Many people in Auburn are already aware of who I am.  For those unacquainted, I am the quintessential “outsider,” having moved to Auburn from Chicago in 2000.  I’m 56 years old, divorced twice and along with my son, I operate Carpe Vino, a wine shop, wine bar and fine dining establishment on the plaza of Old Town.

I’ve spent a lifetime arranging words on paper. My modest start came as a Navy journalist and then I earned a degree in communications from Columbia College of Chicago. After learning the true mechanics of writing during a stint with a community newspaper, I embarked on a career in business communications that culminated as a publisher of a number of professional journals. Along the way, I contributed for more than five years to the Chicago Tribune and two national shelter magazines. People here got to know me when I wrote some 100 wine columns for the Auburn Journal.

I landed solidly and permanently in Auburn after spending a life on the road.  Sitting in airplanes for more than a million miles, I’ve circumnavigated the globe twice and worked on and written about nearly every continent.  I’ve made two trips to Vietnam, and I even enjoyed a clandestine, three-day visit to Cuba.

Despite this experience, I find myself woefully unprepared for living here.  I have a unique way of viewing things, and while that may be an asset for a writer, it is a distinct disadvantage for anyone trying to fit into a small town.  Auburn is uniformly conservative; I am not.  Auburn is racially homogenous; I relish diversity.  My personal view is that traditional Auburn is suspicious of newcomers and reticent to accept new ideas; I celebrate both.

There are more and more people like me, however, who now call Auburn “home” . . . so many, in fact, that a census would likely reveal that homegrown Auburnites are now vastly outnumbered by transplants. But we revel in the place for the same reasons as residents who continue the chain of four or more uninterrupted generations.

The point of this column is straightforward: I make it my business to look at issues, people and places from a different angle—from the other side of Auburn—with the perspective of someone who hasn’t sipped the hometown Kool-Aid. Simply put, I don’t immediately subscribe to locally certified preconceived notions, accepted truths, hallowed halls or sacred cows. At the same time, I am loathe to advance an alternate view purely for the sake of being different or contrary. And, oh yeah, I harbor no deep-seated ambition to be mayor. 

Some accuse me of willfully stirring the pot. That’s a charge I find difficult to deny because I’ve never lived in a place that needs it more, and I find it my nature to oblige. Some find it expedient to write me off as an “outspoken” rabble-rouser, unless of course, I promote their point of view . . . which transforms me seamlessly and temporarily into a reasonable and thoughtful advocate. In reality, I’m just a smart-assed writer with a limited sense of fear.

Many people have cautioned me that what I write will cost me business or friends.  Well, as an owner of a wine bar and restaurant, I am fortunate to enjoy more friends than one person could expect to consume in a lifetime. But I know for sure some people—including many civic leaders—avoid my joint as though our French-inspired cuisine is seasoned with anthrax.  But that’s okay, because the foodies and wine nuts from Granite Bay, Sacramento and San Francisco who make the trip to Auburn are none the wiser.

It takes thick skin to do this, and I’ve absorbed barbs and insults in recent years with limited damage to my fragile psyche . . . until last week that is, when I was viciously pistol whipped in a letter to the editor penned by one Therese M. Pope of Auburn. Ms. Pope, exhibiting youthful inexperience and leaning on well-worn themes that are hackneyed even in modern-day Auburn, attacked me personally with the dual intent of embarrassing me and inflicting hurt. She unleashed her tirade with a vengeful zeal that surprised even me.

What incited Ms. Pope’s wrath was one sentence in a column I wrote about the old-school taverns of Auburn. Based on a visit to a downtown bar, I obliquely described a scene in which one patron flashed her breasts. Ms. Pope responded by bludgeoning me with a lengthy letter.

Therese, if your intent was to hurt me, well, congratulations. I’ve been hurt by people I’ve loved. I’ve been hurt by people I’ve trusted. But, I’ve never been hurt by someone I didn’t even know. We’ve never met, and until I wrote this piece, you didn’t have a clue about who I am. 

The most troubling to me of all Ms. Pope’s pronouncements was: “I have a very special fondness for my hometown and I will not allow an ‘outsider,’ who didn’t even grow up here or contribute to the Auburn community over the years, to demean and portray the women of Auburn as bare-breasted harlots.”

While it is no longer acceptable in our society to publicly insult people because of their race or religion, being from somewhere else is clearly still fair game. Just ask the Latinos of our sovereign state. Such intolerance is a learned behavior, so I wonder who taught Ms. Pope her disdain for “outsiders.”

When it comes to Ms. Pope’s charge that I have not contributed to this community, I’ll let others be the judge of that. But her accusation that I created an illusion that all women of Auburn are “prostitutes” is a simply a lie. Those are her words—filtered through her own prejudices—not mine.

My conclusion is that Ms. Pope is angry about something unrelated to me, but she channeled that anger at and through me. I know this is likely true because I’ve been guilty of doing the same thing. And I’d be lying if I did not confess that hurting others with words in the past has, fleetingly, made me feel damned good.

Therese, I’ve read some of your stuff posted on the Internet, and you’ve got some obvious, raw talent. But if you want to be a real writer, you have to work it every day and write about what you know.  Most importantly, focus on marshaling your skills and energy positively. The world will be a better place for it.

And that’s advice I should heed myself.

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Gary Moffat's other writings can be found at www.onlyinauburn.com and www.carpevino.com. He is the co-owner of Carpe Vino in Old Town Auburn and a journalist. His Only in Auburn column publishes weekly in the Sentinel. To subscribe to the Sentinel, call 530-823-2463.

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