It's Part of Me ...

Downtown Springfield, VT
(Source)

I was born in 1953 in the town of Bellows Falls, Vermont. My two brothers were as well, at the time my parents lived in Springfield, Vermont. Which did then, and does now, have its own hospital. I don't know why they chose Bellows Falls, might be because the family doctor had privileges there, I don't know. Back then doctors did everything, specialists in small town Vermont were few. I do know that the hospital, the physical building itself, burned down between my birth and my oldest kid brother's birth. No, I had nothing to do with that. I had an alibi. (I couldn't walk yet, getting away would have been tough.)

Anyhoo, it was a nice place to grow up. My oldest kid brother (The Olde Vermonter) still lives and works there. From what I've read, the old town has its problems. A lack of jobs, a big drug problem, and other things which afflict people in such an environment. It wasn't like that growing up. (Then again, every time I read something, I have to remind myself that it's the "media." People don't report facts any more, they have opinions and agendas. Or so it seems.)

That picture up top, that's Main Street in the snow. We did get a lot of snow back in the day, they still do. It's one of my memories of Vermont, picturesque with snow. I do remember other times of the year, but winter was always a favorite. Not that I was a big skier (didn't start that until I was in high school), it might have been because the big family gatherings were always from Thanksgiving to Christmas. Those always involved lots of good food and lots of people gathering together who really cared about each other.

Things were different back then, vastly different. Better in some ways, depending on who you were I suppose. My hometown was predominantly white, there was a teacher (art as I recall) who had no kids of her own so she and her husband (I presume) adopted a number of kids. Of whom I knew two, both girls, one was black, the other was Native American. (I want to say Navajo or Hopi, my memory is sketchy in that area.) Those were the only people of color I saw when I was a kid, pre-high school. Didn't bother us in the least.

We grew up learning to treat people as individuals for the most part. To us it was no big deal. I remember the shock I felt in high school when I bought a record album by Sly and the Family Stone and one of my friends casually mentioned that he was surprised that I liked "colored" music. (No, he didn't use the word "colored.") It was a shocker that people thought that way, but it was an eye-opener as well.

My Dad was an Army veteran, he enlisted just after the end of World War II (he turned 16 on D-Day, so he was too young, he went in when he was 17, a year later). Both of my Dad's brothers served overseas, one in the Army Air Forces in the Pacific, the other as an infantryman in the ETO. My maternal grandmother's brother was also an infantryman in the ETO, both were wounded but both came home.

My paternal grandfather was also a veteran, he served during World War I but was in Panama, protecting the Canal no doubt. Somewhere in the family archives (probably lost) is a group photo of my grandfather's outfit, he's sitting near the front of the group (as I recall) and in the back row to the left is a future general and president, Dwight D. Eisenhower. Sure wish I knew where that photo was.

I knew my heroes personally as a kid.

The late 50s, early 60s were a great time to be a middle-class white kid. Which is my frame of reference. No doubt the experience varied a lot based on where you lived, the color of your skin, and even (in some cases) your religion. We had a single Jewish family in town, no one minded them, they were good people. Back then it was a Protestant-Catholic kind of clash. Most of the town was Protestant. There apparently was a Catholic Church in town, small and over-whelmed by all the Congregationalists, Baptists, Methodists, and a couple of other denominations I'm unfamiliar with. Oh yeah, there is an Orthodox Church back home as well. When I was a kid we called it the Russian Orthodox Church. Not proper these days, or so I'm told.

When I was a kid, everyone went to church on Sunday, except many of the Dads who only went on Christmas and Easter. "C and Es" my Dad called them. (Which I found odd, seeing as how that's pretty much what he did.) Churches tended to have a pretty sizable crowd on Sundays. Doesn't seem to be the case these days. What happened?

I have many fond memories of those days, like I said, they were good times. I had a great childhood. One of the things I see my kids doing is ensuring their own kids (my grandkids) are also having great childhoods.

So The Missus Herself and I must have done something right. (More her than me, no doubt.) But those early days in small town Vermont made me who I am, so my own parents must have done something right as well.

Maybe things will get better, maybe the people will wake up before it's too late. Lately I have my doubts.

So I'll stick with my family, them I can trust.