“Yep. That there is your propane tank,” Bruce the Propane Guy states matter of factly, pointing to what looks like a very small, abandoned, submarine – dry-docked and hidden behind some wild rhododendrons.

“Huh.” i say, not quite convinced. “i somehow thought it would be….bigger.”

And maybe not so covered in rust.

And maybe like it came from this century.

Is that thing safe?

“Is it working properly?” i ask instead.

“Oh yeah! But that’s why I’m here. Law says you gotta do a ‘change in ownership’ walk through – check for leaks, make sure the pilot light turns off and on, and show the new owner how to work it.. you know.”

 

i didn’t know. But i nodded sagely, hoping i looked like i knew what he was talking about and thinking that it all sounded like a Very Good Idea.

“Ok,” i say. “i’m from around here, grew up in the country, but i never had a propane tank before. i need to learn everything i can about it.”

“Where are you from?” he asks.

i kinda thought i just told him. 

“Well…..here. Like, just up the highway. But i recently moved to California and it didn’t take. So i’m back.”

“Uh-huh,” he says sizing me up and instantly, i knew i’d made a mistake.

Oregonians really hate Californians. It goes back to the 80’s when California was becoming just too dang crowded, and looking north, Oregon started looking like a good place to live. A mad rush of Californians, with California money, emigrated north, gobbling up land and realty, creating a shark-feed of a seller’s market, and driving housing prices up and out of the range of the average Oregonian’s pocketbook.

In time, the resettled Californians realized that the beautiful greenery of Oregon is actually sustained by 9 months of rain – water that actually FALLS FROM THE SKY – and many left after only a few years, going back to the land of sun, palm trees and beautiful people. Oregon’s big housing bubble burst. Costs plummeted, and thousands of Oregonians found themselves upside down in overpriced homes and big mortgages that were now worth half of what they paid. You couldn’t give away a house. Land became dirt cheap and the economy stumbled.

Oregon disappeared off the map once again.

Of course, there were lots of factors affecting this, but it’s just easier to blame the Californians.

And so a contempt, bearing on hatred, of Californians spread through the Oregon grass-roots and cowboy/indian/pioneer stock and it has lasted for DECADES. It is such an integral part of being an Oregonian that most folks don’t even question it or where it came from. It really is remarkable.

And now, looking up at this tall, lanky man in muck boots and faded jeans, with his mid-2000’s flip phone hooked to his  worn, brown leather belt and a wooden toothpick permanently tucked into the side of his grey and grizzled whiskered mouth, i saw a look that was a mixture of smugness and pity.

“Where abouts in California?” He asked.

Oh boy.

“Umm….the…..the bay area.” i say resignedly, knowing that this just sealed the deal on his downwardly-spiraling opinion of me.

“Uh huh.” He responds noncommittally, looking me up and down once more.

“Yes, but i really am from around here! Born and raised!” i blurt out pathetically. But it didn’t matter. In Bruce the Propane Guy’s eyes i was now and forever branded a CALIFORNIAN.

Propane Guy went back to the task of explaining where to find the meter (AHA! it’s UNDER that rusted metal flappy thing!) and, dumbing it waaaaay down, showed me the dial and how to read the numbers 0 to 100. i was JUST about to comment that i had heard a 100 gallon tank was really small, when he said that my tank had just been 100% filled even though the meter only indicated 80%.

Percent?? Those numbers are percents not pounds?

By some miracle, before that slipped out of my pie hole, Bruce explained that they only fill it to 80% to give room for the propane to expand – that 80% was really 100% for all intents and purposes and that it equalled about 135 pounds. Then some stuff about liquid and gas and transporting and filling and venting and lighting and how one of his clients had a leak for a month and didn’t catch it and if the wind took that gas into an open shed and then you closed it you could have a real problem and all i heard was —

“THIS COULD EXPLODE AT ANY TIME”

and i backed away from the tiny nuclear submarine.

“How about you show me where that pilot light is?” i ask.

He nods and starts making his way through the very wet and overgrown grass toward the house.

i shuffle along behind him and making conversation, say, “Thanks for coming by. i’m sorry for the tall grass.”

He stops abruptly and turns to me.

“You’re sorry for GRASS?” He asks incredulously.

“i..i mean i’m sorry it’s so tall and so wet and you have to walk through it,” i stammer stupidly.

“Man, you really ARE a Californian!” He exclaims loudly, and shaking his head, he turns and continues walking in to the house chuckling and repeating to himself, “Sorry for grass? Can you beat that! Sorry for grass!”

SON of a biscuit.

i sigh audibly, and resigning myself to the role of dumb city-slicker, i follow Propane Guy into the house where he shows me more explosive stuff you light with fire and explains how my propane gas fireplace is a “woman’s fireplace”.  i can just turn it on and stand right next to it, he explains, because just like his wife, all women are cold-blooded and want the house too dang hot but like all men who are tough and rugged and not susceptible to effeminate temperature fluctuations, he can sit in his armchair like a real human being and not get overheated. See? Everyone is happy!

And while i wonder how happy the wife is hugging a stone fireplace for hours, unable to sit down, he launches into a story of how he once, while sitting in his Marlboro Man-chair, looked out the window and saw a big deer in his pasture with his horse and how he got his gun to shoot it, but was concerned he would shoot his horse instead and then his wife said something to him and when he looked back it was gone.

All i can think of is that his horse is either very very lucky or very very unlucky.

Then, he abruptly turns and heads out the door again.

“C’mere! I want to show you one more thing!” He shouts over his shoulder as he strides away from me and out into the yard, toward the propane submarine again.

i jog to catch up and arrive at the tank to find him turning some levers, unscrewing a small hose and pointing toward the pencil-eraser sized opening.

“Now some people will tell you to turn off your pilot light in the summer. In fact, EVERYONE out there will tell you that. They will say that the pilot light lets off a little heat and that’s no good in the hot summer and that it will save you money on gas. Now, they don’t have the experience I have and they don’t know what I do.” He puffs up his chest and points to his company’s logo on his khaki, button-up shirt.

“Me and my wife been doing this 30 years and there’s no need to be shutting off your pilot light in the summer. It only costs a few dollars a month to keep lit and the heat is nothing you can’t handle. Besides, there is one VERY good reason to keep it lit.”

He pauses dramatically. i wait, unable to predict what the reason might be. Does gas continually leak a bit when it’s shut off? When i strike a match to light a candle will i go boom? Is this one more thing that is going to cause this whole place to explode?

Finally, he answers his own question.

“PROPANE SPIDERS.”

He looks at me, nodding knowingly as if he were Yoda imparting secret Jedi knowledge to Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Wait…what?

“Yep,” he continues, probably mistaking my look of confusion as one of actual interest. “PROPANE SPIDERS.” He repeats slowly and dramatically.

“Ok, i give.” i finally reply. “What are propane spiders?”

“Well, of course that’s not their real name.”

Of course.

“But we call them propane spiders because they are the only spider small enough to actually get into this tube and crawl through the lines. It’s actually the female spiders who are attracted to the propane lines. I guess propane is what you call an aphrodisiac to the females.”

“What?” i say trying not to burst out laughing, “Are you saying that propane makes these spiders hinky? Amorous propane spiders? Arachnids gettin’ jiggy with the propane?”

“Yeah!” Propane Guy says, flashing a smile before going back into Jedi Master mode. “See, these females are attracted to the gas and it gets them ‘in the mood’ so to speak, and makes them more receptive to the males that follow them in. They lay their eggs in the lines.”

WAIT… WHAT??

Holy mother of creepy crawlies did he just say they lay their eggs in the propane lines? TO THE HOUSE?

“WHAT?” i exclaim in a slightly-screamy voice. “They lay EGGS in the lines?? What happens when they hatch???”

i sound a teeny bit hysterical because, i think i know. i don’t want him to tell me. Oh no, don’t say it…

“Well….” he shrugs and wiggles his fingers while he lifts his hands up and out away from his body. “They go everywhere. In the house.”

Oh. My. Holy. HELL!!! Thousands of baby propane spiders crawling up the lines and through my fireplace and into my house!!  i look at him in horror.

“THAT’s why you wanna keep that pilot light lit. To keep them from getting in the house.” He sinks the point in with a meaningful stare.

And now every morning when i wake up and every night when i go to sleep and every time i leave the house to do anything, i get on my knees and saying a little prayer of thanks to Bruce the Propane Guy, i look into the fireplace, past the iron grating holding the fake, molded logs to the tiny blue flame that is all that is separating me from hordes of thousands upon thousands of tiny propane spiders.

Burn on tiny blue pilot light.

Burn on.

 

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