No Negotiating with The Heavens Part I

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So, back to the Shack Up Inn, this cool place down the highway from Clarksdale. All was well there, after seeing Andy off, it was barely 4 o'clock, so I ventured down to the main shack to talk to the owner, computer under arm, as the Wifi wasn't working. The guy who was sent up to help me with it didn't know what a WEP key was, (argh mississippi!), and was insisting the cable company was closed for the evening (which could be true...the local police station was only open 8am-4:30).

Fully missing the main shack I wandered up to the biggest barnlike structure (it was all confusing with all these barnwood and corregated tin structures), primarily because it started to pour on me and my poor wifi-less computer with little warning, thunder being thunderous, pelting water bouncing off tin like liquid bbs. It was a fast run, and I was greeted on the porch of this structure, which I was beginning to believe wasn't part of the Shackup Inn, by a bunch of locals who were out to watch the storm, nothing else better to do. Chatting is a necessity down here and an artform. People are great storytellers, and my northern sense of reticence when talking to strangers (hence wasting their time and my time) was seriously melting. It didn't hurt that I have been in a constant state of "nowhere I really have to be" recently.

They all greeted me politely, offered me a beer (which I decline, dripping wet with the computer and cord still clutched to my chest). They then started some general conversation with me, "weathers looking wet, where ya from"?, while eyeing up the computer oddly attached to my body. Finally the youngest of the group, a clean faced 20 year old, I guessed, gestured to the computer and said "so, I'm guessing there is some reason you were taking your computer for a walk in the rain?" His accent was very southern, but clear and deep, the drawled words having a soothing effect.

I smiled sheepishly, and related my story about no Wifi, lack of WEP knowledge, cable company closed, and the fact that I was originally intending to end up at the main shack where I was hoping to hook directly to the modem. "what is this place anyhow?" All the men replied at once "why your at ol' Hoskins Commissary". And they started to go on to explain, when the young man broken in... "well, now that sounds like ol' Guy jus wanted to git on home... let me call up that Cable company, I know some people, and I heard that Guy had put some encryption on it, I think he'us scared folks at the commissary would be stealing wifi.. but fact is, is only been up 3 days, and you ain't the first to complain"... he had his cellphone out of his pocket already dialing as he finished this sentence, "evening, John... got a little probably with the Wifi WEP at the Shackup...." Before 3 minutes was out he had his friend John promise to just go ahead and disable the WEP key and any other kind of encryption on the account. Mississippi...the last state in the union not given over to mass paranoia, passwords, and security questions to fix a problem quickly. No matter that Guy HAD gone on home and the entire system he'd created had been disabled in minutes by a young guy drinking at the commissary next door! "Miss, sounds like you'll be up in next few minutes or so." Ha, you know what they say about honey vs. vinegar. It actually works here!

"So" another of the men broke in "you ready to come drink with us now?" he smiled as some harmless older men do when faced with the prospect of the company of younger women. "well, I'll tell you what, I still need to get over to that main shack so I can see that its up and working, but then I'll come right back over." With that, they graciously showed me the back door to the commissary (a massive performance space it turns out, with a good little bar on the side), which made the trip about 25 feet only. It was starting to hail. Crap.

Bill, one of the partners of the Shackup was in the 'office' area of the main shack, chatting with another local when I came screaching in wet and still technologically heavy. "Hey, I heard you was having some problems with the internet" he said. "Your welcome to just use the main computer." I was offered another beer, I took another beer, and got to chatting with the him, and the local who was there solely to shoot the breeze.

2 hours later I came out, my head swimming with local lore and legends as well as the a literary conversation which was well above my head (I was reading Duma Key, by Steven King at the time, but I figured I'd probably better not admit it). Its something else about Mississippi which is mystifying. Many of them are seriously well read. Oxford, just about an hour east, was the home and birthplace of William Faulkner, among others, so the literary pedigree stands out along the wide mainstreets, gracious homes, and town squares. It just feels somewhat odder to have this type of conversation in a big tin shack decorated in old coffee cans. A Dutch couple rain in out of the rain asking for lodging as I was leaving. The place even had international appeal.

Now it was more than raining, it was a sheer wall of water outside, and me and my computer dashed across to the backdoor of the commissary and into the kitchen there. Soon it wouldn't matter about the wifi because the computer would be dead from too many baths. I found all the locals bellied up to the bar listening with some interest to an Australian blues lover whom had decided to live in Clarksdale for the next 2 months to write about it. I joined them for hours, realizing part way through that the commissary wasn't actually opened, the owners were just "roasting some butts" for a wedding the next day, and nobody seemed to have anywhere to go in the rain... so me and the gang just drank beer and entertained each other as we waited for the rain to abate.

The husband and wife team (the wife being the Hoskins which was the name of the farm before it because the shack up inn and the commissary), are super nice but actually HATE I mean like Hatfields and McCoys HATE the owners of the Shackup Inn. Its a long running feud, which by the sound of it, has long ago left reality of what the real problem is, and is now fought completely on principle as each party seems to continue the feud, and truly believes the other side is a)evil and b)past the point of no return. At some point it sounds like there's going to be all out war and probably both the Hoskins commissary and the shack up inn will be torn to pieces in the doing. So, clearly though they abut each other by about 25 feet, there is no feeling of working together. Its too bad too, because if they did work together I can't imagine how much more successful they'd be. The commissary would always have bar guests, and because Ma Hoskins owns all the land around the shackup inn (long story, but she originally sold it to the guys to begin with and they were partners), the Inn could perhaps get more property and put up more shacks. As it stands now, the Shackup pretends the Commissary doesn't exist, and it will be over a few dead bodies before the Shackup Inn can acquire 2 inches more space from the Hoskins farm.

Regardless it made for some good speculation as the butt roasting and beer drinking continued. Finally, around 9pm, we all decided that it wasn't ever going to stop raining, and dominos wouldn't deliver. It looked like a lake out there, and I think the owners had had enough of us on their day off, so I said goodbye to the gang, who was headed out to some coon lodge, juke joint in a field somewhere to listen to blues the way God intended, whereas I was weighing my options and heading back to my shack.

Totally drenched and fearing for my computers life, once again I streaked across what used to be the lawn to my little piece of sharecropper heaven. It was starting to get windy out too, I noticed and no sooner had I been in the door 30 seconds and the power went out. I stared out the window at the insane rain and hitting the panes. If it kept up there would be a foot or more of standing water out there.

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Photos

Hoskins Commissary
The space had some interesting stuff in it