables in front, flipping through a magazine, the old man came up to me again. He stood extremely close; I could see flecks of color in his irises. 

"I talked to you because you reminded me of my home," he said to me, staring intently. "I know you don't want to hear the rattlings of an old man, but let me just tell you real quick. I'm from Kentucky. Back then, when I was young, we didn't have anything like today. No television, no radio. Nothing like that. All we had to do was read! And I had the worst teacher in the world: my mother. But every year, just at the beginning of summer, the traveling book cart would come through — today, we'd call it a Bookmobile — and my mother would check out everything. And I read it all! History, stories, poetry. We had to use kerosene lamps, since there was no electricity, and sometimes to save kerosene I would build a fire and sit with my back to it so the light would fall on the page. And I would read until midnight. Anyway, I'll leave you be."

And he wandered on off to the bookshelf. He was still perusing when I left to climb back up the hill to work. I'm glad he doesn't have to wait for once every year anymore.