Beer-Cave Philosopher

Another Random Meeting, Another Random Conversation

My Honda is pretty much coughing fumes when I pull into JD’s Quick Stop, which also happens to be the home of JD’s Beer Cave.

I’m in central Vermont, right on the edge of the Green Mountain, but not in the Green Mountains. Near enough to the Interstate, but not close enough to matter. Far enough from a gas station that if JD’s and his Beer Cave weren’t here, I might have had a real problem.

The gas pump doesn’t take credit so I go inside. The joint is standard; a counter, snacks, ATM, and in back a big sign pointing to the cooler, or Beer Cave. JD comes out of the auto shop - a tall guy, mid-thirties, wearing blue overalls with mussed hair and grease all over his face.

I pay and we small talk about the weather which for today has been very good, warm and clear.

“Seems like it’s been miserable and raining the past few days,” I say.

“Not just here, this winter was terrible.” He pauses. “I mean, if you like normal winters with snow and what-not.”

Another pause. Then out of nowhere…

“You see what’s happening in Saudi-Arabia.”

Here we go. In the middle of Nowhere, Vermont, at a lonely Beer Cave and the mechanic brings up Saudi-Arabia. Oh boy…

“Once in a generation storms over there. In the desert no less. Floods, sand coming in. Just awful.”

“Thankful we don’t have to deal with that,” I say.

He nods. “Not yet, but if they keep doing what they’re doing we’re gonna.”

“How do you mean?”

“They’re seeding the clouds man, doing all sorts of experiments, just messing everything up.”

Now I’m interested. I lean forward and put my elbows on the counter, like I want to hear a secret. I’m in. “Tell me more,” I whisper.

And boy does he. He gets into it, like he’s been studying, like he’s been waiting a long, long time for someone to ask him. What he talks about is, essentially, cloud seeding, which IS a real thing.

“The government has been doing that shit since World War 2,” he says.

I had to look that up. He’s correct.

“Know what the latest thing is?” I’m all ears. “Drones.”

“Drones?” I say.

“Drones. They send ‘em up and shoot electricity into clouds to make them rain. Can you believe that?”

I can’t, honestly. But later I look that up also, and he’s mostly right again!

I keep waiting for the conspiracy theory part, but it never actually comes. Instead, he says, “You know what the answer here is?”

‘What?” I ask. I really want to know.

“Don’t mess around with, like, the outside. Leave nature alone. Let clouds just be clouds. We screw everything up and then wonder why it rains in the desert.”

“I agree with everything you just said,” I say.

“Well, anyway, here’s your change and the pump is all set up for ya. Need anything else?”

“No, but thanks for the chat.”

“That’s what I’m here for,” says JD as he shuffles back to his shop to contemplate car engines, and apparently world socio-environmental concerns.

I move on, home is calling. The road is a funny place.