Oregon Tavern Age: The Hearing

An OTA man and woman sat across from one another at a table near the bar. He drank a Bud draft. She nursed a well scotch and soda. They were a couple. I’d seen them in here a dozen times and they always kept to themselves and talked quietly.

I sat a table away writing a letter. Television played a hot rod show with the sound muted. Crap country was on the radio.

We were the only customers in the joint. It was noon on a weekday and rain was imminent. I could feel it in my sinew, and of course, the elk and gulls already knew.

A few days earlier, the Kavanaugh confirmation “hearing” had engrossed the nation and ripped through American life like an army of chainsaws through a forest, a very sick forest, I might add.

Their conversation drifted over to me like wispy clouds. They were talking about Kavanaugh and Ford and lying and liars. There were Fox News talking points and I distilled a a general agreement between them—Ford was a fraud. But I didn’t sense they were cheering.

Then the agreement disappeared, like a cloud undergoing instant evaporation. Their weather had changed abruptly, deadly, like weather can change at sea and kill boats an crews. I couldn’t discern why but I sure wanted to know why.

She stood up, and prepared to leave. She sat back down and worked the scotch. All I caught this time were table scraps from a story from his youth. Something about being drunk in high school with a girl, she got sick in his truck from drinking, and they had sex, more or less. I think the man was wrestling with the idea or nuances of consent, then and now.

I couldn’t hear a word of the woman’s response, but she was asking questions, I heard that.