Congratulations! You Have Internet

Go ahead. Use the internet.

It is as if you never left the city. You order a cappuccino so you don’t feel guilty that you asked for the cafe’s wireless password: “All Are Welcome”, no uppercases, no spaces.

You were in a tent the night before. You paid for the tent on the internet. You contacted the host on the 5g LTE, and you used the World Wide Web to get to his house. Then you lost the internet as you got close. And you had to call him on very little cell service to nearly no internet.

The first time you call, it’s dropped .

John says he will call you back on his landline. You see him inside an old as hell farm house and you feel his wealth as his kid comes out and plays on the porch. He’s no rancher, the only wrangling John is doing is of his child, picking her up and swinging her around his back like a hula hoop. The farm you just arrived at has barbed wire deteriorating in a prissy but beautiful way, it’s, so, very, picturesque. The fence gives less of a shit than John did when you asked him for help on getting to the tent you rented.

You rented a tent, you remind yourself of that. You paid more for the tent than you would have paid for a motel, or a hotel back in Poughkeepsie, or New Paltz, or even Woodstock. The grossest part: you have a tent in your trunk. There are thousands of acres around you that you could camp on, but this is easier. You are lazy. At least you think so. But no, maybe not, maybe you’re as hardcore as your car with no hubcaps. You are wild, you sleep in the nature. You call John who comes out to say that he just laid new gravel on the road. Your driveway to nature is paved, your laziness is reassured at least for the moment.

There had been days of rain and it is going to be a pain in the ass getting up the hill to the tent site. It’s beautiful, he says. The foam of the clouds above you cap the valley like a superdome latte. They glow slightly around their soft edges, so much so you have no idea what time it is. You get in your car and you, know, what, time it is.

You drive around the edges of the farm and up the first dirt road John motioned you towards. You see the emblem attached to a metal post for the internet tent company you rented John’s tent from and you turn off one dirt road and onto another.

John didn’t try fucking hard enough to lay gravel. The first thing you see when you pull in is where the vehicle before you had flailed in an attempt to get up the hill. Then you see the gravel, a small band-aid for your Toyota Camry, Grey Goose, that really has no lovely chance. A wingless goose that slips in mud. It flaps and flits. You attempt it anyways.

You roll the camry over a ditch. You build speed as you approach a tight turn slim enough to get you stuck. As you accelerate through it and your wheels spin on the greasy grass. You reverse and then sink. You spin then sink more. Spin then sink, spin then think. The goose is stuffed. It doesn’t make it.

You had thanked John earlier for laying the gravel, this time it's fuck you John. Fuck for saying “Well, in the end it is camping” and you, because you said it. It is as if to say, “You get what you paid for”. As if to say “You lazy fuck”. As if to say, “As if to say”. No John, no it is not camping. No John, I didn’t get what I paid for. This is suppose to be worth one hundred and fifty dollars and what do you want me to do, walk up your gentleman farm? The farm you neutered of it’s self-worth when you retired here early with your family. Look at that hill, it’s steep. Get your six year old out here to spread more gravel. Get her out here to carry the cord of wood and gallons of water that I now need to haul up your gentrified and genteel landscape.

Back in the coffee shop, right after you asked for the “All Are Welcome” no spaces no caps, you tell the Bloomville barista that you spent the last night in an internet tent not far from here. In an implacable accent she asks “Whose?”, now that you have wifi access you pull out your phone you check the receipt while she lists names of people who she knows with internet tents, she says John before you are able to load the transaction. You look up and say “Yeah, that sounds right, it's over this way and beyond that way” and She’s like “Yea yea, that’s John.”

She tells you he made money investing in hay. Huh? Okay. What do you mean hay? Hay futures? He doesn’t grow hay, I saw his farm its as lazy as shit, he didn’t help get my car out of that ditch. He didn’t even help get my stuff up the hill. You tell her he felt rich. She was like yea, around here you really get to know everyone.

You didn't shower. You wished you had. You brushed your teeth out of the trunk of the Goose, with the water that never made it up the hill. And you feel proud that you had the most basic hygiene as you are talking to the barista. So proud. She’s sweet. She gives you instructions on where to buy locally raised hormonal pork or beef or something like that. She tells you where to buy the farm fresh gouda. You thank her and charge your laptop, really you are there because you don’t want to leave. It’s lushious, it feels good. You want a chair, you want electricity and you have someone who you think you can talk to. You’re looking for a connection

Who knows where John is? There is the chance that he will show up and interrupt your charge. She said he comes to the coffee place every once in a while. You brush it off. You’re happy now. There are people like you around. They aren’t charging their laptops. They don’t look like they stayed in a tent. They look slightly happier than you and you are okay with that. You’ve had your coffee. You have your internet. You wait for your friends to arrive so you can watch them, get, up, that hill. Until then, you work like you are in the city. - - -

Common Utilities is a project to get comfortable with the idea of moving Upstate. It was created by Mike Robitz as he looks for land and the complimentary utilities needed to be comfortable within it. If you have suggestions on places/services for him to get comfortable, email him: here.