Photograph: West Pawlet Quarry

 This is the old slate quarry in West Pawlet, Vermont. Taken in the late afternoon earlier today. You can click on it for a larger version.

Tom

Thoughts: Election Day and the Bigger Picture

It's primary Election Day here in Vermont. So I broke away from work this morning and made the picturesque drive to Pawlet to vote. Turnout is predicted to be low. Vermont is not a heavily Republican state and President Obama is not being challenged. The polling area, judging from the conversations around me, was full of a handful of Republicans, and a handful of Democrats who wanted to influence the Republican challenger.

I have a lot of friends who do not vote. Most of them have their reasons, which on the surface, vary, but which in the end boil down to the fact that they don't think it matters. So, for the next four years, they are likely to chafe under a president they did nothing to elect or push out of office. And they missed something else too. The ballot was full of local issues and questions. In the same election there were a host of questions about the town budget, about town officers, and about many things that affect us directly and at a local level.

While (Thankfully!) Vermonters are a pretty level headed lot and the results will likely reflect the general opinion this go around. It could very easily not be the case. A small group of people could easily move us to a place that we as a group don't want to be. And all who didn't vote will have relinquished the chance to make the positive changes in our lot.

But this post is not about the elections. It's just that the elections got me thinking, and wondering, how many of us simply live unconsciously, going with the flow of life, and don't ever step up and take advantage of the opportunities that life gives us. How many of us flounder and rail against life, when the chance for something better is right inside of us? And yet, like those who don't vote, we do nothing.

My life has not always been an easy one. But one life lesson I have learned is that if I want something to change for the better in my life. I am probably the one who will have to instigate it. I am the one who will have to reach out and try something. My taking the steps doesn't guarantee success, but it increases my chances of a positive change. And when I wait or just hope someone else will, it rarely does.

I don't like being the victim in life. I've let it happen in a few periods of my life and it has never been a good thing. Never. Let me repeat that: NEVER. When it happens, I feel weak, vulnerable, and helpless. When I step up, even when I step up and fail, I feel stronger, full of purpose, empowered.

Voting this morning is a symbol of that for me. I doubt my vote will turn the tide of history. But whichever way the tide turns, I did my bit. I stood up. I have a right to cheer or complain. I am not a victim of history, I am part.

And that is the same thing I want for my life. To stand up. To try. To make the effort, create the changes I want and not hope. God, I believe, rewards those who try. Maybe not always with exactly what we want (though often that does happen!), but with peace of mind, a sense of purpose, and personal power. I'll take that equation any time.

Tom

PS - The picture is of Pawlet's town hall, our local polling place. You can click on it for a larger version.

Thoughts: Neither fish nor fowl

I have been in Virginia for the past few days, visiting with my son and traveling around to various family members. catching up, visiting friends.

Friends and long time readers know that I spent the first 54 years of my life in Virginia. Born there, raised there, had my children there. My parents were from there. I worked in Virginia all my life and through my work, I had traveled most of the nooks and crannys of the state. A history fan, I have visited more old houses, battlefields and obscure little places than you can imagine. I wasn't just "from Virginia", I was a Virginian, through and through. I lived there, and the state lived in me.

I moved to Vermont two and a half years ago to be closer to the woman I love. An unexpected gift of romance and second chances in mid life. For some time, I felt like "A Virginian in Vermont", loving my new New England home, but not feeling quite a part of it.

That is to be expected. Vermonters are delightful people, but Vermont is a rural state. They warm up slowly, get to know you slowly. Anyone who expects to land here and be an immediate part of the fabric of community, is probably in for a disappointment. This is a place for people in for the long haul. And those in for the long haul will be rewarded with deep friendships. But there is no pretend here.

Southerners are raised a little differently, but in reality, we aren't so different. The famed "Southern Hospitality" is more a veneer. It's easy to feel like, when you first hit a Southern town or church, that you are welcomed with open arms and a drop or two of honey. But in reality, under the warm veneer, Southerners too are waiting and biding their time and learning about the visitor. You don't really become part of the fabric of a place any faster in Virginia, than Vermont, trust me. The pretend of it all is, to us in the South, just good manners. It's not designed to be pretend, even if, in a way, it is.

The surprise for me now is that when I visit Virginia, it no longer feels like home. It feels like a place I was from. That's different for me, who was always steeped in the place I lived. For me, where I was from was the same thing as where I was. Now, it seems, it is part of my history. I go past familiar places and they are places where I " used to" do this or that. I have... a history.

For many, this is second nature. They have histories that have moved them from state to state, country to country. For me it was notable. No one, I think, not the woman I love, not my family, not my friends, could see me leaving Virginia. I and the state were one and the same. I was like a cat, tied to a place called Virginia.

If I am still like a cat, I am becoming tied to a new place called Vermont. It is slowly getting under my skin, becoming part of me as I am becoming part of it. I've been visiting some of the homes and museums and battlefields in Vermont. I am slowly learning Vermont politics. My life has shifted to a Vermont pace. Outside my house, I no longer fly the early American flag that was so popular in Colonial Williamsburg,  with the stripes mixed with a Union Jack where the stars normally are. Instead I fly the flag from the Battle of Bennington, one of the earliest battles in the Revolutionary war with a rainbow of stars over a hand crafted "76".  My poetry centers in Vermont. It is where I am from, not just were I live.

But at the same time, there is sort of a limbo. It takes one amount of time for a place to seep into you, but it takes longer for you to become part of a place. In the two or three places and churches I have been part of , it seems like five years is about right. After five years, people think you are there to stay. You are part of the landscape, in a way. They begin to open to you in a way they don't when you are just passing through.

So now, I am neither fish nor fowl. No longer a Virginian. Not quite a Vermonter. Fortunately I am sort of a long haul kind of guy. So I expect to be in Vermont for a long, long time. Long enough that the transition from Virginian to Vermonter that has already begun can be completed. And I am so enjoying the journey. My life is richer for the change. It has changed from a life of familiarity, to a life of discovery, and in that, is great, great joy.

Tom

PS, the picture is of the Bennington Battle Flag, similar to the one I fly outside my house. You can click on it for a larger version.

Pictures: Vermont in Winter

 Taken in Pawlet and West Pawlet, Vermont. You click on each image for larger version.

Tom

Pictures: Vermont in Winter

 Last night we got a few inches of snow. I took an hour off from working (and looking for work) to wander around and take pictures of the winter fairy land in that hour after the sky turned blue, but before the snow melted off the trees.You can click on the images for a larger version.

Lake's Lampshades, one of my favorite shops run by one of my favorite people in Pawlet, Judy Lake.If you haven't visited her shop, you can visit her web site and get a taste of her wonderful work.

A barn on Route 30, on the way to Wells, VT.

A shot of the abandoned slate quarry in West Pawlet (Yes, that Quarry, the one I named my house and company after)

From River Road between Pawlet and West Pawlet.

Also on River Road between Pawlet and West Pawlet.

Dutchies

Regular readers might wonder about the picture above. Certainly it is not pretty, interesting or artistic like most of what I post here. But for those of us here in West Pawlet, Vermont, it's a beautiful image.

Last Winter, in the spot the picture was taken, Dutchie's store caught fire and burnt down. The two men who ran the store and lived in the apartment above it, barely escaped with their lives, and they lost two of their beloved dogs. The store, here for nearly a hundred years, was rubble and ash

This isn't just a news story of another fire. Here in Vermont, country stores are often the heart of the town. They are not just a convenient shop to pick up bread and beer. They are where people gather in the morning and talk. It's where the kids go on Halloween to show off their costumes. It's where triumph and tragedies are shared. Will and Eric, who ran the store, were a combination friend, bartender, therapist, newspaper and more to people here.

For me, a newcomer, the store was where I met people. I would often go down in the mornings and get a cup of coffee and sometimes a breakfast sandwich, and sit for an hour or so reading or writing in my journals. People would come and go and Eric or Will would introduce me, and fill me in on who was who and who was related to who and what they did. That way, I slowly came to know people in this New England town where people are wonderful, nice and kind, but in a typical New England way, also private and not prone to show up on your front porch and say "Hi!"  I've made far less progress in getting to know people here since the store burned down, than I did when they were there.

At Dutchies' you could always find good conversation, on almost anything. At Dutchies, I, and my kids, have made friends, talked politics or fashion, or families, or antiques, and always felt welcome. Always. Were it not for Dutchies, I fear I would always have been just "a Virginian in Vermont". because of Dutchies, I have slowly became a Vermonter.  In a town that at the time only still had the post office and Duchies still open, it was the heart of this village, and losing the store was a blow to West Pawlet's heart.

But not a fatal blow. In fact, losing the store did a lot to bring the area together. A totally grass roots fund raiser brought in over $30,000.00 towards rebuilding Dutchies. A local restaurant added a dollar to the cost of meals to help raise money. A nearby architect donated his services to design the new store. Others gave money, time and heart. That gathering together made local and state news. Other towns had lost their stores, lost their hearts, but this town was not going to let that happen.

And yesterday, the heavy equipment arrived, and began to dig out for the foundation. So this dark, muddy picture is, a picture of hope, of rebirth, of the return of heart. It will take a while, but there is a new joy here in West Pawlet, a new excitement. Our friends are coming back. Our meeting place is returning. The Phoenix is rising from the ashes.

Tom

PS - I know it's not pretty, but you can click on it if you want to see a larger version.

Poem: Truck Memories

 Truck Memories

Your grandfather drove such a truck,
and seeing it now
sweeps the past into the moment
and for a moment you are ten years old again,
watching his rough capable hands
shift the gears, a satisfying
click with each gear signaling
the simple mechanics
of getting from one place
to another without distraction,
able to focus
not on buttons and technology,
but the September high corn, green still
with golden tassels,
on your own past joys,
on lessons learned by life's weather,
the sureness that nearly every complication
your life has,
has nothing to do with richness,
or memory,
or forever.

=====================

The picture was taken as the Consider Barnwell farm, not far from me in West Pawlet where they make the most delicious gourmet cheeses, all named after towns near here in Vermont.

My grandfather really did have such a truck. Riding in it as a boy is one of my fondest memories, ever. 

You can click on the picture for a larger version.

Tom

A Virginian in Vermont - Seasons

I have been in Vermont now about 18 months, long enough to begin to get a feel for the seasons here. Like Virginia, Vermont has four distinct seasons (maybe five, if you include the few weeks in the spring that it rains and rains that the locals call "mud season".

Four distinct seasons is something I always loved about living in Virginia. I have had friends and family move to places like Florida and out west, where the seasons are not as distinct and for me, I would feel something was missing, a sense of losing track of God's own timing, without them.

That's silly of course, a notion, since much of the world does not have the very visible and tactile sense of changing seasons. But having had it all my life, it would be missed.

The four seasons are a delight, but different here than in Virginia. They run different lengths because we are eleven hours north than my birth state.

So winter comes earlier. We had snow here, capping the mountains with a lacy crown of white, in early October. It's now mid November and the locals, when we are gathered together having coffee in Duchies Store, seem surprised that we have not had a "real" snow yet. My daughter, who moved up here with me in June, thinks the idea of a "real" snow in November is unthinkable.

I remember when my sister moved from South Carolina to Virginia. It took a couple of seasons for her to acclimate to the earlier cold. I feel I have adjusted to the timing, but not the severity yet. It gets downright cold up here. People here just go with it, but I suspect when the digits on the thermometer only have one number in them, which is pretty common in winter, I won't fully adjust.

Snow lingers here. In Virginia, even in the western part of the state where I lived for thirty years or so, it snows, and in a day or few, it's mostly gone. Here, snow does not visit, it moves in. The ground stays covered much of the season in it's blanket of white. And the sky is gray much of the season.

No wonder Vermonters love their spring so much. The growing season is short here, but once the snow melts, the gardens here are glorious. And there are more nurseries per capita here than you can imagine. That 11 hour difference means we're not supposed to plant our gardens till after Memorial Day, but once we do, the who area explodes in gardens and color. It's like nature knows it does not have much time and moves in fast motion. By the end of June, the season and gardens have nearly caught up with Virginia, and for a month or two, the seasons seem in sync.

Except that here, with the exception of this summer, there is far less heat, and far less humidity. I did break down and get a window air conditioner in this, the hottest summer in 53 years in Vermont. I think I used it about a week or two all summer. If there is a perfection in weather, it is the normal Vermont summer. A few days in the 80's, mostly high 70's, and low humidity. Perfection for being out side doing anything.

And fall. Oh my. Again, it comes fast. The colors this year began to change in early September. I love fall in Virginia, but there is a light, probably again the 11 hours north difference, that makes Vermont fall color particularly brilliant. I've now had two falls up here, and they are amazing, but short.

Short because winters are long, and so here we are in mid November again, grey and cold and the trees are bare, and everyone is planning their gardens for spring. A beautiful cycle of change, growth, and endings that parallels life.

I do love my seasons.

============

The picture was taken a month ago at Burr and Burton Academy in nearby Manchester. You can click on it for a larger version.

Tom

Poem: A Year in Vermont

A Year In Vermont

You have lived here a year now,
far from the place you were born,
raised, married, suffered, divorced,
and emerged broken

but stronger, pieced together
in this new landscape,
where every vista, every conversation

is different, where even in the bright sunlight,
there is fog,
where you see little, know little,
where the slightest turn

takes you into discovery and lostness, where
you can dance in candlelight
and no one notices, where
you blend in, or at least

almost, where snow piles high in the winter,
higher and colder than you imagined, yet
that very cold makes the spring
more glorious and vibrant, where

summers are short, yet perfect, where
the death of fall shouts from the mountains
like the gleeful cry of a child on a swing, where
your heart is challenged

by newness and fears you never imagined,
growing from the ashes of a life lost
by folly and frailty, it is a place
that is more than a place,

but an adventure that runs deeper
than most could believe, deeper
than a change of scenery,
it is a change of soul.

And so you sit on your front porch,
gazing over the abandoned quarry
at the walls of slate, mountainous high,
grey, yet not forbidding,

but pocked with flowers and grasses
crawling from the cracks, reaching
for the light in the same way
you have done in coming here, reaching

through the rubble to a new place
to grow and transform, flower by flower,
change by change, grey to color,
knowing eternity is not a roar
but a whisper.

=============

Yes, dear readers, it really has been a year since I left my beloved Virginia to come here to Vermont. Time flies. Life changes. It's all an adventure.

The picture was taken near Rupert Vermont. It is hay-making season here, and you can see the rows of silage in the fields with the warm sun. You can click on the image for a larger version.

Tom

Thoughts: Not exactly writer's block

I got an e-mail this weekend from one of my readers, asking if everything was OK, because there has been little new poetry over the past few weeks. The short answer is yes, I am fine, but I am suffering a mild case of writer's block.

Well, not block actually, more like overwhelmedness. Two of the non-writing, non-posting weeks were spent in Italy. Last week of course, I came back, but my mind and my heart is awhirl with thoughts and feelings I cannot quite grasp enough to even write of.

For better or worse, that is a pattern for me. I experience things and often have trouble putting words to it in the moment. I seem to have a need to process them for a time before I can deal with them well. This makes me useless in an argument - I just can't deal with the emotion and think at the same time it seems. Sort of like mental/emotionally not being able to chew gum and walk at the same time.

And that is where I have been the past few weeks. Italy and the trip there stirred all kinds of things in me, particularly the time in Venice, which sang to my spirit in a way I cannot yet, weeks later, fully quantify or explain. That is the glory of travel I think - it not just exposes you to new things, it changes you for experiencing them. Two weeks in a place gives you time to not just see sights, but to begin experiencing the pace of life, the feel of things, to soak the place into your mind and soul, to change as a result.

I am also looking at the fact that I have now been in Vermont a year. I know a year is an artificial marker of time - there is certainly nothing magical in it. Yet we humans seem to be wired to give some significance to time, and a year is a substantial time to be in a new place, particularly for someone like me who has lived in one place, Virginia, all his life.

Vermont is changing me. Relationally, creatively, spiritually, there are changes going on and again, as I look at them, they are more whirling around like vague spirits on All Hallows Eve than anything I can point to and talk to very well.

This will settle down. I am not fretting over it. I'm old enough to have experienced it before and know what's going on. It's a time to simply be still a while and let it settle down, like mud in a pond, it will settle and what's underneath will make itself clear in time.

And as it becomes clear, I will write. Writing poetry, for me, is part of the internal process. It is my beginning (only beginning) see the bottom of the pond as thing settle, my attempt to describe the shapes of things in the fog of life as they come closer.

So bear with me dear readers (and you are dear to me), and wait. The mud will settle. The fog will lift. And poetry will come.

Tom

============

PS - the picture is from the tomb of the unknown soldier, in the midst of Rome. You can click on it for a larger version.

A Virginian in Vermont: Christmas Decorations

When I was growing up in Richmond, Virginia. January first was the day all the Christmas decorations had to be down by. It was do or die, and no matter what else was going on, the decorations came down. I don't know what the reason was, but I do know that either New Year's Eve or New Year's day was marked by pulling down the tree, packing up the lights, and rendering the house devoid of the celebration that was Christmas.

It wasn't just us. The entire neighbor hood went from fairly land of lights and wreaths to Plainville, USA overnight.

Traditions dies hard, and when I had a house of my own, I continued the habit (I hesitate to call it tradition, because no one could really tell me WHY we took everything down.), and did the same thing, making sure everything was down and packed away by New Year's, year after year for twenty five years or so.

Take a look at your calendar. And then at the pictures in this post. They were all taken in the last week or so. Yep, it's still Christmas in Vermont. People here keep their decorations up an extra special long time.


I like to think it's because they want to extend the Christmas season, to have reminders of Christ's birth around them for months instead of a few weeks, that somehow Vermonters are a celebratory lot. But asking around give me a does of reality - Winters are brutal around here and people don't spend a lot of extra time outside in the cold and snow.

OK, I can accept reality, even when it doesn't jibe with my rose colored glasses view of the world. Still, whatever the reason, the result, for me, is the same - a months long reminder of the joy of Christmas as you drive by houses with wreaths on the door, or the manger scene in front of Rupert United Methodist Church, or the houses still running their lights late into the night.

I have gotten into the spirit, leaving my wreath up late into Winter. There must be some sort of Vermont magic, because it was a "real" wreath of pine, yet three months after Thanksgiving, it was still green, not brown and dried. I like to think that it's God preserving the Celebration, but I know it's really just too cold to dry out completely. Freezing things is a favorite way to preserve things, after all.


So here I am in March, still surrounded by Christmas and loving it. Maybe we'll think about taking things down by Easter here in Vermont. But I am in no hurry.

Tom

PS, the pictures were all taken in West Pawlet, VT. You can click on them for a larger version.