Voodoo Donuts // sharing is caring

I once read a poem that equated Valentine’s Day with venereal disease. I thought that experience would be an isolated event, but a trip to Portland proved me very wrong.

Most people don’t go on vacation expecting the topic of sexually transmitted diseases to be a prevalent motif of the trip. I certainly didn’t. What a fool I was. I should have known; the very purpose of my visit to the west coast’s hipster mecca was to attend the Sigma Tau Delta (STD) English Conference. Evidently, when the initials didn’t tip me off, the universe figured I needed more obvious hints.

In a conference wide meeting, I was inundated by a flood of innuendos, or in-your-windows as my mother is wont to call them.

“STD! Spread the love . . . of literature”

“We always test positive!”

Needless to say, I got it. At which point someone attempted to coerce me into buying a bright red t-shirt with the words “The Dickens are bigger in Texas” scrawled across the chest in the Bleeding Cowboys font. There were so many things wrong with that. From the red to the font to the words to the fact that the seller’s eyes were borderline rapey.

It was all very scary.

In any case, we eventually ended up standing in the seemingly infinite line in front of Voodoo Donuts, in a dim alley in the middle of Portland, OR. A pink sticker on the window said “Get VD in Portland” in bright, cheery letters. A few drunk partygoers stumbled out of their limo and into the line behind us. Someone told us this was the best donut shop in the world.

Ten minutes later, with an Arnold Palmer donut in my hand, I understood why. I only caught blips of the conversation around me as I reveled in flavor. I knew I’d regret it later, but donuts are about living in the moment, so that’s what I did.

Thirty minutes later, the conversation about cannibals and trust finished with a suitable but inappropriate bang and we followed the cold back onto the street. I was somewhat listlessly following my group when one of the men leaning cold against the brick wall caught my eye, his blonde hair curling with his grin.

“Spare a dollar for a donut?” he asked, pulling his ragged sweater closer around his body. I grinned back. Spread the love, right? I handed him a few dollars and a smile. A few minutes later, he emerged, bright faced from the warmth of Voodoo donuts, opening a paper bag to share his haul with a couple friends.

A little lesson about the small things, I guess.