As most people who hang out in Door County probably know, Norbert Blei died about a year ago. Norb was one of those people who was regarded as a central figure of Door County life. He came to the county in the 1970's after growing up in Chicago and working as a newspaper writer. His first Door County book, "Door Way," was a series of interviews with and profiles of local community members and business people like Al Johnson, Bill Beckstrom, "Uncle Tom" Collis, and Freddie Kodanko. It won praise from Studs Terkel, and became one of those books that every shop in Door County had on its small bookshelf. In a way, it was a tremendously valuable book, in that it documented those Door County personalities who made the county what it is. The problem, to me at least, was that the portraits of those personalities were filtered through the personality of Norb Blei himself.
I have to confess that I never met Blei, and haven't read any of his books other than "Door Way," but I've read interviews with him, and I've read a lot of the content that he posted online during his last few years. From all of that material, I get the impression that Norb sort of enjoyed being a dick. By that, I mean that he enjoyed making people feel uncomfortable, and used their discomfort as proof of his own uniqueness. He took "crusty" to a new level, and kind of dared you to find fault with his views because it would show what a narrow-minded and conventional person you were. Ironically, though, he was really a fairly conventional thinker himself.
Norb made himself sort of a caricature of a writer, conjuring up a little Mark Twain, a little Ernest Hemingway, a little Studs, and a little Mike Royko (with whom he worked in Chicago). He smoked a pipe, worked in a rundown chicken coop crammed with enough books, papers, and assorted junk to merit an entire episode of "Hoarders," regularly parked himself at a few favorite watering holes, and grew a walrus mustache that made you itch just looking at it.
Blei made a big splash a few years back with an essay called "Shut the Damn Door," in which he rhetorically advocated closing the bridges leading onto the peninsula to keep the tourists out. Of course, it triggered a storm of controversy, but it really wasn't all that original a rant. Sydney J. Harris, another Chicago newspaper columnist, had written a similar rant over forty years ago, in which he complained about the "gooks" coming to the county. (He must have realized when he wrote it that the term would sound like an anti-Asian epithet, especially since this was during the height of the Vietnam War, so he made sure to explain that a "gook" is someone who's "looking for the action.")
As an aside, I only saw Sydney J. Harris one time in Door County... At the Thumb Fun amusement park. Hypocritical, I must say.
At any rate, Norb Blei always struck me as one of those people who knows when they're pushing people's buttons and get a kick out of doing it. Which I suppose could endear him to some people. Probably the same people who love those Vegas comedians who pick people out of the audience and make fun of them.
So, rest in peace, Norb, and be assured that you have achieved immortality along with Al Johnson and the other people you wrote about. And every little bookshelf of essential Door County books will still include "Door Way." Just not mine.
Friday, August 1, 2014
Tuesday, July 29, 2014
Welcome to the Lake House Blog!
Two years ago, while we were vacationing in Door County, Wisconsin, we were out for a walk and saw a lakeside condo for sale. I went back to look closer, and fell in love with the view. We had to think long and hard about it, because (first) it's small - only 500 square feet - and (second) it was very dingy and run-down, and needed a lot of work. But after a second trip up to take a closer look, and much discussion, we decided to try to buy it.
We'd always wanted a place in Door County, since I've been coming up here almost every summer since my parents bought a cottage on Lake Michigan east of Sister Bay when I was in high school. After I got married and had kids, we continued to visit Door County for most of our vacations - first to visit my parents, and then (after they sold their cottage and then had to sell their townhouse when my dad became ill) by renting places ourselves. We had always figured that a place in Door County might be out of our price range, and I'd pretty much given up on the idea of waterfront property altogether, after seeing prices shoot through the roof over the last thirty years.
We'd looked at vacation properties in different areas around the Midwest over the past ten years, including central Wisconsin (deer flies and green lakes), southern Michigan (beer coolers and speedboats), and northern or central Indiana (little lakes with a million houses crowded around them). We decided that northern Wisconsin (around Minocqua) and northern lower Michigan (around Traverse City and northward) were nice areas and would suit our style well, but they are just too far to get much use out of while living in Chicago.
But we kept looking, now that our kids were on their own and I'd recently inherited some money after my mom passed away. And spotting this place at the tip of the Door County peninsula was suddenly an exciting find. It was actually in our price range, and the travel time (while a good long drive) was only slightly longer than what I was used to with the Sister Bay trips to my folks' places. The downsides included the condition of the place (gloomy darkened cedar paneling, ancient appliances, dingy smelly carpeting, rotten window frames, and a patio door with water condensed inside), very small bedrooms (8.5 x 9 feet), and a steep hill to get down to the place. There were also no washer and dryer in the place - they were up the hill in a laundry house - and the boat dock in front was severely damaged by ice (as in the middle section was gone).
So to make a long story short, we bought the place in November of 2012 and spent most of 2013 cleaning, painting, and fixing it up. By the end of the summer, we had a place that suited us well, and now, in 2014, we can enjoy it.
The purpose of this blog is to give me a place to reflect and tell some interesting stories about our vacations here, and eventually about our retirement. I'd always liked the idea of a guest book when we stayed at other people's places in Door County and elsewhere, so I wanted a sort of online version of that plus a journal. I also enjoyed a book that my parents had, called "Your Piece of the Peninsula" by a Chicago guy who was a longtime summer resident. In addition to his (now somewhat outdated) advice, he also recounted his own routines and way of living here, including his regular get-togethers with his drinking friends, whom he dubbed "The Cliff Swallowers." I feel like an updated version of such a journal is probably long overdue, so maybe this will serve... As long as I avoid the dreaded "TL:DR" trap (which my son usually accuses me of... Too Long: Didn't Read).
I'll also try to be careful so someone doesn't try to infer when it would be a good time to burglarize the place (or our Chicago home, for that matter), so I'll keep things rather vague. But there aren't too many condo developments at the tip of the peninsula, so I have to risk revealing some hints. After all, that's part of the appeal of the place.
We'd always wanted a place in Door County, since I've been coming up here almost every summer since my parents bought a cottage on Lake Michigan east of Sister Bay when I was in high school. After I got married and had kids, we continued to visit Door County for most of our vacations - first to visit my parents, and then (after they sold their cottage and then had to sell their townhouse when my dad became ill) by renting places ourselves. We had always figured that a place in Door County might be out of our price range, and I'd pretty much given up on the idea of waterfront property altogether, after seeing prices shoot through the roof over the last thirty years.
We'd looked at vacation properties in different areas around the Midwest over the past ten years, including central Wisconsin (deer flies and green lakes), southern Michigan (beer coolers and speedboats), and northern or central Indiana (little lakes with a million houses crowded around them). We decided that northern Wisconsin (around Minocqua) and northern lower Michigan (around Traverse City and northward) were nice areas and would suit our style well, but they are just too far to get much use out of while living in Chicago.
But we kept looking, now that our kids were on their own and I'd recently inherited some money after my mom passed away. And spotting this place at the tip of the Door County peninsula was suddenly an exciting find. It was actually in our price range, and the travel time (while a good long drive) was only slightly longer than what I was used to with the Sister Bay trips to my folks' places. The downsides included the condition of the place (gloomy darkened cedar paneling, ancient appliances, dingy smelly carpeting, rotten window frames, and a patio door with water condensed inside), very small bedrooms (8.5 x 9 feet), and a steep hill to get down to the place. There were also no washer and dryer in the place - they were up the hill in a laundry house - and the boat dock in front was severely damaged by ice (as in the middle section was gone).
So to make a long story short, we bought the place in November of 2012 and spent most of 2013 cleaning, painting, and fixing it up. By the end of the summer, we had a place that suited us well, and now, in 2014, we can enjoy it.
The purpose of this blog is to give me a place to reflect and tell some interesting stories about our vacations here, and eventually about our retirement. I'd always liked the idea of a guest book when we stayed at other people's places in Door County and elsewhere, so I wanted a sort of online version of that plus a journal. I also enjoyed a book that my parents had, called "Your Piece of the Peninsula" by a Chicago guy who was a longtime summer resident. In addition to his (now somewhat outdated) advice, he also recounted his own routines and way of living here, including his regular get-togethers with his drinking friends, whom he dubbed "The Cliff Swallowers." I feel like an updated version of such a journal is probably long overdue, so maybe this will serve... As long as I avoid the dreaded "TL:DR" trap (which my son usually accuses me of... Too Long: Didn't Read).
I'll also try to be careful so someone doesn't try to infer when it would be a good time to burglarize the place (or our Chicago home, for that matter), so I'll keep things rather vague. But there aren't too many condo developments at the tip of the peninsula, so I have to risk revealing some hints. After all, that's part of the appeal of the place.
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