Hardwick Vermont

In the midst of a tedious work project, I took my laptop to the laundromat, which promised the double advantage of using a clothes dryer and providing me with a clean, well-lighted place. Hardwick’s a slow place this time of year, and I had banked on a quiet space.

As things turned out, I ended up closing my laptop and chatting with a woman working there. She shared stories about growing up in town, sixty years ago, and showed me her scars from heart surgery. And then – as though I were someone else entirely different – I told her a half-pretend life for myself.

I couldn’t do much about my careless ponytail, but I created a different occupation, a husband with a steady salary, and a childhood in Maine. While my daughters are brightening up the house with Christmas carols, my laundromat foray qualifies as November humor in Vermont.

…Not yesterday I learned to know
The love of bare November days
Before the coming of the snow…

– Robert Frost, “My November Guest”

West Woodbury, Vermont

Driving through Hardwick, Vermont, last night, beneath a crescent moon, the 11-year-olds in the backseat playing a word game and clapping, the 17-year-old dreaming thoughtfully at the wheel, I marveled at how good Hardwick looks in the dark, the handful of streets lit up, the Town House’s double doors open for a musical, foyer chandelier shining welcomingly.

Run-down Hardwick, with its perpetually empty storefronts, the town of two auto parts stores, five gas stations with cheap greasy food, one food co-0p with pricy produce, and one thrift store. Reservoir of cheap beer and highly-taxed cigarettes and way too many scratch-off tickets. A town of more well-heeled days, called theirs now by those who have moved in with plenty of money or education or both, while those who have lived here for generations frequently are scant on both.

I left the Town House before the finale, standing outside in the cold. Freakishly, a structural fire burned behind the Town House, bright flames turning billowing smoke and steam bright red, split through with blue police lights. The cold gnawed at my feet. Overhead, clusters of stars and that curl of moon pushed through the streetlights and hazy atmosphere. From the closed doors, I heard a girl’s clear song, her voice graceful as a heron in flight, slowly winging its way through the sky.

Oh, there’s nothing wrong with the children. Only the governesses.

The Sound of Music, 1965

Hardwick, Vermont

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