Seems like this has been a busy week - well last week, anyway.  Nearly every day or evening had some appointment or meeting - and that's ok, but I'm afraid I don't get much done otherwise when that happens.  My policy of saying "no" sort of went out the window as my curiosity got the better of me and I agreed to be on a steering committee in Cabot.  I don't like to get involved in that sort of thing much, but because I've been aware of various efforts within the Town of Cabot to organize, update and invigorate the town, I decided to go on the basis of assurance that this was only one meeting to set things in motion.  I wasn't sure I'd be of much use, but like I said, I was curious.

As things turned out, I wasn't much use, but I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed it.  There were perhaps 20 people there, from all parts of town and all ages, from a couple of high school boys to an old geezer (me).   The facilitator, Paul Costello, from the Vermont Council on Rural Development, knew how to handle the group and got things done.  He explained our mission, and how his group works with communities like ours, and then we got down to business. Within the space of perhaps a little over half an hour, we had identified categories of concern that included the so-called Cabot corridor; food and agriculture; economic vitality; school and community; arts, culture and recreation; transportation and infrastructure; and the challenge of poverty.  From there we listed names of people who might have good input and solutions.  By the end of the session (and Paul said we'd actually finished up a little sooner than he'd anticipated), we had set a time for the first meeting, what media coverage we have available and how to get people to attend, how many individual groups there would be, where the facilitators would have lunch and how we'd feed the participants.

As I sat there listening to one good idea after another followed by sensible, reasoned comments, and suggestions rather than arguments, I thought back to only a few weeks ago when the community was so torn over ATVs and disrespecting e-mails among our officials, and I was very proud to have witnessed this kind of cooperation.  I left the meeting feeling I'd been part of something special, and I was glad I'd agreed to go to that meeting.  

I had another uplifting meeting on Saturday.  It was our final meeting of the Joe's Pond Association, and we'd had a week of phone calls, e-mails and chatter about the E-coli in the pond that has caused the beach to close numerous times during this summer.  We've had issues come before the Joe's Pond Association that have caused considerable concern, and it was clear from the comments on the web site, people wanted answers.

The president of our association, Tom Dente, opened the meeting and immediately put the issues out there and let members know everything possible is being done to get to the bottom of the problem.  Tom has been working with local, state and federal agencies, and there have been some answers - at least one failed septic system identified, and more on the radar; the goose situation is being handled for next year; and definite steps are being taken to clean up the water and find out exactly why the tests have been so high in bacteria.  Again, there were solutions and responsible people are at work to fix the problems.  Makes you feel better just to know there's someone on the job, doing the best they can.  The minutes of our meeting will be on the website within a few days, if you want to read details.
 

Fred and I took a walk in our woods today.  We've been meaning to do that all summer in order to find out if many trees are down after the winds we had on the Fourth.  We found a few trees down, and some broken off high overhead, but it wasn't as bad as some of our neighbors experienced - like on Brickett's Crossing Road.  What we noticed most was that the underbrush has increased in most places - lots of berry bushes and foot-tangling vines, ferns and branches, and we couldn't even find the trails we used to use.  It doesn't take long to change.  It was nice up there, although very hot being midday, and it wasn't as wet as we've seen it most years.  Some of the normally swampy areas were mostly dry.  We probably won't go again until there's snow on the ground.  It's a lot easier to get around up there when we can walk over the underbrush on our snowshoes.  Or this fall we might go out with the chain saw and machete to make some trails for next year. 

The top photo shows some of the underbrush - a mixture of small bushes growing and fallen trees and limbs.  The second picture shows how some of the trees snapped off high off the ground and remain hanging - widow makers, they're called by loggers.  We lost a nice ash here, but we are happy it wasn't worse.