You Can't Make This Stuff Up

Brian and I had a lovely shortened week at the beach and then wonderful concerts at Tanglewood in Massachusetts. On our last night there, we had a lovely French meal at Zin.c in Le.nox, We walk a bit and see red light emitting from what appeared to be an underground dwelling, an establishment called Ru.mpies. Hmmm, you have to walk down the dimly red lit stairs to enter this pub dug below the bed and breakfast. Brian looks at me and says, "Well, it would be an adventure." And so I laugh, and we quickly discover that you can't make this stuff up.

The pub is lit with only red lights, except the numbers from the cash register emitting a faint mocking greenish glow. Red Christmas lights wind around what appear to be snarled twigs in the windows situated just above the ground. Lava lamps with red ooze sit on the L-shaped bar, and red lights shine over a corner area for musicians. We settle into seats at the corner of the L, and watch as the hosts of "Open Mic Night," Robbie and Lefty get set up. The bartender finishes opening a bottle of red to pour a full glass of wine for a women who disappears through a door marked with an exit sign--red--of course.

We sit down and Troy with a wide smile says "Welcome, to a place you never thought you'd come to."
Weird, how did he know?
"What'll you have?"
"What was that you just poured?" I ask.
"Cabernet"
"I'll have that."
"Me, too," Brian echos.

We toast and settle in as our adventure continues. We listen to Lefty say nothing and Robbie quip jokes with Troy, like a warm-up for his stand-up act. Another couple enters confidently, sits at the bar, orders a beer and mixed drink, and checks the magic eight balls on the bar. The plastic advice-giving spheres are conveniently placed, likely for those who can't decide what to drink, who to hit on, or whether to pick another day to quit smoking. Joe and Jan (not their real names) can't read the eight balls in the thick red light, despite the red lamplight that seeps through the windows from the outside door, so they reach the mini-flashlights attached to the bar with cords (apparently drunk people have sticky fingers), for just such a purpose.
"It is decidedly so."
So, Jan asks Troy for the lighter, one of those gas grill ones with a flint, and goes outside with a cig in the other hand.

Just after she returns to continue the eight ball fortune-seeking fun, a 60-something man (I'll call him Bob.) escorts a short stocky blind guy from the red exit-sign door and gives us a wary look.
"Here's your seat, Jack."
He shoots another look to Troy, who takes a bottle of Bailey's from the bar and pours a healthy glass.
"Here's your drink, Jack."
Troy pours an ice-tea-sized glass with B&B and walks it over to Bob, who has taken a seat on one of the church pews that now serves a different kind of parishioner. On the way back from serving Bob's drink, Troy reaches above my head and turns on a light with a focused bright, though red, beam for the Robbie and Lefty Show.
"Whoa, that's quite a spotlight, and red too." I exclaim.
(Yup, in real life, one actually discovers that one exclaims when experiencing a "Where's Waldo's red light moment.")

The canned circa 1930s music is turned off and the strange red Ru.mpie bar is quiet for close to ten minutes. We watch quiet Leffy set up his drums. Robbie Robbie tunes, delivering another stand-up line.
"Where we care enough to tune."
Robby and Lefty's playlist includes some Billy Joel, John Mayer, and Beatles to name a few, and following the applause Robbie launches into full comedy mode with "yadda, yadda" and plenty of self-deprecating Yiddish humor. We applaud and laugh, and the cast of characters grows.

In walks, single white blondish girl with bad teeth, no need for the magic eight ball to tell her to go out for a smoke, and no need to ask Troy to pour a glass of something red. Jennifer, the instigator of the uncorking of the bottle of red reappears. Entering from the exit door, I swear there is no light from behind that door. It's as though she emerged from Muggleland to the sister bar to Ha.rry Po.tter's pub, The Three Br.oom Sti.cks. With an announcement of "What a effin' week," she grabs an already poured B&B on ice at the bar, and takes her place in a proper bar chair across the table from parishioner Bob.

"Tanglewood, Schmanglewood. Who needs it when you got us!" Robbie declaims.

All laugh, and I think, "If he plays 'That Old Black Magic' I'll know I'm in some Bershire Bus Stop reality-play."
Their next song is interrupted by a ring tone. Troy surveys the cast--not the misplaced tourists, not the magic eight-ball couple, not other white girl or B&B Bob and Jen or . . .
"Hello . . . yeah . . . It's OK, I'm playin' . . . "
"Lefty, is that you!" Robbie strums what might have been a chord, abruptly halting the tune and turns to look at his partner.
"It's Chenelle."
"What?!! Whose Chenelle?"
"My girlfriend . . . yeah, that's fine . . . OK, see ya then."
We laugh and applaud. Robbie groans.
"She's French," Lefty explains.
"OH!" we all respond as if the script had called for it, and the playwright had included the instructions, "with jovial laughter and exuberant applause."
Robbie strums randomly, and Jennifer lets us know that the registers were down for the lunch rush upstairs in Mugg.leland Bed and Breakfast.
"Sing a song, Jen. You'll feel better," Troy yells as he comes from the bar with the bottle of B&B to refill their glasses.
"Nah."
Blonde girl with waiting unlit cigarette in hand adjusts her long face enough to smile and chime, "Yeah, come on, Jen, sing."
Troy flashes us a smile as he lifts the bar "gate" and I catch the bumper sticker slapped onto the underside. It reads, 'If anything good can happen, it will."
Bob plays guitar and Jen sings "You got a Friend." Jen, it turns out carries a master's degree in vocal performance from a known New England school. Jack, it turns out has been visiting this same Inn and bar for over 10 years. He finishes the bottle of Bailey's, and Troy lists his other drinking options.
"The first time I met, Jack," Jen explains, "He asked if he could have an orange juice."
"Oh, yeah," Jack nods in agreement tapping his fingers in excitement on the bar.
"I told him, he could have it, but I wasn't going to tell him where I put it."
Jack and Jen roar with laughter at their well-worn joke. This opens a series of blind jokes from Jack and Jen, with a few thrown in from Troy for good measure.
The music resumes, and we applaud graciously for our excellent adventure.

Brian orders a beer and I choose water. I don't want to miss a thing, after all, if anything good can happen, it will. And you can't make this stuff up.