I Don't Have a Happy Place (20 page)

“So, wouldn't you rather be unhappy with fresh air?”

We entered into a game I like to call
the malcontent's duel
, where he throws happy, glass-half-full scenarios at me and I block them with my half-empty glass. It was the only game I was good at.

“Let's put a pin in this conversation,” Buzz said. “But let's revisit it.”

“I think we should just take it off the table.”

“Why?”

“I can't move to Vermont, realistically.”

“And why not?”

“I'm not a farmer.”

“You think only farmers live in Vermont?”

I bit my thumb. “No.”

“So?”

“I don't look rural.”

“What does that even mean?”

“It means I don't look rural. I don't look like I belong in ­Vermont.”

“What do you look like?”

I shrugged and walked into the kitchen.

“You realize that this is not an argument, right?” Buzz said, following me. “Your not looking rural and not being a farmer. You understand those are not real points, right?”

“What if I don't make any friends there?”

“You make friends everywhere.”

“No, I don't.”

“Yes, you do.”

“No, I don't.”

“Oh my god, this is stupid,” Buzz said.

“Exactly,” I said, trying to break the orange netting on a bag of clementines. “This idea is stupid.”

“Not the idea!” said Buzz. “Your excuses for not wanting to go!”

“Oh, those are not stupid,” I said. “Those, my friend, are solid.”

“Right,” he said. “Your not looking rural is solid.”

Buzz was getting on my nerves. “What would we even do there, realistically?”

“We'll just live, man,” he said. “We'll figure it out.”

“
We'll just live, man
?” I said. “You're Matthew McConaughey now?”

Buzz is the guy who gets a restaurant menu days before he is slated to eat there just so he'll know what to order once he arrives.
Now
he wanted to just walk around living?

“Are you worried you won't be unhappy in Vermont?”

“Oh, please,” I said. “I can be unhappy anywhere.”

“Then what's the big deal?” he said. “It's not like the other places we've lived have worked so well for you. What's the difference if you're miserable here or there? At least there we'll have a view.”

I rooted around in the bag of clementines, trying to find the perfect one.

“Hello?” Buzz said.

“What if I have to go to the dentist?” I said.

“They don't have dentists in Vermont?”

“Not real ones.”

“Okay, this is now officially the dumbest conversation we've ever had,” Buzz said, pelting two clementines at the pantry door. “I'm going to bed.”

“Fine,” I said.

“You win.”

“Good.”

“We'll stay here because of the dentists,” Buzz said, storming up the stairs, leaving me to pick up the fallen fruit.

•   •   •

I sat in front of our flip-the-switch fireplace for hours that night, thinking about Vermont. We'd been visiting for years, way before
we were married or had kids, but I'd considered my relationship with it a superficial one, a fling. All I really knew about it was its fresh air and mountains and woodland creatures. It was a postcard, one I'd attach to the round mirror of my sit-down vanity and stare at longingly, if I'd had one of those set-ups or did that kind of staring.

I'd floated in its ponds and snowshoed on its trails and hiked up its mountains. I'd picked apples and sampled all varieties of syrup and filled up the basket I'd bought at Basketville (real name) with local kale and purple carrots and fingerling potatoes. My friends who lived there would clear their schedule when we arrived for the weekend, making us feel like we were the best and only friends on earth. I'd drive the back roads, taking in the white barns, and fall in love a little more each time, knowing deep down that every quick trip was a tryst with John Irving and Sam Shepard, who, in reality, would have no interest in me because I didn't look rural.

When it was over, we'd drive back to sludgy New York and I'd pine for Vermont and dream of living there permanently, where every day would be maple syrup and forest friends. But really I didn't know this Vermont character at all. We'd never stayed up all night talking about its dysfunctional family, compared pet peeves or stories or scars. What did it do when I went home? And what would happen when the magical attraction eventually fizzled?

It was time to call up the police blotter. If Vermont wasn't ready to share its stories just yet, it left me no choice but to snoop around. “All right,” I said out loud, “let's see what you got. . . .”

Various DUIs. A bar fight. Someone's Havahart critter trap stolen from Woods Road. Ho and hum. Three entries, less than seven minutes of investigative work. Montclair's always took at least half an hour. What was Vermont hiding? Where were its
secret fetishes? Its second family? I'd even settle for a weird rash. But there was nothing. A different route had to be taken with this one.

Enter the catamount.

I'd heard this name on prior visits to the Green Mountain State. It's possible I'd even seen a billboard somewhere. I thought Catamount was a ski resort, but it made little sense that a mountain would warrant gaspy noises from the locals I was dining with, no matter how many black diamonds it had. Being the victim of a mortifying no-soap-radio incident as a youth, I have made a lifetime practice of pretending I get the joke, or whatever it is people are talking about, followed by in-the-know noises so they don't think I'm daft. I was a city dweller, though—what did I know about how seriously they took their mountains? When it just didn't add up anymore, I pulled my friend aside to ask her what the hell a catamount was.

“Oh,” she said, fishing around in a bag of organic chips. “It's a mountain lion.”

A
what
?

This was the nugget I was searching for. Never mind the blotter, look to the great outdoors. I couldn't believe it took me so long to get there. I went to work. The wilderness websites were abuzz with news of this majestic creature prowling the countryside; there had been sightings in six towns. Great debate ensued over what to call this thing—some liked
eastern cougar
, others preferred
mountain cat
or, worse,
mountain screamer
—but no matter its name, they all seemed hopped up about it.

The catamount is a stealthy beast, able to jump seventy feet in order to pounce on deer or rabbits or, potentially, me. The mountain cat kills you by digging its hind claws into your legs, front claws into your shoulders. Then it bites your neck with these special teeth, ones with nerve endings that aid in finding the perfect
spot at which to pull apart the vertebrae before snapping your spine. Finally, it drags you to a ravine and eats your organs. The catamount has been known to stalk its prey for a few days, familiarizing itself with your habits so it knows exactly when to strike. I turned off the light and closed the blinds.

Working under cover of night for the next few hours, I began to feel a kinship with this stalk-and-ambush predator, who, it turned out, is also reclusive and usually avoids people. Catamount attacks were rare but they still happened, mostly when people entered their territory. Statistically, there were maybe four attacks a year, one being a fatality—a fact I didn't dare share with Buzz, because he'd accuse me of being narcissistic for believing I'd be the one-in-four to get murdered by a puma. I had a comeback for him should the need arise. I'd tell him that although they don't attack frequently, when they do it's usually a small kid or a solitary adult. It's then that I'd remind him that for the most part I'm a solitary adult. He'd just sigh and leave the room. This was not a strong enough case to keep us in Jersey.

I needed more information about the troublemakers I'd be sharing my new neighborhood with if we moved. I started small by familiarizing myself with what the local snakes liked to eat (small rodents and toads) and where wild rats might nest (I don't want to talk about it). There were two varieties of fox that might saunter onto the property—red and gray. Both species inhabit the same territory, though they prefer not to interact with each other, so they use the land like a time-share in Florida. I'd already pegged the reds as favorites, because they were famous for being intolerant of one another.

I wondered about the moose, an animal I'd been obsessed with spotting. Apparently the most likely problem with a moose-tangling would be hitting one with your car. However, they were showing up as special guests at certain ski hills, one even recently
charging a skier. Of course, there were the bears. No matter how many times I read about them, I never remembered which I was to fear, the brown or the black. One is an opportunist, eating whatever berries it finds in the forest, and the other eats the people. Studying up on nature hooligans seemed to give me the ease and pleasure I felt when reading about crime. I thought it quite adaptable of me, to switch what there was to worry about so effortlessly. I guess it is all how you choose to see things.

City people often tell you the country terrifies them, that it's too dark and quiet. They feel safer with people around. Nightfall in the middle of nowhere can be daunting, especially if you have a lush imagination. In Montclair, I'd lie in bed hearing the sigh and whine of the DeCamp bus outside my window, but rarely did it make me conjure up the Wood Chipper Murder. In Vermont, the sounds of crunchy noises outside my window brought images of fanged creatures traipsing through the brush, ready to rip me to shreds.

My Internet connection might be slower in the country but my typing skills and patience are as sharp and fierce as what lurks outside. And they need to be when, at four a.m., you hear shrill screeches belting through the trees. At first you think you are imagining things, but when the yowling pierces the air again, it all sounds a little
Jurassic Park
out there. You can't wake the husband or call friends at that hour, and you certainly can't shout out the window to keep it down! All you have left is the Internet.

So you type in things like “weird screeching noise in southern Vermont.” It is then you meet the fisher cat. Yes, it sounds adorable. Conjures up stuffed toys my son might have, a soft kitty complete with rain hat and fishing pole. Inquire about the beast, however, and you'll learn it has nothing to do with fishing or cats. This thing hails from the weasel family and looks like what might ensue if a woodchuck screwed a bear. It doesn't eat people
(although watch out for the family cat), but when this varmint is mating or back from a kill, you can't imagine the racket. Teeny hairs you were not familiar with make special guest appearances all over your body.

There is also another group of no-goodniks responsible for caterwauling—the coyotes. Honestly, I never would have pegged coyotes to sound so effeminate. Don't tell them I said this, but I always imagined them to be macho things. Really, they sound like a pack of teenage girls on a teen tour bus. A local vet told me that when coyotes meet up in the middle of the night, all that screaming is just their way of catching up with each other. Those freakish yelps, the ones that make you want to hide in the closet, are them having a little chitchat. Just gossip. I have no idea what stories hang off the coyote grapevine, but I can promise you I want no part of it.

I was feeling slightly jazzed about Vermont until I read that the coyote is super adaptable, able to live happily in all habitats, including the suburbs. I then took issue with the coyote, hostile toward this creature that was so mangy and yet still more well-adjusted than I was. Frankly, I took issue with the whole state of Vermont. Buzz was annoying and the country was stupid and I was not moving. Animal research did not do the trick, and now, on top of it all, I couldn't sleep. I typed in medical symptoms I'd been experiencing just to end the evening on a high note. “Crunching sound while bending knee” took me well into the wee hours.

People will tell you life is a journey. To them I say, I don't care for journeys. They're long and dusty and they make you tired. I was already fatigued from all the research and the decision-­making process. I just wanted to know what would happen to me if I moved. See into the future a bit. Flip ahead. A side note about my nature: I am terribly nosy. I have participated in some diary
hijinks of which I am not proud. I can't help it if I have stealthy eyes and I notice stuff. I like to think it is my job to be observant, that all this interest in other people's privacy helps me hone my craft, but really I'm just a snoop. And while I will definitely dip into your letters, I will never read a book out of order. Ever. I do not, under any circumstances, flip ahead. (I also never peek at the author photo, because if the author is peculiar looking I spend the entire reading experience focusing on the wrong thing.)

A book and its chronology demand respect. Plus there was a small incident when I was nine and accidentally opened the soft cover backwards and read the ending of
I Was a 98-Pound Duckling
,
by Jean Van Leeuwen. I was assaulted by the second-to-last line of the book, which then promptly imprinted on my brain:
I now weigh 102. I now weigh 102
.

For years, the line continued to harass me. It would taunt me in math class, during a root canal, even once at my wedding. Now when I read a book I have to actually cover the last few lines of a paragraph just so I don't read ahead. I kind of think it was Jean Van Leeuwen's fault. She was probably the trigger for a lot of my special behavior. Let's go ahead and blame her for some other stuff that's wrong with me, too.

But I wanted to flip ahead. I also probably needed to, because Buzz seemed slightly annoyed with me and was throwing fruit around. Also, the act of deciding whether or not to uproot was beginning to make me mental. I tried filling up a glass halfway by stuffing it with fun animal facts, but the truth is my glass is never even close to half-full—I barely even have a glass. Sometimes, when my decision making goes poorly or gets to this point, I ask a small committee of friends to tell me what I think. Unfortunately, they tend to say stuff like,
You've got nothing to lose
or
You can always move back
or
The city will always be there
or, the very worst,
Live every day like it is your
last—carpe diem!
Which, frankly, all sounds a little too pom-pomish for me.