Down Crow Pasture

In the later years on Cape Cod, I'd just slide the skiff into the water, a flat-bottom pirogue with lots of rocker, I could pole this boat in two inches of water, and visit the tidal creeks. I'd seeded beds of shellfish that no one else could access. I was a student of tides, knew that at three o'clock, Sunday afternoon, I could harvest oysters, and planned my schedule accordingly. The Cape, at that time, 1970, was virtually deserted in the off-season. I worked all summer at the Playhouse, house-sitting in the winter, and ate free seafood twice a day. One winter I had a pet Harbor seal. Down Crow Pasture was a walk Ted (my first partner, the first print shop in his mother's basement) would take almost every day. Down to the end of Sesuit Neck, where Quivet Creek found the bay, then around the beach and back to the shop. Maybe five miles. In those days we were eating a lot of hallucinogenic plants and producing beautiful books; the halcyon years when the National Endowment for the Arts was giving away money, before Jesse Helms shut down the show. There's a lot of work involved in hand-setting, treadle printing, then hand-binding a book; but having a press, the ability to print any damn thing you pleased, and do it nicely, is a great liberty. Why I remembered those walks, now, is questionable, could be one thing or another, I'm not qualified to say. There were some large glacial erratics; we could hunker down, in the lee, and smoke a joint. I often collected debris. I've always been interested in debris. Several winters I didn't even have a car, never left the village, just walked everywhere. Once a month or so, someone would be going to Boston, and I'd hitch a ride, so I could hit the used book stores. People would visit, it was Cape Cod after all, and I'd take them on a beach walk, we'd collect dinner. I'd started cooking by then. I remember having a couple of dozen quahog shells that I used to cook Clams Casino. I'd make these from chopped razor clams and they were excellent. I'd cook them a dozen at a time until we were ready to explode. Wild berries for dessert. At some point I became known as a good cook, I am a good cook, but it's a grain of salt, actually. I'd usually rather have beans on toast than fuck with anything complicated. The heel of winter grinding me in. What about those odds? I'm still alive.