With the end of the summer comes a different feeling from the
magnificent, magical atmosphere that saturated the Island in late May and early
June, something quiet, understated, but still undeniably surreal. You thank the
Seasonal Work gods when the hordes of Midwestern tourists dissipate from the
streets, leaving you to wallow in the strange silent mist that’s cast over the
village. You watch the leaves fall from the trees and rest on the shit-covered
roads. You miss the money you make off Rich White People, but you don’t miss
the jittering chaos that this overcrowded Victorian island wasn’t built to
handle, but somehow allows itself to endure every single summer. You’ll start
to prepare for the merge into the Real World, and you begin to relax. But you
know you’ll never be truly prepared, because you’re a part of this place now,
and you don’t even realize it.
When you Get The Cut from work, you stay in bed till three
p.m., emerging from your apartment only to shuffle up the street to the “corner
store,” where you purchase overpriced single cans of beer, and Ramen that has
most likely made a home on that wooden shelf since the 1990s. The cashier asks
you if you’re still busy down the hill, and you shrug, saying it’s slowing
down, but it’s been slow for awhile now. She already knows, you already know,
but it makes for some conversation. She really wants to judge you for the six
boxes of Pizza Rolls you’re buying that you’re going to shovel down your throat
when you get home.
You grow used to the quiet, but out of nowhere,
representatives of the GOP descend upon the Great Turtle for a weekend
political convention. Signs displaying support for State Representatives appear
in peoples’ yards, and you become uncomfortably conscious of the fact that the
island is crawling with these people. That night, a bar brawl breaks out on the
streets. Tourists are startled to witness political elephants punching each
other in the face, but the taxi drivers calmly light up their cigarettes, and
await the arrival of police on bicycles to calm the chaos. They’ve seen it all
before. Partying continues on, as usual. Everyone talks about it the next day.
Only on Mackinac, we say.
You might consult the Island Tinder to search for someone to
Neflix and Chill with, and you might meet someone nice. Much to your surprise,
you find yourself with a casual stalker, and suddenly Main Street is even
smaller than it was before. You duck under the windows to pass the fudge shop
where they work, and you pull your jacket hood over your face whenever you pass
the carriages in front of your hotel. You can’t blame them for their
desperation, though. Everyone’s gone mad here, and no one is safe. You decide
being single is a perfectly good option.
The bars are less crowded this time of year. If you’re sick,
the bartenders will make you tea with honey and lemon, forgetting to add it to
your tab, and they’ll ask you whatever happened to so-and-so, or tell you about
they completely ate shit on their bike coming down Turkey Hill the night
before. You’ll drunkenly stagger over to the pull tab lottery ticket machine,
lit up with the neon glow of false promises from the State of Michigan. You’ll
buy more than you really need to, and sit at a nearby table with your friends
who’ve already accumulated a pile of spent tickets higher than Sugar Loaf rock
on the table. Someone might win a few dollars here and there; occasionally,
they’ll win a hundred. You find solace and cheap entertainment in this
practice, hoping and praying that you’ll win the lucky $25k, so you can leave
the island early. You talk about what you’ll do next, Where You’re Going This
Winter. People ask you if you’ll be back next season, and as much as you wish
you could move on, the truth is that you’ll probably be back.
The power might go out sometimes, but some bars might still be
open. They’ll place a floodlight at the end of downtown, and the streets will
look like something out of a post-apocalyptic film. When the lights are out,
the stars are perfect, and you’ll make your way up to Fort Holmes to see the
galaxies spread out across an indigo sky. Across the straits, the Real World is
lit up, humming, glowing, while you’re stuck somewhere in time.
As it starts to grow colder, you may see some snow. The
horses, the ones that seem like they’ve been here since the beginning of time,
are led down the hill to the docks, and sent away to farms in mainland
Michigan. The ferries don’t run as much. Soon, they won’t run at all. You’ve
never stayed here for the winter, but there’s something about it that sounds
appealing. When you hear tales of the Ice Bridge, you wonder if you’d ever be
brave enough to cross it.
On your last night of work, you’ll make your way down to the
VI with your coworkers. You’ll all do a shot, maybe Something With Rum, and
you’ll toast to a good season, and maybe a better one next year.
It’s strange, to have to leave somewhere like this. It’s
like something out of a dream, never truly within reach, never quite tangible.
When you tell your friends about it, they’ll smile and listen to your stories
about Glow in the Dark Capture the Flag, Rock Paper Scissors Tournaments, Power
Outage Weddings, and Mustache Mondays, but they’ll never truly get it. You
found a family on the Great Turtle, people who understand you, who might have
been there for the same reasons you were. The Island is home, and the people
there are unlike those anywhere else in the world. You leave a piece of
yourself behind when you leave, but you feel like there’s a secret that’s been
imparted to you from long ago, to take with you, wherever you land next.
