GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Mostly sunny, a little warmer. There'll still be some clouds around, but we get plenty of sunshine today with temperatures climbing into the upper 50s, maybe 60 in some spots. Winds today are from the northwest and things could feel brisk out there. Clear skies tonight, lows around freezing.Lunch? A pair of snacking gray foxes, wondering what all the fuss is about on the other side of the window, near Goose Pond in Canaan, from Helen Morrow.Bookstock pulls the plug. In an early-morning press release yesterday, co-founder and board chair Peter Rousmaniere announced that this year's literary festival in Woodstock, scheduled for June, has been canceled. Though an ambitious slate of authors was lined up, organizers had been struggling to nail down venues and set up infrastructure for the event—and, Rousmaniere tells Seven Days' Mary Ann Lickteig, there was disagreement among partners over the festival's size and ambitions. Even so, with 400-500 boxes of books already collected, there are plans for the signature book sale to go on later this year.Starbucks plans spot in Centerra parking lot. Once Centerra owners Crosspoint Associates "square away some final details" with Lebanon, reports John Lippman in the Valley News, they plan to build a drive-thru and small café in the corner of the lot where Morgan Drive peels away from Centerra Parkway. The developers, Lippman writes, are hoping the site can open by the end of the year; Starbucks, which would only confirm it has its eyes on Lebanon, cites a spring, 2025 opening. Crosspoint says the café would attract about 100 additional cars each weekday and 450 vehicles “on a typical Saturday.”For Hartford Dismas House, a decade of helping former inmates "get on a straight path." Over 150 men have stayed at the house on Maple Street in Hartford Village, arriving—as Jim Kenyon puts it in the VN—"needing a roof over the heads, food in their bellies and a second chance." They pay $85 a week for room and board, hold down jobs, and every night break bread and live in a community of other men who know exactly what they're going through. "Dismas was my only ticket out of prison,” says one. “If you don’t have a job and a place to live, you’re going to fall right back into your bad habits.”SPONSORED: The Upper Valley Nighthawks are looking for staff host families! The team is searching for 5 beds for college interns from June 1-August 10. All that is required are a spare room (non smoking), internet and laundry access, and some meals (mostly breakfast). Please email [email protected] if you would like to host an intern for the summer, join the Nighthawks family, and show them the community spirit of the Upper Valley! Hit the burgundy link or click here to learn more about what you receive in return. Sponsored by the Upper Valley Nighthawks.Not your usual salamander sighting. Last week, volunteers in Thetford found four-toed salamanders migrating across a road in town. It was a big deal, Northern Woodlands' Elise Tillinghast writes: "This species is rare in Vermont and New Hampshire, and almost never found in the Upper Valley." They're small and not especially noticeable—at least, when they're right side up—but have some intriguing features, including detachable tails and, of course, just four toes compared to most salamanders' five. Also out there this week: spotted salamanders, eastern red-backed salamanders, wood frogs, spring peepers."Here. Look." Those Thetford volunteers were part of the Amphibian Road Crossing program co-founded in 2018 by the North Branch Nature Center's Sean Beckett. And last Friday night, Beckett and his wife, Allison Waring, were leading a group of volunteers at a vernal pool in Montpelier—joined by VTDigger's Juan Vega de Soto. Over three wet nights last week, de Soto writes, "thousands upon thousands of frogs, newts, salamanders and toads [were] hopping, skipping and sliding down hillsides in the dark — and across dangerous roads." The ARC, he writes, helps—and meticulously documents.Maybe next year...? Not baseball or football, but ice skating. In northern New England. As Liz Sauchelli wrote over the weekend in the VN, the region's Nordic skaters this winter faced disappointing conditions on the Lake Morey and Mascoma Lake long-distance skating trails, and the future looks uncertain. The Mascoma Lake Skating Association, she reports, stopped taking donations in March; its members want to wait until next winter to see whether the ice is thick enough to be plowable. At Morey, the resort's Paige Radney says, “I think it’s going to be a lot of ‘take what you can get.'"SPONSORED: An evocative drama set against the backdrop of our turbulent times. Artistree's Grange Theatre in Pomfret, VT is proud to present "LUNGS", running from Friday, April 26, to Sunday, April 28, 2024. As the world outside contends with rising temperatures and global unrest, "LUNGS" takes you on an intimate journey with one couple's debate over bringing new life into our uncertain world. This smart, witty play by Duncan Macmillan, co-directed by Matthew Robert and Jade Evangelista, captures the lifecycle of a relationship with all its highs and lows. Learn more here. Sponsored by Artistree.Uncovering what writing wants to be. The secret to good design, architect Louis Kahn once said, meant uncovering "what the building wanted to be." That's stuck with the poet and former VT laureate Sydney Lea, who lives in Newbury. In a wide-ranging Seven Days conversation with Strafford writer and reviewer Jim Schley, Lea talks about his two new collections, his attention to the storytelling of Robert Penn Warren and the "ambiguous and intriguing relations of Emily Dickinson to the natural world," the voices of old New Englanders that he still hears every day, and the wonder of still being alive.Wildlife control: "I like to call it conflict resolution." That's Kelsey Breen, who owns a wildlife and pest control business based in Cornish. Talking to Patrick O'Grady in the VN's Enterprise section, both Breen and Bethel's Hunter Garland point out that a big part of keeping unwanted animals or pests out of a house is figuring out why they're there in the first place. “Every animal and every pest infestation is a symptom of a conducive condition in that immediate environment,” says Garland, who also works as a VT parks manager. “It can be simple or complex but there is a reason the animal is there.”285. That's how many wildfires NH averages per year, which is why the state's Forest Protection Bureau is making this "Wildfire Awareness Week." As Steven Porter writes in the Globe's Morning Report newsletter (no paywall), on average just 221 acres are affected each year, but "it’s important to remember that dry and windy conditions can turn small wildfires into larger and more damaging threats." Spring cookouts, burning brush, improperly disposing of wood stove ash—all can “quickly run and turn into a big problem," says NH forest ranger Nathan Blanchard.A grim look at NH's child care picture. Yesterday, reports Ani Freedman for InDepthNH, the NH Fiscal Policy Institute held a webinar detailing the challenges the child care system faces. In a nutshell, said senior policy analyst Nicole Heller, child care should cost about 7 percent of household income; right now, the median cost for single parents is 61 percent and for married couples 20 percent. And that's only if they can find it. “I think anyone with little kids right now that’s trying to work understands how wild the waitlist scene is when you’re just trying to get into a daycare," one father told the panel.VT plans secure juvenile facility for Vergennes. Seven Days' Kevin McCallum reports that, although the state hasn't announced the decision publicly, it "has informed Vergennes officials, lawmakers and others involved in the process" that a 14-bed facility will be built on state land there. The new site replaces the shuttered Woodside rehab center—and comes in place of a controversial plan to put a six-bed facility in Newbury. Though one Vergennes state rep says she's "really, really pleased," McCallum reports that the site's neighbors appear not to have been informed yet.You like Thai food. You like Italian food. How’d you like some Thai Italian? Google AI’s Food Mood now lets you create fusion cuisine at home. Say you’re craving vegetarian with flavors from Singapore and Romania (because who isn’t?), starring broccoli (because it’s in the fridge). Up pops Green Symphony on a Golden Canvas, brightened with mint, ginger, and lemongrass. Choose a course, a couple of cuisines, add an ingredient, et voilà: a recipe. No guarantee it will be delicious (or edible), but the possibilities are endless. Nyamirimbi and Apfelstrudel Fusion (thanks, Rwanda and Austria!) could be tonight’s dessert.Daybreak doesn't get to exist without your support. Help it stick around by hitting the maroon button:
It began as an almost inaudible hum,low and long for the solar winds and far dim galaxies,a hymn growing louder, for the moon and the sun,a song without words for the snow falling, for snow conceiving snowconceiving rain, the rivers rushing without shame,the hum turning again higher — into a riff of ridges peaks hard as consonants,summits and praise for the rocky faults and crust and crevicesthen down down to the roots and rocks and burrows the lakes’ skittery surfaces, wells, oceans, breakingwaves...—
The first stanzas of "Hymn" by Marie Howe.
with a description by Maria Popova and, even better, Howe herself reading the poem to animation by Ohara Hale. Just set it going, sit back, and fall in.
See you tomorrow.
The Hiking Close to Home Archives. A list of hikes around the Upper Valley, some easy, some more difficult, compiled by the Upper Valley Trails Alliance. It grows every week.
The Enthusiasms Archives. A list of book recommendations by Daybreak's rotating crew of local booksellers, writers, and librarians who think you should read. this. book. now!
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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