DAY ONE....from Toronto to Napoleon, Ohio
Breezed from Toronto to Freedomland..not too much over three hours. The Customs and Immigration Thugs...CIT, citizens-in-training, did their best to terrify us into some terrible admission.
Stubby but well-armed agent Collicello suggests: "Turn off the car and get out." (Indicating Adrian's dashcam) "I don't want to be on that security camera. Move to the back of the car," Briefest of pauses: "Stand at the back of the car where I told you."
Finally I remember how to use the passenger-side seatbelt and join Adrian at the back of the car.
In a rapid and toneless staccato he asks our destination and how long we expect to be in the US, and is not pleased to learn that we will not be returning together, or by the same route. Adri tells him we will be joining Linda in Carefree and he says "why aren't you travelling with your wife?" "How long has your wife been in the US?" Told she isn't coming down until the 14th he wants to know why she isn't travelling with us." Adri tells him he hates aeroplanes and we wanted to have a trip together.
"What's your connection?" he demands. I tell him we'd worked together for 50 years. Simplicity replacing accuracy. Given time I could learn how to do this properly, or maybe get shot.
My turn in the disciplinary barrel...I move closer so I can sort through the nasty wee syllables. "Move back to the car, sir." I said I couldn't hear what he was saying, that I was hard-of-hearing. "Move back. I told you to stand at the back of the car"
We notice there is another, much larger agent off to the side now; apparently he'd called for back-up.
"What have you got in the car besides clothing and toiletries." Adrian tells him we have cameras, lots of camera equipment. He couldn't have been less interested. They could easily have been exploding cameras.
"Get back in the car sir." So we do, and moments later he returns our passports and wishes us a happy trip. Abashed but free of a certain freedom we book for Toledo and press on to Napoleon which is featuring a familiar damp and miserable windy chill.
Got a decent burger/salad bar dinner and fruitlessly searched the downtown for an open coffee shop, giving up and driving to McDonald's for a coffee substitute.
Mickey D's was huge. An army--must have been 20 extra red-T-shirted greeters forced good will and free chocolate chip cookies on us. A big one with a clerical collar under his red Mickey shirt poked his trayful at us."No thank you,' said Adrian. He insisted. "I said, 'no thank you'. Adrian reminded him.
There was one more repetition, but I had drifted away toward the counter where two measly ordertakers (from among at least fifty employees) were sorting out large families engaged in polling their children for their sodium and corn gluten preferences.
Closer to the counter I scanned the new McCafe menu noting that the closest I could get to a real coffee was a 400 calorie latte. Adrian had withdrawn from his confrontation with added value and established an escape route near the parking lot which I could see featured yet one more scarlet-clad cookie flogger who was working the drive-up line. Realizing that the family clusters between me and my unsatisfaction pretty much guaranteed a lengthy wait, I joined him
No comments:
Post a Comment