A while back, during Earth Week, I met a woman named Monika Riney, who belongs to the Winthrop Green Committee and helped organize some wonderful activities to celebrate that special week. These activities included movies, a tour of a farm that was hosting community gardens, and a public supper featuring local food. My husband, Clif, and I thoroughly enjoyed the week, and one of the pleasures was getting to know Monika, who has a farm called Wildermirth Farm in East Winthrop, which, as she puts it, is “a vegan farm where nobody is killed.” And on that farm, she has hens, who do what all good hens do—they lay eggs. In a recent email, Monika wrote, “The yolks are a yellow/orange because the girls have a varied diet that includes cracked corn and a lot of fresh greens.(They’re the middle managers in my compost factory.)”

Last night, Monika came to our house to deliver two dozen of her beautiful eggs. Talk about service! I can’t remember the last time anyone delivered food to my house. (And, no, I am not interested in becoming acquainted with the Schwan’s man.) She had taken her children to Tubby’s in Wayne, and thought she’d combine things by bringing the eggs to our house. (Earlier in the week, I had emailed her and told her we were interested in buying some of her eggs.)

“You know, of course, that Tubby’s is coming to Winthrop,” I said to her.

“In nine days, but who is counting?” she replied, laughing.

Everybody in Winthrop seems to be counting the days until Tubby’s comes to Winthrop. I find it both humorous and heartening that this new business is causing such a stir in our little town.

“We’ll be there on Tubby’s inaugural day,” I said.

I expect a lot of other people will be there, too. I’ll have Clif bring his camera so that he can record the big event.

But back to the eggs. After Monika left, I opened the egg cartons to take a look, and I just marveled at the lovley variety of shapes and colors. Some of the eggs are blue, some are brown, some are tan, some are speckled, and one is a ghostly white.

What to do with those eggs? Why, an omelet for supper, of course, along with a spinach salad from my very own little garden.

Last weekend was a wet weekend, close and humid, with the rain, at times, coming down hard. There were also tornado warnings, very unusual for Maine, which made us all anxious. Whatever their size, tornados are a terrifying event, and even small ones can do a lot of damage and can even take lives. Fortunately, no tornados came to the Winthrop area, just a lot of bad, humid weather. 

However, last Friday was a lovely day—the calm before the storm—and as my husband, Clif, only works half-days at home on Friday, we decided to go on a bike ride in the afternoon. In fact, we had rather ambitious plans. Not only would we go on a bike ride along Memorial Drive, our favorite lakeside ride, but we would also do errands along the way—go to the bookstore, the post office, and the library, and, finally, pedal to Hannaford to pick up a few groceries. We only live a mile or so from town, which means that in theory pedaling to all these places is not a big deal. However, sometimes theory and reality collide, and this is certainly the case when it comes to riding to Hannaford, which is at the top of a steep hill. A very steep hill. An incredibly steep hill. 

All went well with our Memorial Drive ride and with our bookstore, post office, and library errands. The ride up the hill to Hannaford was, shall we say, a bit of a challenge, and it was with great relief when we finally rode into the parking lot and hitched our bikes to the wooden fence that is off to one side. After catching our breaths and regaining our composure, we adjusted our backpacks and headed into the store. The reactions we got made that hill completely worthwhile. 

In Winthrop, it is somewhat unusual for people to ride their bikes to the grocery store. All right, it is very unusual. Most people come in their cars. So when the young man collecting the grocery carts gave us a double take, it was completely understandable. 

“Did you come on your bikes?” he asked. 

“We did,” I answered. 

“Wow!” He replied. “It’s pretty hot.” It might have been my imagination, but I think there was admiration in his voice. 

Once inside, an employee, about our age, helped us find garbage bags and spent a few minutes talking to us about bikes. He is also a biker—he has two—and he briefly told us about a bike ride he took from New Hampshire to Maine. A long way with lots of hills. 

The young man at the checkout gave us a bemused look as we put our knapsacks on the bag counter. Into the knapsacks went a rotisserie chicken, rolls, sour cream, garbage bags, and a few other things. Clif carried most of the groceries, but I tucked a few around the library books in my bag. Everything fit, and after we paid and were about to head out, the young man said, “Have a safe ride home.” Again, it might have been my imagination, but along with the concern there seemed to be a hint of admiration in his voice. 

As we left, I had two thoughts, pretty much simultaneously. That is, if we keep this up, we will become known as the town eccentrics, and yet  I couldn’t help but think that along with being eccentrics, we were also being good examples. We were coming to the store in a way that was not only healthy but also environmentally friendly, and it seems to me that example is far more powerful than preaching. If we live our lives according to our environmental values then maybe, just maybe, we will encourage others to do the same. 

That is the hope, anyway, which goes right along with Bill McKibben’s eearth, the book I bought that day at Apple Valley Books. In eearth, McKibben writes that climate change is here, and the centuries of our “sweet time” on Earth are over. We are living on a new Earth, one we humans have changed, if not irrevocably then for a very long time. Because of this, we will now be facing harder times as the climate becomes harsher and harsher. As McKibben puts it, “The planet on which our civilization evolved no longer exists.” 

McKibben is right, and it is easy to fall into a kind of hopelessness when reading his book. However, this I refuse to do. Instead, I will hang my laundry outside, drive as little as possible, and ride my bike as much as I can. I’ve written this before, and I will write it again: I know I am only one person, but it is my firm belief that it is my responsibility to do what I can, to live as lightly as possible. 

That Friday night, I made chicken tarragon salad and broiled some homemade bread with olive oil and oregano. My husband and I were both good eaters, and the food was especially delicious. We had earned our supper. 

We discussed the hill, that dratted hill, and how it was our summer goal to become good enough riders so that the hill isn’t a problem anymore. And after that, who knows? To the pub in Hallowell? To the Theater at Monmouth? This is central Maine, and there are lots of hills along the way to each town. 

But our philosophy is this: bike on, dudes!

On Memorial Day, my husband, Clif, and I decided to give ourselves a day of rest with no household chores or projects. (The day before, we had had a feast honoring our ancestors.) Except for hanging laundry and watering plants, we stuck to our plan. The day was sunny and warm, the blackflies were gone for the season, and we spent a pleasant day on the patio, where we ate both breakfast and lunch, read, and, yes, even dozed a little.

Midafternoon, we roused ourselves for a bike ride along Memorial Drive, a fairly flat road (for Winthrop!) that goes by Maranacook Lake. As we rolled along, the water sparkled on one side, and a loon swam in a small cove. Young boys with nets patrolled the water for minnows. We smelled hot dogs and hamburgers cooking on grills. A large flat-bottomed boat, with lots of people, made its slow, serene way not far from the shoreline. We went about six miles, and when we were done, we decided we needed a sweet, refreshing reward. In short, we needed an ice cream from Tubby’s. (For the complete “scoop” about Tubby’s, see my post Tubby’s Is Coming to Town.)

Tubby’s in Winthrop was supposed to open the end of May. However, as is often the case, actual construction has fallen behind opening plans, and although the place—a once drab industrial building—is coming along nicely, it clearly isn’t ready to be open for business. This meant we had to drive to Wayne, seven or so very hilly miles away from Winthrop. (Clif and I both agreed we weren’t in good enough shape to bike up those hills. Maybe we will be by the end of the summer.)

“I wonder when Tubby’s in Winthrop will be opening?” I asked.

“Don’t know,” Clif answered.

“I’m going to ask,” I replied. “How cool will it be to go for our bike ride and then swing by Tubby’s for an ice cream?”

As it turned out, I didn’t have to ask. There was a sign on the window at the Wayne Tubby’s. It read: The take out window at our Winthrop store will be opening June 18th. Or something to that effect.

June 18^th! Yes, Tubby’s is behind schedule, but in a few weeks, we’ll have our nice, relatively flat bike ride and our ice cream, too. We weren’t the only ones who were excited. A couple from Manchester, a town just outside Augusta, had driven all the way to Wayne to get some of Tubby’s ice cream, and they were thrilled they would only have to drive to Winthrop for their Tubby’s fix.

As luck would have it, the great man behind it all—Skip Strong—was resting on the deck in front of Tubby’s. He looked tired, but he wasn’t too tired to speak enthusiastically of all the wonderful treats that would be coming to the Winthrop Tubby’s—the ice cream, of course, the lobster rolls, chicken tenders, and, eventually, even breakfast a couple of times a week. He also spoke of how thrilled he was with the way the building was shaping up.

The woman from Manchester said, “Maybe this will bring back some life to downtown Winthrop.”

“That’s what I’m hoping,” Skip replied.

So are Clif and I. When we first moved to Winthrop, the downtown was full of little businesses—a hardware store, a five and dime, a pizza place, a craft store, and two clothing stores for women. One by one, they blinked out. How could they compete with the chain stores in Augusta? And, during the day, too many people were working someplace other than Winthrop. As a result, there were too few people in town to keep those shops going during regular business hours.

Other businesses have come and gone, and the main street, while not exactly vibrant, is not totally shabby, either. With a little effort, it could make a comeback, and as Winthrop’s population ages, there are more and more people in town during the day. While an aging population is not so good for the school system, it might very well give a boost to the community in other ways.

When I think about community, I am reminded about something the Dalai Lama said in a film called 10 Questions for the Dalai Lama: “When traditions are good, keep them. When traditions are not good, don’t keep them.”

Community is a tradition worth keeping, even though we let it slip away, first with the automobile and then with strip development with its miles and miles of parking lots. How good we are at tarring things!

Perhaps one of the great benefits of peak oil will be a return to community. As gasoline becomes ever more expensive, people won’t be able to drive as much, and they will rediscover the virtues of their own towns. Perhaps they will haul out their bikes and begin riding again, with the sun shining down on them as they hear the sound of children playing, and the smells of summer surround them. If they are very lucky, there will be an ice cream waiting for them at the end of their ride, and because they have gotten so much fresh air and exercise, they can relax and enjoy their ice cream, knowing they will burn off the calories on the way home.

Yesterday, it was ninety in the shade, “breaking the old record of 85 set in 1985” as an AP article put it. One day of heat, of course, doesn’t signify anything, but there is no denying that everything about this spring has been warm and early. Winter ended the last of February, and now, the end of May, it pretty much feels like summer. On the one hand, I know this is not good. On the other hand, I have to admit I like the heat. Hot weather does not faze me, and when you combine this with my passion for fruit, you certainly could be pardoned for wondering why I live in Maine. Sometimes I wonder why, too. What can I say? I guess I love Maine more than I love year-round hot weather and a wide variety of fresh fruit. 

Therefore, even though it was blazingly hot, I worked in my gardens, pulling weeds, watering, and setting out some of my garden ornaments. I just love this kind of puttering. I did wait until late afternoon, when the sun had left our shady yard, to plant seedlings. For the most part, this is a fern, hosta, and lily kind of yard, but I do have one spot that gets the minimum amount of sun necessary for herbs and some vegetables. In that spot I planted cucumbers, which do surprisingly well; Juliet tomato seedlings, a variety that can actually tolerate a bit of shade; broccoli, zucchini, basil, rosemary, and sage. 

I spent midafternoon under the umbrella at the big table on the patio. I ate my lunch and brought out my little portable radio so that I could listen to the writer and environmentalist Bill McKibben speak on It’s Your World, a show on National Public Radio. As the heat completely enveloped me, Bill McKibben’s message seemed very timely—because of our reckless use of fossil fuels, we humans are spewing so much carbon into the atmosphere that the world will soon be a very different place from the one we have known for thousands of years, a planet whose overall climate has been hospitable to a multitude of species, including our own. McKibben asserted that this hospitable, nurturing climate will quickly become a thing of the past and that we will be living on “an uphill planet” rather than the “flat world” described by the writer Tom Friedman. (In fairness, although McKibben didn’t do so, it must be noted that Friedman is a huge proponent of green energy, and the environment is one of his major concerns.) In the face of the challenges brought about by climate change, McKibben advocated that national and world goals should be “resilience, stability, and security.” 

The only glimmer of hope McKibben had to offer was the resurgence of small farms and local food, both of which are making huge gains in our country. No longer just for a small, select group of people, local food has become popular with families with modest incomes as well as for affluent families, and many vendors are now accepting food stamps (now known as SNAP).  

McKibben has written a new book called eearth: Making A Life On A Tough New Planet. I think the subtitle pretty much describes the tone of the book, as well as the talk he gave on It’s Your World.

I will soon be ordering eearth from Apple Valley Books, a local bookshop. It won’t be cheery reading, by any means, but the message couldn’t be more important. Somehow, some way, we have to find less destructive ways of living.

As incredible as it might seem to this lifelong Mainer, summer seems to have arrived, even though it’s only the end of May. (In years past, it wasn’t uncommon for summer to wait to show its pretty face until the Fourth of July.) The lilacs are nearly gone—usually they are not in bloom until Memorial Day—the leaves are fully grown, and the lupine, normally a mid-June flower, are beginning to bloom. Then there is the heat, more like July’s than late May’s. I can’t help but wonder what the rest of the summer will bring. Will there be a rainy stretch in June? Or, will our summer be dry? Will the heat hold? Will it get hotter? Much as I like the heat, I hope not. Ninety in the shade is hot enough, thank you very much. 

Last night, my husband, Clif, and I went to our friend Claire’s house for dinner. Because it was so hot she made a variety of salads—chicken, pasta, coleslaw, and green—and nothing could have been better. The heat also allowed us to eat outside, and the mosquitoes weren’t too bad. I suppose it’s because it has been so dry. 

Claire also invited two poets—Steve Cowperthwaite and Jay Franzel—and the conversation was as good as the food. We talked, not necessarily in this order, about Monty Python, the Dalai Lama, the nursing shortage in Maine, health care (and how it is indeed the right of all citizens to have it!), and hobos on trains during the Great Depression. We helped ourselves to the various salads. Pickles were passed. Iced tea was poured. Most of the bran muffins I brought were eaten. The sun set late, the air was hot and close, and a nearly full moon rose, casting its glow between the branches of a tree. Occasionally, a slight breeze rustled the leaves, and the sweet smell of night settled over us. 

One of the most interesting facts I learned—from Steve, who as well as being a poet is also a history buff—was that at one time a forty-mile (or so) canal ran from South Portland to Long Lake in Sebago. Lumber, apples, and firewood, among other things, were transported down the canal to Portland. This morning, I did a bit more research and discovered that the canal opened in 1832 and that the project cost $206,000, quite a bit of money back then. On a towpath next to the canal, horses hauled the flat-bottomed canal boats while boatmen steered with poles. Passengers could hitch a ride for one-half cent per mile, and manufactured goods were hauled inland as well. But in the 1850s trains came to replace the canals, and finally, in the twentieth century, roads and cars came to replace the trains. 

You never know what you are going to learn when you have dinner with poets.

Last Friday, my friend Claire and I met for lunch at Mia Lina’s, a small pizza place in a converted old house in town. Although Mia Lina’s is primarily a takeout restaurant, there are a few tables inside as well as one lone picnic table, right outside the door. Claire got there first and grabbed the picnic table, and as soon as I arrived, we ordered our favorite dish from Mia Lina’s—a teriyaki chicken salad, which comes with marinated chicken (not breaded) on romaine lettuce along with cheese, peppers, tomatoes, olives, and onions.  

All in all, the food at Mia Lina’s is pretty good. While the pizza is not cooked in a brick oven, the dough is fresh and the sauce is zesty. Clif and I mostly make our own pizzas, but whenever we order out, we do so from Mia Lina’s. 

Because the day was so fine and sunny, Claire and I rode our bikes to Mia Lina’s. As we sat outside, ate our salads, and chatted, we both agreed we felt very European. The problem was, of course, that there was a single table outside, and Claire and I were the only ones having this European moment, which included riding our bikes, eating outside, and saying hi to the various customers as they came and went. 

Winthrop does not have what you might call a café culture, where people come to sit outside in fine weather, have a drink—either alcoholic or not—linger for a bit, meet with friends, and generally relax. When she was in college, my eldest daughter, Dee, spent a month in Tours, France, and one of the things she loved best was the café culture (along with the chocolate croissant). Each night, after a day of studying French, she and her friends would go to a café and while away the evening, talking and arguing. They wouldn’t spend much money. In fact, they weren’t expected to spend much money. After they ordered one drink, they were pretty much left alone by the servers, who didn’t come again unless they were beckoned. 

We do have a couple of small restaurants in town—Sully’s and Pepper’s—but somehow they don’t really fit the bill when it comes to café culture, which is as much about being social as it is about eating. There was a small sandwich shop in the center of town, where locals used to hang out, where the food was even more basic than it is at Mia Lina’s, but it has been closed for a number of years. 

We are getting a new place—Tubby’s—which I wrote about in a previous post—Tubby’s is Coming to Town. Everyone I’ve spoken to has high hopes for Tubby’s, that the food will be really good and that it will provide a much-needed place for people to gather. As far as I can tell, there won’t be outside seating, but even a comfortable indoor spot would be better than what we have now. 

I think what the people I’ve talked to realize is that a town without a central gathering place isn’t much of a town. It’s just place where people drive through on their way to someplace else—to home or to work. While home is our refuge, and work is necessary, we also need gathering places in our communities, places where we can come together with folks we might not normally see otherwise. Maybe all we do is nod and say hi and comment about the weather. Maybe we meet friendly acquaintances and have more of a conversation, but whatever we do, we form connections with the people who live nearby, and, lately, with our rushed, isolated American lives, this has become harder and harder. 

So here’s hoping that Tubby’s will indeed be an asset to the community, a place where we can come together and be social. Claire and I will be there when it opens, and so will my husband, Clif. It will be interesting to see how many other people become regulars, but it’s my guess that Tubby’s will be a great success. The quality of food at the Wayne’s Tubby’s is very good, and the renovations of the new Tubby’s are a marvel to watch. Slowly, an extremely drab building in our downtown is being converted to a place that is snappy and attractive. 

I’ll certainly be keeping an eye on Tubby’s, and I’ll be writing about it in future posts.

Along with being “A Good Eater” and somewhat food obsessed, I also love to ride my bicycle, and from now until the weather gets too cold, I will be on the road, weather permitting. I ride for pleasure; I ride to meet friends in town for lunch; I ride to do errands. It’s a terrific carbon-free way to get around, and it’s great exercise, something every Good Eater certainly needs.

A couple of days ago, I came across this piece in Diner’s Journal, a blog in the New York Times. It’s about Kickstand, “a collapsible coffee stall that’s wheeled around on a pair of salvaged bikes” in Brooklyn, New York.  Kickstand is “[t]he brainchild of Aaron Davis and Peter Castelein” and their ingenuity and creativity give me hope. If we put our minds to it, we can come up with ventures that are fun, snappy, profitable, and have a low impact on the environment.

As I like to tell my pedaling friends: Bike on!

Yesterday, I went to East Vassalboro to meet my mom’s friend Esther Bernhardt at the Grange. (My mother passed away two years ago, and Esther was her best friend.) My daughter Shannon is getting married this summer, and we will be having her wedding shower at the Grange, which was a central part of my mother’s life. Having the shower at the Grange will be like having a little piece of my mother there.

This particular Grange is lucky enough to have a dedicated group of “Grangers” who have taken loving care of this big, old yellow and white building with its large front porch. Unlike some Granges, this one has not fallen into disrepair. The porch is freshly painted, the inside of the Grange, with its stenciled walls and new curtains, is clean and bright, and the long tables have jaunty red and green checked table coverings.

Natrually, I had been to the Grange before, but I had never really checked out the kitchen facilities, and as the shower is in July, I figured I had better do so. Right from the start, we had planned to have a bridal tea shower—we are a family that is crazy about tea with all the little fixings—and this, of course, means that the food will be cold. I was pleased to discover that the Grange has two refrigerators—plenty of room for cucumber sandwiches, egg salad sandwiches, and ham salad sandwiches. There is also a big gas stove, but aside from heating water for the tea, we won’t really need to use it for much of anything. There are plenty of plates, bowls, cups, platters, and silverware, an eclectic assortment and well used.

In keeping with the rustic nature of the Grange, Shannon’s bridal tea will be a country tea rather than a fancy tea, and I have all sorts of crockery I can fill with flowers to add to the rural charm of the place. I will also be looking for cloth napkins to go with the checked table coverings.

Fortunately, I have lots of people to help me with this shower— Dee, our eldest daughter; Andrea Maddi, Shannon’s maid of honor; our good friend Kate Johnson; Esther Bernhardt; and Claire Hersom, another good friend and Shannon’s soon-to-be aunt. We’ll be making fruit salad, little sandwiches (there will of course be cucumber sandwiches), little pastries, and lots and lots of iced tea. After all, it will be July, and people might prefer to have cold rather than hot tea.

After Esther and I were done looking at the Grange, we fired up the gas stove, made ourselves tea, and took our mugs to the front porch where there are rocking chairs. It was a rainy day, but the porch is wide, and the rain wasn’t a bother. As we rocked and sipped tea, we watch the rain drip from the roof. The Grange sits in the middle of East Vassalboro village and is surrounded by many old homes. We talked a little of the history of the town, of the black smith shop across the street and of the library, celebrating its hundredth anniversary this year. The library started out in the Friends’ Meeting House, eventually moved to a small building that had been a fishing shack (an addition had been added), and is now in a new brick building not far from the Grange. I grew up in this town, went to the library, worked on rummage sales, and have been to many events at the Grange. It is full of history for me, full of memories of my mother.

There can be no better place to have Shannon’s shower, and I know she feels the same way.

Correction—5/24/2010: After reading the post, Shannon reminded me that Andrea will be her bridesmaid, not her maid of honor. Dee will be Shannon’s maid of honor. As Miss Piggy might say, “I knew that.” I just forgot that I did. Oh, my! That certainly qualifies as a distracted mother moment. Let’s just hope there aren’t too many more of them.