Napping on the Quaalude Sofa

Napping on the Quaalude Sofa

It’s been a long time since we’ve done this. I’ve only been with Kim for fourteen years, but I can honestly say that I haven’t done this since the ‘80’s, when it was all the rage. And then we did it more in the Hamptons than anywhere else. It’s nice to do it again and I have to be honest and say that it was not without some trepidation that I agreed. There’s a part of me that thinks I’m getting too old for this. It’s a long holiday weekend that is sort of religious, but not so much for non-religious types like us. It’s the Easter/Passover weekend so we have the time to do this all in very casual manner and with no pressure. We can take things as they come. We can feel comfortable experimenting and getting back into it at our own pace. We’ve put off going off on the motorcycles until tomorrow, so today is the perfect day to begin.

We agreed with Chris and Ann to come up to their country house in Duchess County for the weekend. That’s a big deal. We know them from a number of motorcycle trips, but there are always other people around and we are usually at hotels. Being a weekend guest at somebody’s country house and deciding to spend two whole days with one other couple doing whatever fancies us is a big departure from normal weekend protocol…for both couples. What to eat, when to eat, what to drink, when to drink all must be considered. At the moment Chris is preparing dinner with the main event being a roast that has been put into the wood-fired smoker on the patio before it gets put into the pre-heated oven to get crisped. Kim and Ann are coloring Easter eggs for Ann’s hollow Easter egg collection. Bob Dylan is wailing on his harmonica over the central speaker system. I have chosen to come into the living room and take a nap of sorts on the Quaalude Sofa that was made famous in the 2013 Wolf of Wall Street movie scene when DiCaprio and Hill decide to hit the Quaalude 714’s hard.

You see, Chris is a movie Art Director who has worked on many movies including The Wolf of Wall Street. As the guy who sets the visual tone for these movies, I guess he’s in the front row when it’s time to sell off the props. As it turns out, he needed a sofa for his Duchess County house and hence, the Quaalude Sofa is here for me to nap on this lazy weekend.

People who live in New York City understand this, but I’m not sure everyone around the country does. You get a weekend house to have somewhere to go to keep you sane in the fast-paced NYC lifestyle. Your choices are generally shore or country. The shore is the Hamptons (too much traffic and too much like NYC in terms of the money culture), the Jersey Shore (too much traffic and too much attitude), the North Shore of Long Island (too snooty) and the Connecticut/Rhode Island shore (too much pink and green Country Club stuff). The country is far more open-ended, but generally means the Poconos (yikes, too many heart-shaped tubs), the Catskills (too much borscht-belt and bungalow colonies) and the Hudson Valley. The Hudson Valley is further broken down as Westchester County (too much polo), Putnam County (CPW and 5th Ave.), Columbia County (Upper West Side, Columbia Professors), the Berkshires (nice, but too damn far) and Dutchess County (just right – I am expecting my hosts to read this while I’m still a guest).

Almost all of these places are populated with one local for every twenty weekenders. That means the locals make their living off serving the weekenders. They sell them Sunday New York Times for $10, they import Brooklyn lox and bagels, they offer every form of service from lawn mowing to handyman to plumbing services that would make Cosmo Castorini blush. Basically, what city dwellers want in a weekend house is to have all the comforts of the city with some fresh air. They all say they don’t socialize when at their weekend houses, but then they invite friends to join them for the weekend. The problem is that they all have weekend houses and no one is available to join them. That’s probably why we haven’t done this for so long. Our country house is in Ithaca which is WAY too far for a weekend according to Kim. That means we are perfectly available for weekends like this. Maybe we can rent ourselves out…now there’s an idea.

The best part of country weekends is that they are totally unstructured and don’t involve much screen time (TV or movies). While the womenfolk did some shopping in the quaint stores of the local burg, Chris and I did manly stuff like crank up the smoker and take a tour of Chris’ wood shop, metal shop, barn and garage. The highlight was updating the registration stickers on the five motorcycles he keeps (2 Ducati’s, a Triumph, a Honda and a Suzuki). You know Chris is a man’s man because he knew exactly where his razor scraper was. I’m not sure I could claim the same given its annual usage schedule.

Tomorrow the weather will be nice and we will pick a bike from the stable and go for a ride through the country while Kim and Ann find another burg to strip of it’s cute offerings. We will likely have a nice lunch of leftovers, comment about why we weren’t inclined to go to church on Easter, thank each other profusely for the fine weekend and then make our way down what I like to call The Cat & Mouse Parkway (The Taconic Parkway) with all the other New Yorkers working their way back into the City.

Chris and Ann have not asked yet, but I have lived in New York for forty-three years now and owned three weekend homes (shore, country and remote country), so I know the drill. Yes, we brought some nice items as gifts on arrival, but our greatest gift comes when it’s time to leave. You see, weekenders create weekend trash and all the dumps are closed on Sunday. On the way down the Taconic on Sunday, every rest stop will have a mountain of trash bags piled around the waste can despite admonition against littering or dumping. New Yorkers are scared of trash. So as good weekend guests, we will offer to take home a bag of trash. How often do you get to nap on a Quaalude Sofa, right?