Jodie Arnold
Hell, Michigan is an unincorporated community with a whopping THREE business fronts and a population of 72 people. And I was mayor for one day. Yes, you read that correctly. I was mayor of Hell for one day.
Let’s back up a minute.
I just had one of those “quarantine birthdays” and honestly, I didn’t mind. I’m 41-years-old. All I really wanted for my birthday was to drink before noon and not clean the house, which is coincidentally what I’ve been doing a lot since March.
My fiancé’ had purchased my “mayor of Hell for a day” birthday gift with the intentions of us actually visiting there (obviously this was in “pre-Covid times”). Then he looked at the prices for flights and pretty soon that idea was abandoned. I was left with an extremely socially-distanced mayoral term and a huge packet of unusual “Hell—themed” merchandise, including legal ownership of one-square-foot of Hell (I even got dirt), a coffee mug, and devil horns. I wasn’t really sure what it all meant.
He casually mentioned to me, “I think they might be calling you a few times today or something?”
The first call from Tristan came during the morning. “WHAT IN THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN DOING ALL MORNING?” she shouted at me before following up with a, “I heard it’s your damn birthday and you’re mayor of Hell for the day so let’s get this swearing in ceremony over.” We went through whatever one does to become Hell’s mayor and then she said,” Your accent…are you from Wisconsin?”
It turns out Tristan has family from all over Wisconsin. She loves Point Beer. She’s been to Chippewa Falls. We talked about the Midwest and the general “weirdness” of life right now. At some point, it stopped being a funny call about some temporary mayoral gimmick and we just started talking.
Tristan has been out of work since March 26. “Work” being running the tourism of a place like Hell, Michigan. You can imagine with a name like that, people from all over want to come for at least the magnet and photo next to the town sign. She’s been trying to figure out unemployment, but couldn’t get an answer. She told me she had to keep coming to work because otherwise it would all go away and then what would happen to the town? She owed it to people like me to make the most of my day in Hell.
Her entire day was committed to harassing me with phone calls, demanding me to make laws for the town (I decreed the town could only drink Busch Light, and that was a problem, as it should be) and eventually having me impeached around 6 p.m. She was getting paid for none of this and that was not lost on me.
After my impeachment, Tristan gave me tips on a cheap way to get to Hell. (the jokes write themselves, folks). I promised we’d visit. She said she’ll always be there.
Jodie Arnold just graduated from UWEC with her Master of Arts in Creative Writing. She writes plays, creative non-fiction, radio dramas, and poetry and has been published in Volume One, Twig, Nourrir Magazine, and NOTA. When she’s not writing, she’s co-hosting a podcast called “Cool & Unusual Punishment” and making fun of men (it’s almost always men) who post Craigslist Missed Connections. She’s a mother of twin boys and has plans to get married once she can grocery shop with her fiancé’ again.