Gypsies in Geneva (on the Lake)

So Chef Jim and I went away last weekend. We left our little Gypsy under the watchful eye of her many doting aunts and protective uncles and headed to Ohio Friday morning.

Jim and I are Gypsies who like to collect many and varied treasures, which makes us flea market people, so we gassed up the Magical Mystery Caravan and headed out to our first stop in Rogers, OH, home of pretty much nothing other than the sprawling Rogers Open Air Market and Community Auction (www.rogersohio.com). Although the relentless rain and early date kept all but the most stalwart outdoor vendors (Go buy plants NOW! Herbs are GORGEOUS!) away, we still scored some sweet swag.

My favorite score was a gift for Dubi our bar manager, better known as “La Diabla” of Steel City Derby Demons fame. I found a 50’s era blue and red metal roller skate case, complete with hand-lettered name of owner (“Property of… Jane Rufus”) and tiny brass key still attached. We also scored some awesomely Amish provisions for the weekend including maybe the best Amish jam ever——a magical concoction called “FROG Jam”. No frogs were harmed; the jam contains only Fig-Raspberry-Orange-Ginger. FROG combines happy, homey raspberry with fancy/thoughtfully gourmet fig and orange peel ratcheted up to Amazing via very present ginger. This stuff now officially rivals my obsession with Cherry Butter that emerged during our honeymoon in WVA. Know what goes great with a little FROG? Goat Gouda, another new obsession, also Amish (that’s what the label says anyway). But what really kept us alive all weekend--while killing us slowly--was the scrapple and cornmeal mush. With smoked hot pepper Amish cheese and eggs from the farm, of course. Scrapple. A conveniently-shaped, spam-like block of unmentionable bits of magical mystery meat. I’m not a big fan of the organ meats, or offal of any DISCERNABLE kind, but once you grind it up and jam it all together…Heaven. (Holy crapple, I love scrapple!) Amish Honorable Mentions: the “It really is that good” Amish butter, and Jim’s fave chocolate chip-peanut butter cookies.

So we left the rains down in Rogers(ica) and headed NW to our destination, Geneva-on-the-Lake, OH. A few years ago, Bob Batz Jr. of the PG wrote a big weekend travel piece on Geneva, which inspired our first visit just shy of Labor Day ’06. Here’s a quiz. What natural disaster occurred back then? Answer: Hurricane Katrina. And what natural disaster occurred this past weekend? Giant Earthquake in L’Aquila, Italy. Hmm. Although I don’t WANT to see a connection with my going on vacation and natural disasters, when I do leave this world, it might be appropriate to bury me at a crossroads, or upside down on my horse or something, just in case. So we spent much of Saturday in our tiny cabin, again, watching grainy CNN reports of an earthquake this time around, and of course, the disaster much closer to home, the city-shattering loss of the three police officers we remember today, and will not forget any day soon.

Our wee little cabin, “Gia” part of “Our Gang Cottages” was about the size of a dorm room, and just what we needed. The living room, which contained a chair meant to recline, but unable to, a futon couch, and a wee hexagonal table with a TV, was about half the size of the kitchen, which contained a tiny round table with 3 chairs, a surprisingly full-size refrigerator, the necessary countertop appliances crowded on a wee isthmus of counter space, and a stove that had to be original to the cabin, circa 1940’s. It was a direct-light black and white enamel jobbie with THREE burners and the tiny oven barely accommodated the Stouffer’s frozen lasagna we picked up at the Geneva Giant Eagle on the way in. The kitchen was equipped just fine, I thought, until I volunteered to cook up our scrapple ‘n eggs Saturday morning. What the kitchen lacked was a decent pot or pan. There were three tiny frying pans from which to choose. Two of the thin-as-aluminum-foil-might-as-well-put-your-food-DIRECTLY-in-the-fire variety, and one tiny cast iron guy who had been terribly mistreated and wasn’t exactly well-seasoned. Luckily, we had a big bottle of vegetable oil that we’d purchased for popcorn (just try to make popcorn in a 1 ½ inch-deep cheapie skillet, I dare you.) By the way, just in case you’re still concerned about using non-stick pans in your home, fearful that Teflon is flaking off into your food and killing you, realize that a flake or two of Teflon can’t possibly kill you as quickly as essentially having to deep-fry everything you cook in tons of vegetable oil to keep your food from permanently bonding to cheap pans. Yes, I “deep-fried” SCRAPPLE. And it was DELICIOUS. Jim’s note: The frying of scrapple, mush, and eggs was also infinitely complicated by another notably absent item—a spatula. Nothing like trying to gently turn a block of stuck cornmeal mush with a plastic slotted spoon….

Saturday night we heard about a psychic fair happening at “The Lodge” of Geneva, which is a giant hotel and trade show complex just as you enter Geneva on the Lake proper. Being that we’re hosting our own Rebecca’s “Spring Psychic Symposium” here at the café Saturday, I felt destined to check it out. Jim said his impression of the Psychic Fair was that it was kind of like a Comicon—but with different kinds of Geeks. This is true of any such event I think, and the energy is kind of “the same but different” too. Enthusiastic, like-minded people sharing ideas like schools of fish moving through open water. I did a little recon and then got a very insightful Tarot reading from a very kind lady. There’s something to be said for a complete stranger opening a conversation with me by saying, “You’re surrounded by people in a social setting. I feel it’s your calling, but also your actual job. You’re very strong minded, though, and if you don’t have your own business that involves working with people every day, you need to start one.” Check.

Afterward, we drove over to Coventry, on the outskirts of Cleveland proper. Coventry is a neighborhood where Jim once hung his hat, and we checked out his old haunts. Two important ones, The Grog Shop, where a Kent State student version of Jim traveled for shows, is now located on the corner, but still there. Mac’s Backs Bookstore, where Jim was a poet-in-residence back in the day, now shares space with Tommy’s, a landmark veggie-friendly café we visited for lunch. (Lots of creative and messy sandwiches. And delicious Kuchen.) Record Revolution has gotten smaller, but still has an awesome collection of vintage vinyl. (When’s the last time YOU saw an “Amazulu” record?) And Big Fun is just the same—think South Side’s Groovy with a giant selection of Archie McPhee goodies and a photo booth.


By Monday the weather had degraded to snow, and it was time to head home. Both of our visits to Geneva have happened in the off-season. It’s early spring and the weather’s still crappy and cold. It’s windy as all get out. Geneva is a ghost town; we’re here too early even for visiting fishermen. But depressing as a still-boarded boardwalk arcade is, we’re here precisely for the lack of activity; for the peace of it all (and the super cheap rates). The true call of this place for me is the lake itself, as close as I dared get to it. The swift, sharp breezes whipping over the lake and whirling through town constantly remind you that just over the lip of the cottage-clustered cliff is the immensity of Great Lake Erie in all its ship-grounding tempestuousness. There is something very important to me about water, and the perspective it gifts you. The best part for me about our weekend away was the opportunity to get grounded again, to be reminded that there is a forever beneath our feet and over the horizon, so important to remember, especially compared to the uncertainty of the fragile things we’ve built on top of all that forever. We all need that, sometimes, I think.