Meeting up with the purple pizza eaters

This is one of those towns that appear suddenly as you round a forested bend in the road. Had you not read a map or seen a sign, you wouldn’t have known there was anything up here but a lonely highway through the mountains.

It’s late in the day as we come upon it, after what seems like an endless trip up 89 from Hallelujah Junction, past patches of open farmland and grazing cows.

Greenville is in Plumas County just south of Lake Almanor, and is a town of 2,000 souls and no restaurant, although I was told by a local, “We’re supposed to get one soon.” What they have now is a combination hamburger joint and pizza parlor, which, if you’ll forgive my priggish attitude, hardly qualifies as a restaurant.

That there is little else to do in town except chow down on burgers or pizza, and engage in whatever might pass as entertainment, is evidenced by the front page of the Indian Valley Record, which, among other local areas, serves Greenville. The entire top half of Page 1 is taken up with a photograph of the Greenville High homecoming queen and her princess. The bottom half includes a story of an elderly woman who, seeking fun in her life, had her hair and the hair of her poodle dyed in matching shades of lavender. A picture of the unfortunate couple accompanies the piece.

Living in L.A., I can relate to the lavender-haired woman and her purplish pooch but not to front-page play for a high school homecoming queen, unless she’s just committed the crime of the century. But this is the stuff of small towns, where events that are usually lost in the cynicism of large cities become matters of importance in communities where people actually know and care about each other.

It is beginning to rain as we check into the first motel we come to, a series of cabins set off the road in a grove of oak trees. The manager is a cigarette-smoking woman whose office is her living quarters, a place of pleasant disarray and a barking basset hound. We have left our dog, Barkley, in the car while we register, but he is going bonkers trying to get out to create a contrapuntal barking duet.

I worry that the manager will say enough is enough, too many dogs spoil the soup, or something similarly mountainish, and send us on our way. But she doesn’t seem to notice the calamity and we settle in to a pleasant cabin with a TV set, which I immediately turn to the news. That’s a mistake. We are here to disconnect from the trauma of the real world, but there it all is on television, the killings, the stupidity, the greed, the downhill slide toward Armageddon. We turn it off and pretend, at least for a lovely moment, that it isn’t happening.

I have given up martinis for most of, but not all of, the trip and stop at the local market to buy a bottle of wine to enjoy at the pizza parlor where we have decided to eat. It’s the only option. The hamburger section, if you can believe this, has run out of hamburger, and buns alone do not make a meal. I’m glad I bought the wine at the store, because the pizza parlor offers only something pink called “blush,” which I am not prepared to drink, however desperate I might become.

The rain is heavier now and the wind is blowing, both of which cause Barkley to stand at the window barking. Our old dog, Hoover, used to bark at the weather too and at the garbage disposal, the icemaker and a clock that bonged the hour. What truly mystifies Barkley is the pitter-patter of acorns, loosened by the wind, rattling on the roof of the cabin.

He stands in the middle of the room, looking up silently, undoubtedly wondering if we are under attack from outer space and what to do about it. His tail never stops wagging, indicating, one supposes, that he will greet them as a friend. “Welcome to Earth, wanna share a bone?”

I take him out for a walk to ease his apprehension and meet the cigarette-smoking manager with her dog, the basset hound. We exchange pleasantries and then she says, apropos to nothing, “You will be out by 11 a.m., won’t you?” It is about the third time she has said that to us, suggesting that we appear to be the kind of people who might take over the cabin and refuse to leave, holing up inside with shotguns and blush wine, until way past the 11 a.m. checkout time.

As we prepare to leave the next morning, we see her among the oak trees, watching suspiciously. But once we have cleared the abode, she relaxes and waves, content in the knowledge that the cabin has once more reverted to her care.

“I would shrivel up and die in this town within a month,” I say, as we drive northward toward Lake Almanor, shimmering in the distance. “But for one night I can endure its, well, rustic charm.”

“Look on the bright side,” Cinelli says, forever positive, “it’s not likely to be a terrorist target.”

Amen.

(To be continued)

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Al’s column appears Mondays and Fridays. He’s at al.martinez@latimes.com