Oregon Tavern Age

I stepped inside my local OTA joint and a large, tattooed woman with enormous breasts barely contained in a halter and wearing a camo trucker hat that read “Camp Bitch” jiggled toward me on a collision course.

Sweet country Jesus!

At the last minute she swerved around the pool table and I was safe.

Bad dance music played and two other women danced along. The Camp Bitch joined them and there was plenty of profane hootin’ and hollerin.’

Obviously tourists, but all the great coastal OTA joints are great because of the occasional mixing of local and tourist and the stories that result.

The women were hitting the sauce hard and appeared in what I would describe as camping or rafting attire. They were all in their 30s.

I sat a high table across the room and the OTA bartender brought my usual ale. I asked about the ruckus and she informed me that the women were the self-described Roseburg Camping Bitches and were camping at the county beach park about ten miles away, which of course meant they were drinking in nearby bar.

Time to eavesdrop because it was impossible to write with all the hell raising going on.

“No kids, no dogs!” one of them yelled.

There also wasn’t any men with them. Maybe they were past men. Can you blame them considering the state of the American male in his 30s?

They carried on for 15 minutes, slammed some shots, and then I overheard them say they were going to hit the Coos Bay thrift stores. For sure treasures abounded that the thrift hounds hadn’t discovered.

It had been a long time since I’d seen tourists fired up like this and I relished the sight. And not once did I observe any one of them doing anything of their phones for social media purposes.

An OTA man sat at a high table in a Coos Bay OTA joint and told a story to three OTA men and one OTA woman who were sitting with him. They were all drinking cheap and tasteless American lagers.

I sat ten feet away at a table under a stuffed and snarling bobcat, drinking an Oregon ale, and thinking about writing a letter.

The story went something like this: the OTA man had a favorite and ancient webbed lawn chair that was so threadbare in the seat that most of it was shredded and barely supported the man’s weight. It was only a matter of time before collapse.

Until then however, the man liked taking a shit through the hole in the chair when he was too drunk to get up and use the restroom inside the house. He just pulled down his pants and underwear, plopped out a dump, and then pulled his pants and underwear right back up. He didn’t have move all that much and could do it while drinking. Once sobered up, he’d head into the house and wipe his ass if he got around to it.

After hearing this story, his friends exploded into laughter and profane congratulations.

I must assure readers that I never make up anything when it comes to eavesdropping on and later writing up stories in OTA country. There is no need.

Could this lawn chair story possibly be true?

I believed every word of it. Would anyone make up something so practical, improbable, degenerate, absurd and utterly irony-free?

No.

It took me all of five minutes to inspect the crafting vendors row at Coquille’s River Days celebration. Most of the crafters appeared dour, as crafters typically do at these type of rural events. At least some of them had their dogs along to alleviate the boredom. I’ll give these people credit: this is gigging and gigging the hard way, ass to chair for eight hours Friday and Saturday. I’ve done something this at a book fair but for only one day and that nearly broke me as a creative entrepreneur.

The parade was a half hour away and the downtown streets were teeming with people decamped to check out the show. Doubtless, some 4-H kid (is there still 4-H?) would leash up her prize chicken and march that fowl right behind the vintage fire truck and ahead of River Days court.

I’ve seen many of these rural Oregon summer parades and they no longer interest me, especially with so much MAGA shit in sight.

The vintage car show would also be bypassed; I always did wish I had driven an El Camino.

I did step inside the Coquille historical museum and overheard an elderly volunteer explain with incredible detail how Coquille dentists performed oral surgery 150 years ago. I absolutely dug the black and white photos of the volunteer fire departments from the 70s and 80s. Men sure looked better then, an weighed half as much as contemporary American men.

So why Coquille with River Days happening?

OTA, that’s why. I wanted to find an OTA joint in Coquille and see if there was any storytelling action.

I asked a couple of men attired in MAGA wear who were running a food truck specializing in barbecued meats if there was a joint in town. They directed to me to The Corner, a mere two blocks away. One of the men said he’d been there last night but didn’t remember a damn thing.

Seconds later I entered The Corner and beheld its supremely vast and dark interior which included pool tables, a shuffleboard table, disco ball, stage and a professional PA system.

I ordered an IPA from a male bartender who took forever to make two bloody marys for some locals. I stood and waited, hoping for some scuttlebutt, but nothing. Everyone was talking about sports.

At last my beer arrived and I decamped to a far table and whipped out my notebook and pen. My mind drifted to a fabulous woman I’ve known for a long time who grew up in Coquille and doubtless broke a thousand country boy hearts in Coquille High School, home of the Red Devils. One might of thought the school district might have changed the mascot from something satanic, but I’m glad they didn’t.

I have often wondered who I might have become had I grown up in a town like Coquille. Oregon City was working class for sure in my youth, but nothing like Coquille. The close proximity to Portland ruled that out.

There’s no telling.

Nothing much happened in The Corner. I scribbled a few notes and an OTA couple sat near me with food orders that could have fed six people.

On the walk back to the car, I passed some of the unhealthiest Americans I have ever seen and the most misshapen Boy Scout in the history of Scouting. Nevertheless, they were out on the streets in the sunshine, lining up for the parade, bringing their community together to celebrate.

A Saturday afternoon. OTA country in Coos Bay. Eighties Aerosmith rocked the joint. Men’s professional golf and a dirt bike race played on screens. A 200-year-old man worked the slots while drinking a bottle of Bud Light.

Christ! I had just beheld a can of Heidelberg resting on a table. Heidelberg still existed! Not really. The brand had been gobbled up decades ago by some international spirits conglomerate. The same sad thing happened to all the great cheap Pacific Northwest lagers brewed in the Pacific Northwest by union men and women.

I was killing time in an OTA joint before attending an open mic across the street. The music store in my neighborhood hosted the event twice a month. I brought something to read but there was no telling in advance whether there was any kind of literary scene. I would soon find out.

An OTA man a few tables discoursed on muff diving. His name was Ferguson. He drank a bloody mary.

Two OTA females complained at the bar about how their OTA men couldn’t get it up.

An OTA couple entered. He patted her ass and went to the can. She sat at the bar and ordered shots and beer back. An ass pat. True OTA love.

The open mic was minutes away. I looked above to the wall behind me: a snarling taxidermied coyote glaring my way.

Oh yeah, Coos country for damn sure.

An hour later I walked out of the open mic. The smell of mold tickled my nostrils. I had just heard the longest acoustic guitar version of “House of the Rising Sun” ever performed and a Helen Reddy cover. I heard a real pro on mandolin.

At long last, I was back home on the Oregon Coast, and in time, I will gig this open mic. It’s time.