GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Quick heads up: Daybreak will publish all this week, then take next week off. (Sounds so... dissolute.)If you liked yesterday afternoon, you'll like today. There'll probably be some high clouds filtering the sunshine, especially as the afternoon goes on, but still: After a cold start to the day, temps should climb nicely into the mid-20s by early afternoon. Winds today from the south, lower 20s tonight.It doesn't look like this now. But pre-storm, the unusual warmth late last week (I know, I barely remember it, either) lent a dreamy, late-afternoon wistfulness to the area's waters. Like, for instance, at:
Mink Brook, by Jed Williamson
and Lake Fairlee, by Ridge Satterthwaite
If there's new housing coming to the region, it's probably in Lebanon. Between 2010 and 2019, Nick Clark writes in the first post for a new Upper Valley section of Sidenote, there were 667 units built there—a quarter of region's new units. But over the last 24 months alone, planning director David Brooks tells him, the city's approved 855 units, with another 444 in the offing. "We are trying to promote housing near job centers and in areas where we already have adequate infrastructure and services so people have transportation options (walk, bike, transit)," Brooks says.Dartmouth mandates boosters, suspends indoor social gatherings. The news came in a Friday email to the campus community, and requires all students, faculty, and staff to get the shot by Jan. 31 (or if they're not eligible by then, within 30 days of becoming eligible) and to submit proof. The social-gathering ban runs through Jan. 18 and applies to “purely social events, like Greek parties," spokesperson Diana Lawrence tells The Dartmouth.SPONSORED: Chapman's General—making the holidays merry! For over 125 years, Chapman’s General has served Fairlee, the “Town Under The Cliff." Today, it's a modern take on a Vermont country store with a curated selection of local art, art supplies, New England food products, and ethically sourced jewelry—and a favorite destination for holiday gift-buying with its robust toy selection, wines, greeting cards, hand-picked gift baskets, and vibrant community gathering-spot vibe. Come visit us for all of your holiday gift-buying needs! Sponsored by Chapman's General.“Be humble, be kind and treat people the way you want to be treated.” Judging from the outpouring of fond well wishes after Ed DeNike let people know he'd be retiring from the Lebanon landfill, it's fair to say he learned that lesson well. It's not just that he taught people how to dispose of things properly, writes Claire Potter in the Valley News, but he helped customers navigate the sometimes emotionally fraught process of getting rid of stuff. And also gave excellent wine suggestions. Here's a photo of him by Lyn Swett Miller (who can in turn be seen saying goodbye in one of the VN's photos).Plenty of boots and snowshoes. Socks, not so much. That seems to be the state of play at Farm-Way in Bradford, reports VTDigger's Fred Thys. Vermont retailers are reporting brisk sales this season, but supply issues continue to hamper them. Farm-Way president Carol Metayer tells him that North Face clothing won't arrive until after Christmas, and that some sock manufacturers just don't have enough wool. Still, outdoor gear is selling well. And so, she says, are smokers and cookware, adding, "It's been really busy."More snowy owls. They're showing up everywhere. Reader CH (thanks, CH!) sends in a link to eBird photos of one discovered by Kyle Jones that's set up shop in the tires topping a silage mound at the Newmont Farm in Bradford. And on the NH side, reports Bo Hopkins, there have been sightings in Grafton, Cheshire and Rockingham counties—and this one at Hampton Beach State Park last week."It’s gruesome to kill an animal, no matter how used to it you get." Local novelist Makenna Goodman and her family have been living the VT back-to-the-land life, and in many ways, she says, it's "paradise." But it is also "fraught," she tells Anne Strainchamps and Steve Paulson on their public radio show, To the Best of Our Knowledge. She zeroes in on Helen and Scott Nearing, the spiritual founders of the idea, who arrived in VT in 1932: "The Depression beginning, Hitler rising to power, a looming world war... And they said, 'Let’s get out of here!' And they could. The decision they made was a retreat."The continuing traditions of the Abenaki people, on display in Hopkinton. Remember that birchbark canoe that Bill Gould and Reid Schwartz crafted this year from all-local materials? It's on display at the Hopkinton Historical Society, along with a 100-year-old canoe and works of art that range from several hundred years old to of-the-moment. It's part of an effort to weave the Abenaki past and present together, report NHPR's Peter Biello and Julia Furukawa. “We want to fill up what was erased, we want to unerase," says contributor Sherry Gould. "We want to expose just a much fuller story."Both right and left gird for NH school board elections. “Parents are mad as hell,” former state Rep. Fran Wendelboe, managing director of the conservative group 603 Alliance tells NH Bulletin's Ethan DeWitt. From "parents starting to attend meetings and being made to feel like they’re not wanted" to specific issues around diversity and "critical race theory," her group and others are encouraging candidates to step forward. Meanwhile, 603 Forward has been encouraging younger progressive candidates to step up, and will join the NEA and Granite State Progress in training school board candidates.Wait! Not quite so fast on that home-test insurance coverage in VT. You'll remember that a couple of weeks ago, the state mandated that insurance carriers cover the cost of rapid Covid tests. However, WCAX reports, some plans are regulated by the feds, not the state—and, thus, not subject to the new rule. “It does not unfortunately apply to everybody because we just don’t have jurisdiction over all of those plans," financial regulation commissioner Mike Pieciak tells them. "So, that’s the first thing I would say is before even going to the pharmacy, make sure that your plan covers these tests."What is the importance of an alphabet? Especially one on the edge of extinction? Tim Brookes is a writer, former Champlain College prof, former NPR commentator, lover of words, lover of alphabets, and the subject of Ken Picard's profile in Seven Days. Since 2013, his Endangered Alphabet Project has sought to "document and share such threatened writing systems as the Afáka script of French Guiana [and] Takri of India," Picard writes. He's created a new board game intended to preserve elements of Mongolian culture—in part to help resist Chinese efforts to eradicate it.Everyone saw them. They're not fake. And they don't exist. Scotland-based writer Mike Sowden has a lovely Twitter thread on one of the gifts of winter: light pillars. They're created by ice crystals floating downward that, when aligned right—"a slow rain of tiny fancy-gastropub dinner plates, made of ice"—make it appear as if pillars of light are shooting skyward, even though it's only our eyes tricking us (same effect as with sun/moon pillars). "Like an incredibly relaxing version of fireworks that even dogs could get behind," he writes.Daybreak doesn't get to exist without your support. Help it keep going by hitting the maroon button:
For the last 46 years—if that's not an institution, nothing is—Willem Lange has been performing a public reading of A Christmas Carol (his first one, in 1975, was in his living room in Hanover for friends; he soon had to move to St. Thomas Episcopal Church to accommodate demand). His most recent outing—with a small live audience—was at the Lost Nation Theater in Montpelier on Friday night. Now that's available online, for $15, for the rest of this week. You can read more about its history—and Lange's empathy for Scrooge—in Jordan Adams' Seven Days writeup.
This is about the time of year when styrofoam seems to multiply inexplicably...and, because it's not recyclable, you grumble and throw it in the trash. But now along comes the City of Lebanon to tell you to hang onto it. Earlier this year, Sustainable Lebanon and Lebanon Rotary filled a 24-foot trailer (donated by Bruce Bergeron of Jake’s Market) with collected polystyrene foam (its official name). The effort was so successful that Leb Rotary is going to do it twice in 2022 (dates haven't been set yet) and, the city says, other organizations are considering collection days as well. So stay tuned and don't throw the stuff out. (Thanks, CH!)
Upper Valley songwriters are in a reflective mood as the holidays approach and the year comes to a close. Two cases in point:
Lyme singer-songwriter James Graham—along with lead guitarist Jim Musty and drummer John Foster—just recorded Graham's mellow "Reaching for Your Heart," with footage of local sights.
And Norwich-based singer-songwriter Lisa Piccirillo (The Tricksters), who also teaches in the Music Together program at Upper Valley Music Center, just went up with her new song, "Bring Your Joy," as part of UVMC's online Holiday Music Festival.
See you tomorrow.
Daybreak Where You Are: The Album. Photos of daybreak around the Upper Valley, Vermont, New Hampshire, and the US, sent in by readers.
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