THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, October 13, 1995 TAG: 9510110292
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 07 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Over Easy
SOURCE: Jo-Ann Clegg
LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines
When it comes to country stores, I am a purist.
If I had my way, roadside shops with flowery-encrusted signs proclaiming ``Karlotta's Kountry Kupboard'' would be banished from the face of the earth.
Spare me, please, the potpourri-scented air, the neat rows of jams and jellies, the machine stitched ``homemade'' quilts draped over blanket racks made in Taiwan.
Spare me, too, the teased and glued clerks with manicured nails, the hammered dulcimer echoing from a CD player hidden behind an opened fan, the slices of canned pineapple macadamia nut bread encased in plastic wrap, tied with scraps of gingham and selling for 10 times their worth.
When I visit a country store, I want it to smell like fresh apples, dried fish, kerosene and what's left behind on soles when real country folks plod through a cow pasture on a drizzly day.
I want hip boots hanging in bunches from the ceiling, hand knit mittens next to the cash register, a barrel full of pickles by the door, a couple of checker players in front of the stove and a clerk who's as plain as she is competent.
What I want, in short, is the country store in Bucks Harbor, Maine, population 100 or so - maybe.
Bucks Harbor, when I was growing up, had a real, honest-to-goodness country store. I know because I spent a lot of summer afternoons poking into its dusty corners or sitting on the wide front porch sharing bags of penny candy with my cousins.
If there was anything on the face of this earth that the Bucks Harbor store didn't stock, I can't recall what it was. If there was anything in the store that was neatly displayed, I know for certain I never saw it.
Country stores weren't meant to be tidy, just as country store clerks weren't meant to be fashionable. Both were plain, functional and comfortably rumpled.
The reason I bring this up now is that, for the past year, I've been struggling with a difficult situation in one of my spare bedrooms. Last year, my cousin, Lee, and his family came to visit. His two daughters, 12-year-old Sakele and 8-year-old Nicole, shared that bedroom with my collection of ships' plaques, stuffed advertising figures, aging cameras and doll house miniatures.
The miniatures are housed in two different places. One is a doll house a friend made for me. The other is a large bread box, which I've turned into a replica of the Bucks Harbor store.
By the time Sakele and Nicole came to visit, the bread box was jam-packed with authentic reproductions of household necessities from the first half of the 20th century.
A cracker barrel holds a checker board, a good-sized rat eyes a trap behind the meat counter, bolts of fabric scraps cover a long table. There are eggs and milk in the ice box, buckets and mops in the corner and a Bible with leather binding and brass hardware on a shelf.
``Feel free to play with the doll house and the store,'' I told the girls when I showed them to their room. By the time I headed back down the stairs they were shrieking with delight at miniature lamps and big-horned gramophone.
For two days they spent most of their time arranging and rearranging the furnishings. It wasn't until they left that I took a look at their work.
And almost had a heart attack.
The youngsters had done the unthinkable, the unpardonable even. They had straightened my country store!
Where there had been piles of clothes, there were neat rows. Where there had been a jumble of fresh fruits and vegetables, there were precisely arranged bins. Where bicycle tires had hung together with boots and sweaters, they now had their separate space.
The mops and brooms had been moved outside, the rat and his trap had disappeared completely. Only much later did I find them in a dresser drawer, along with three miniature bolts of fabric, a beef roast and a couple of broken eggs.
Any resemblance to the Bucks Harbor store wasn't coincidental, it was nonexistent. I might as well have boiled a scented pot and posted a ``Karlotta's Kountry Kitchen'' sign outside.
All this happened more than a year ago. After much work, tires, boots and sweaters hang from the ceiling again, mops and brooms have been moved inside and the rat and his trap have been rescued from the desk drawer.
Most of the floor space is covered now so I guess it's time I moved on to other projects. Which I will do as soon as I can find a source of the odors I remember from Bucks Harbor.
Does anybody know where I can find potpourri that combines the scents of apples, dried fish, kerosene and cow pookie? No Maine country store would be complete without them. by CNB