Photo by Eduardo Barrios from Unsplash.
By Joshua Elie
In a way, everyone that grows up in a small town has the same story as a young person. This town is so boring! There’s nothing to do, nothing to see. Everybody knows everything about everybody … It’s just so boring. And then our ambition takes over. We can’t wait to graduate from high school, so we can run off to college, the big city, to explore and experience all the grand adventure and success life has to offer.
Anybody that knew me as a teenager will tell you about how I would spend 5-7 hours a night working on music and sleeping in school during the day … well, the sleeping in school part for sure. My grades were terrible, but I didn’t care. I was going to be a Rock Star someday. My dad insisted I go to West Shore Community College for a couple years after high school and, unfortunately, it was the same thing. I say unfortunately because even back then WSCC was a gateway to so many fantastic life options, as many of the credits could be transferred to major universities. They also had great programs teaching very desirable and lucrative skills to take into the workforce.
Due to some “youthful indiscretions,” I found myself on probation with no driver’s license. So, the big city was just going to have to wait a couple more years. But, when I turned 21, it was, “Look out, Detroit; here I come!” I packed up my guitars and speakers until I couldn’t see out the passenger’s side window. This was not a good idea for driving in Detroit for the first time, or ever, but I quickly learned what a “Michigan left” is.
My second day there I secured a house gig, performing music five nights a week at Charlie’s 2, the Budweiser bar at Merriman and Michigan Avenue. At the same time, my uncle put me to work doing basement waterproofing. It was everything I dreamed of, well, the start of it anyway. The lights, the music, the people everywhere, more than two radio stations to choose from … After two months, I knew I was going to have to give up either the music or the construction because I just couldn’t physically do both. Chuck, the owner of the Budweiser bar, made it easy to choose by bringing in the next new thing (at the time), Karaoke. I was OK with not performing because I was making more money than I knew what to do with in construction, and the work was really fun.
Before I knew it, I was listening to the country music channel (purposely) and thinking about fishing in the quiet stillness of the forest. I started going home on the weekends, and soon the city lights began to dim, the sunny days in the city seemed to turn a little gray, and even surrounded by so many people, I felt alone. I didn’t even know the names of my neighbors or anything that was going on in the area. Gas was more than $4 a gallon, and I was driving a ’71 Cadillac Seville. It took forever to get out of the city on a Friday evening because everyone else wanted to go “North,” too. Everything was just so expensive, and I kept bouncing back and forth between music and construction, with lots of money coming in, but going out just as fast.
Later, I found myself in Niles, Mich., really a suburb of South Bend. Living there was a little less expensive, and the work was beyond steady. I had so much that I stopped answering my phone. But who were these people? What was going on around me? I might have known the names of a couple of my neighbors but nothing about them, and for crying out loud, what does anybody do for fun? There was nothing of interest at all to me. No fishin’, no muddin’, no big bonfire parties. I can sum up everything that I was missing with one word, “community.”
This is what Freshwater Reporter is all about, and why I started writing for this small, local paper. I can share my memories, my thoughts about our area, and my love of baking and cooking in my stories, creating simple recipes that require just one more ingredient. You.
Joshua Elie is Freshwater Reporter’s “Northwoods Sauce Boss.” He is a musician and retired building contractor who now enjoys life as a homesteader.
Read more by Joshua Elie HERE
