The Geographer's Library

Jon Fasman
purgatorial. I like local color as much as the next outsider, but still I tended to
steer clear of bars like this. As I walked in, my hands—still shaking a bit from
the beer-can incident—began to sweat.
“Help you?” the barman asked. I couldn’t place his accent, but it wasn’t
American.
I shut the door behind me and nodded. “You open?”
“Maybe. You member?”
Did he mean “Are you a member?” or “Do you remember?” I guessed the
first one. “A member of what?”
“This private club. Social club, not bar. Need to be member to drink here.
You got membership card?”
“No, I’m afraid I don’t. Could you maybe make an exception and sell me a
beer? I won’t tell anybody.”
He plonked his forearms on the bar and leaned forward. “No exception,
my friend. Must be member. But you could maybe make temporary member
for this afternoon only.”
“Sure. How can I do that?”
“Invitation only,” he declared, grinning, as if the entire conversation had
been leading to this point. “Sorry.”
A skinny guy wearing a peacoat and silver granny glasses piped up from
the end of the bar nearest me. “C’mon, Eddie. Give the kid a beer. I’ll invite
him. Chris’ sake.” He waved me over to an empty seat. “Siddown here. This
is the only bar for three towns around, and the only decent one left in this
whole part of the state. Siddown already, why don’t you?” He had a reedy
voice and a local accent, the New England chowder thinned out a bit this far
inland, all slippery endings and round vowels.
The bartender shrugged, feigning indifference, though he seemed upset
not to have been able to kick somebody out. I’ve never understood why some
proprietors derive so much pleasure from denying service. “So okay, so sit.
He invite you, so sit. What kind of beer you drink?”
“Bud?”
“Don’t have.”
“Rolling Rock?”
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