“Iced mocha please,” I request from bored-looking teenagers with expensive hair cuts. We have yet to see a Starbucks in our neck of the northeastern woods. The Dartmouth Bookstore feeds our need to be a part of the American gourmet coffee addiction by at least brewing Starbucks coffee. Patrons are eager to support our local bookstore, even though it is no longer independently owned. This college town offers a slight hint of an urban experience. Locals mingled with Dartmouth students and professors sip the latest iced cappacino at cafe tables, speaking in appropriate tones of current politics and research. We hang on to small town traditions, while dipping into the pool of consumer trends.
Outside, Spring winds bluster, and billows of charcoal clouds push across the sky. Summer wants in. One minute of pelting rain, then sun dominates once more. Changes felt on my skin reflect on faces of anxious Dartmouth students racing toward the year-end finish line. End-of-term projects weigh these weary young people down as they blindly rush across the street. Passing The Gap windows filled with fun-in-the-sun outfits, they flip through Class of 2008 t-shirts on sidewalk racks, grabbing mementos as they prepare to move on to Goldman Sachs internships or volunteer opportunities in developing countries.
From the door below Hanover Strings, high school girls step onto the sidewalk with newly curled, braided, swept hair, flushed and giddy with thoughts of the evening ahead. Prom night. Older women smile at the memories of their own proms decades ago. Little girl dreams and glamourous dresses create a magical stir as young couples stiffly act out the social customs of proper adults. Most will ride in urban-black limousines, but a few wear their rural heritage with pride and drive the family truck to the formal event.
On a bench in Hanover, the future and the past intermingle. New England values blend with contemporary flair. International students flavor this upper Connecticut River valley, expanding the suburban culture. Every economic strata manifests through the transportation; working poor disembark wearily from free Advanced Transit buses while well-dressed drivers of German automobiles buzz confidently through town. Suburban women push sturdy strollers with beautiful babies, educational toys and organic crackers stuffed into mesh pockets, ready to entertain or stimulate well-cared-for children.
It’s tame here. Some say boring, some say safe. Privacy abounds. Education, valued highly, is central in our communities. We’re all conscious of our carbon foot print. Most of us have always eaten local, used possessions until they wear out, and then find new ways to put them to use. There are seasons of change, endings and beginnings, new and old. Look up from a bench in your hometown. I bet there’s much good to observe right in front of you, enough to balance the urgent concerns delivered up each day on the news.
