Our shopping center's trees

 For about 51 and a half weeks a year, I pay little attention to the three trees that are located in the plaza. But right now, they are just outstanding! So, if it doesn't rain or blow tonight, take a peak at the three trees. They aren't famous, and most likely they never will be. My little blog may be their moment of fame! Check them out!

excerpt of a conversation overheard @ the shopping center...

"Panama, anything happening over your way?"

"nope.......no cars over this way except getting some gas"..............

"ya....nothing here cept' Heather's from the pharmacy, that lady who carpool's, and that Jeep thats for sale....."

another big weekday in Sharon......

New sign at Sharon Beach......?

~Is it hot around here or what? that was a statement heard around Sharon this past Saturday, Sunday and now today as its been in the 80's and even 90's in the direct sun I am told. And tomorrow is supposed to be in the 90's everywhere!  But have no fear, this isn't global warming concentrating on NW Connecticut. I just heard it will be more "seasonable" on Wednesday, with highs only in the 60's.

It'll probably snow on Memorial Day.

(and no, the sign is not posted @ the beach!)

so what did you do this weekend????

~I had multiple mistakes this weekend, starting on Friday. Each day seemed to bring another one or more, with each being not just a spilt glass of milk kind-of mistake. But the best part? Each one led to a lesson. A lesson to be learned. A lesson to be followed. One is never too old to stop, or start, learning.....

Thank You Hotchkiss!

Back in the spring of 1999, I became aware of something which I find to be something very special which the students and staff of The Hotchkiss School give back to our communities, and to our earth. I remember this time of year well because my kids were out doing it as well each of their years there . They all picked up trash along the roads to celebrate Earth Day. 

 It's Earth Day, or very near to it, and the Hotchkiss kids just showed up in the parking lot here in Sharon. It's after 2 pm, so that means they've probably been on the pick-up detail since about 10 am or so this morning. They break up into groups and they man themselves with bright orange vests for safety, gloves and trash bags and off they go. They do Route 41 all the way from the school to Sharon, (five miles) and into Lakeville as well, picking up trash on both sides of the road. And 112, east and west. And 44 thru Lakeville to Salisbury I believe, and west to the state line. I think they may even go right into Millerton to Cumby's, but I am not sure. What a give back! As I look out my front window,  I see two huge plastic bags of trash waiting by the post office to be picked up by the Hotchkiss maintenance crew who'll follow along later and gather up what the kids pick-up, filling multiple trucks to overflow stage. And the roads are not all they do. I remember that they work at the transfer station cleaning up debris which blows into the woods there in all directions. And I know they also go out and do special projects like cutting honey-suckle vines where they are overgrowing trees and trails on the grounds at the school.

I don't know if they have ever weighed or done an estimate on how much trash they gather from their pick-up, but it must be just an amazing amount. What do you think....a thousand pounds sound right? Perhaps more? I really don't know. I just remember seeing one truck stacked so high with bags of rubbish last year, I was amazed. And I later learned that was just one of numerous loads they had gathered up.

So I just wanted to take a second to say "thank you" to The Hotchkiss School for teaching these students about the need to take care of Mother Earth. Seeing what good they do in the roads they cover makes me wonder isn't it too bad the Housy kids don't do the same in the Falls Village area, and the Kent Prep kids in their area as well. Maybe they do. I hope so. It's such a message for all of us, if we just take the time to listen.

I can't do my walk tomorrow morning before work due to a conflict, but you can bet next Monday morning I am going out with a bag and some gloves, and I am going to do Jackson  and Lucas. It all helps, right? Right!

thoughts that come when classical music is playing.....

I was just thinking about what makes Sharon great. There are lots of things or reasons and especially people that make Sharon great, and here are just a few from today:

Ted Roeske, Dave Heacox, Joe Heacox, Deb Reyelt, Mike & Tracy Rand, Will Trowbridge, Tim Perry, Debbie @ Twin Oaks, Emily Bartram, Bob Loucks, Jack Downey, Terry Ryan, Clare, Joe Sterling, Kelly Sr., Karen Hansen, Mrs. Southhack, Joanne Wilcox, just to name a few. These are but a few of the people of Sharon.

Sharon is a town of great history, and sights, and places, but without its people..... Sharon is nothing but a museum. The more we continue to sell ourselves as just a weekend sleep-over, the more we become a lifeless museum, Sunday thru Friday afternoons. Sharon needs more affordable housing, a better business environment and a vision that sees controlled, planned, welcomed growth as a good and needed thing. A pond with water flowing in and out breeds life. A still pond brings weeds, evaporation, mud and death for certain.

Sharon needs to really look at where its headed, and do it soon. We have so built ourselves around the wealthy of late, and look to them for our answers to which their money cannot provide. I bet history, if studied well, shows that while the wealthy do help in many ways, it is the common man who made Sharon what it really is. Drive the common man all out, give them no place to work, to live, to eat or to shop and Sharon will just be a town of houses, not of homes and people. Then the building of the museum will be complete.

"The Toast Song"

and now, for a completely change-of-pace....

(thanks to Kristin)

kinda goes with toast, no?

~ever drive around Sharon and look at the names of the town roads? King Hill Road I am guessing was named for Col. King, a big name from Sharon history in the 1800's. Low Road was I believe named after the Low family, who once were where Jasper is now. Herrick Road is after the Herrick family. Bowne Road the same. Calkinstown by all that's right should probably be Calkins Town road (not one word), named after Stephen Calkins family I think, again from the 1800's I believe, but may well be wrong. All of this leads me to this. Does anybody know how Butter Road really  got its name? I suppose a family named Butter could have been there, but that sounds like stretching it to me. Was it because it was so slippery that it was like butter? Come on historians out there. Let me know. I've wondered this for some time now. Let me in on how this was really named.....

lighten up, will ya?........

Wow! I make a comment about the sad condition of some roads that I've seen, and folks are telling me I am too serious with my blog? ....."After all, it was just the winter......"  Yep, you're right...I can't argue that!

  To those whose feelings I may have hurt in yesterday's blog, I'm sorry. I guess I shouldn't be so serious and point out something that is a fact, or sure appears to be that? Maybe I'll try to make this blog more of a fun and games place to go, with photos and fun memories. Then again, I think I just keep doing whatever.. a pic here, a newsy story there. A history note that my old mind can remember. I think I'll do just what I said I'd do on my title page, and folks can either follow along when they want or stay away.

(Pictured above is Cat and some friends from Hotchkiss--Nov.9, 2005

---thought they were a good change of pace..   :)  ---

Travel at your own risk...

I gave you all the news about ten days or so ago that Bob Loucks is intending to run for the office of First Selectman here in Sharon. When I spoke with him at that time, he shared with me about his concern for the infrastructure of our roads and bridges, and what he said is the extremely sad condition that so many of both are now in. He spoke of thirty or more bridges and culverts of all different sizes I believe. Some which may even force road closing before cave-ins do occur. So my logical questions..... Where have our town supervisors (road boss, selectmen) been for the last five, ten or more years? These didn't all go bad over-night. Sounds to this writer like Sharon is falling apart, culvert by culvert, bridge by bridge. Was our management all worried about keeping the taxes down, and just wait till it breaks, then fix it? Hello! Didn't we go thru that at the school? Or were they told what they could spend by the tax board, who always seems endlessly worried about possibly raising taxes? And if that's the case, wasn't Bob on that board for some of that time? Why do small towns do so many things right, but then basically turn their head on other things? 

  In my walk last Friday morning before work I was going out Sharon Mountain Road, just a few hundred yards east of Lucas Road I found this lovely little section of town road. Can you imaging being an unsuspecting motorcyclist or bicyclist who might round the corner just above this spot? Its about three feet to four feet wide and more than twenty feet long... Its not a series of cracks or a single pot hole. Its more than 60 square feet of missing pavement! And what is left there on either side is so thin, it must be cracking and just more and more disappearing with each passing car. I knew that upper Fairchild was in really rough shape, and I might share some photos from there perhaps soon, but wow do we need to do some serious repairs around here. Last week the town crew with their backhoe, a dump truck and and a man with a hand-held iron rake(seriously) started doing some work up there. A start?

Maybe its time to fix the foundation, so it's sound, so that what they build on top will last. Just like building a new home. I don't care if they do 200 feet of a road a year for the next 190 years, but let's start to do it right. Don't we deserve it? Why do we have to make-do? 

I am sure Bob, if he goes unchallenged, will make a fine first selectmen. He sure seems to be tuned into this matter now in a really good way. I hope he and our boards can do more than what apparently the last few have not been able to, for whatever reasons . 

The comments in this blog is not to point blame at anyone, but to point out the time to get this straightened out is now, before someone gets really hurt. 

Sounds like we all have work to do.

ladies at work.....

~I suppose everyday life in a small town, to some, would be the most boring way to live.  And living here every day, as I have for my whole life, it's been kind of fun to get that camera in hand and just see things from a bit different perspective, through the camera's eye. The other day I did the same thing I always do on weekdays, and that's take a visit to the bank. In this case, the Sharon office of The Salisbury Bank and Trust was my stop during the morning. I have a personal connection to the Sharon office as that was my great aunt's house when I was growing up. I spent many, many childhood hours in and out and up and down throughout that house-turned-bank. About the only thing that remains today that takes me to the past is the stair banister. I slid down that a good many times as a kid. I have nothing but good memories from that house.

Enough old history. Today while one teller (oops, they don't call them that anymore do they...) was counting my deposit, I snuck a picture of the ladies at work. Sharon is a busy office, but at this particular moment, I was the only customer in sight. I like this shot. It works telling the story of three ladies, all busy, with yet but only one customer (me) in sight at this moment.

Salisbury Bank's success is in it employees, and these three are three very dedicated folks. They make banking there an easy decision.

Sharon Town Beach...1958.......2009

On my way back from the transfer station, I took the long way to work and came down Long Pond, Mudgetown, and on to Mudge Pond. But as I came to the beach, the gates were open, I had some time, so I swung in and took a look around. Not quite the place my pictures will show. The one above shows a couple of tractors, with the Ford on the right getting pulled out of the drink, now somewhere between the parking lot and the picnic area I'd say. In that picture you see some of the men who really built our public beach. Josh Lovell is on the tractor on the left, my dad and Ken Seeley are standing talking and supervising, Ray Lovell is leaning on the Ford's fender, and in the checked shirt on the left is Maurice McCann. The other man to the right has his name torn from the back of the photo, so I can't give him credit.

Obviously not the same day as the tractor pulling, but still, that first summer. My dad, and Lance Pruyn are seen here assembling the merry-go-round with your's truly being the supervisor! The merry-go-round and the slides have gone with time and insurance companies, but the swing set still remains! (was I a cute kid or what?)

Out by the entrance is a nice new planting and a memorial marker dedicated to Anne Gudernatch, honoring her for her working on the original beach committee and I know she served on the town beach committee for many, many years. A nice tribute to an extremely dedicated individual. One of the best things about Sharon is it is still small enough where volunteers still work together for the good of the town,ie., the ambulance squad, fire company, rec commission, the Lion's Club just to name a few. The day that we hire everything done will be a sad day.

So, the beach has been here for 51 years this summer by my calculation, and while it may not necessarily be the beach I remember, it still appears to be a real nice town facility. New bathrooms, new docks and playground equipment have been added recently by the looks, and the beach goes farther to the north than I remembered, but these are all good things. I need to visit again in the summer when its officially open for business. We just need a little sun and warm weather to get us thinking about those days of summer.

where'd they all go???? (merchants heard talking)

     ~if you came to the shopping center this past Friday or even Saturday up until about 3pm, there were actually cars and customers around. The diner had a good week, the pharmacy was all out of chocolate candy, jelly beans and their cards looked low when I glanced their way today. And my store had a few nice busy spurts, the first since late December, but look what Monday brought just after mid-day......(the pickup and white wagon are employees cars)

old great shot from Sharon...

~ I found this on the web probably three or four years ago, and I just have always loved it for what it was.....thought I'd pass it along. It's from the area of the public boat launch on Silver Lake Shores, looking west. I'd give credit to the person behind the lens if I knew who took it, but I don't. It wasn't me is all I can say..

not a car in sight...( I Luv it!)

~ since my earliest memory as a child, I have been attending the Ecumenical Sunrise Service on Easter Sunday morning, high atop East Street. What a special treat today was. The morning star, the moon setting to the southwest and a beautiful sunrise to the east. A special little place up on top that mountain, and indeed a special time for those who attend.

After the service, I always ride down to town and grab a newspaper @ my old store and see what there might be to take a picture of. Today the peace and quiet of a small town street shouted out to me. When was the last time you were on Main Street and didn't see soul or hear a peep? I bet those who live there really enjoy the peace that a holiday morning brings them.

Happy Easter everyone! He is Risen!

Benton Hill, looking North(and a little bit west)

Was out toolin' around for a few minutes Friday morning before work and I rode up over Benton Hill. I hadn't been up there in easily a good year or more, so I stopped at one of the bar-ways into Miele's field and grabbed a couple of early spring shots. I was really surprised at how much Charlie's is growing, I enjoyed that view up to the northwest over Sharon Valley and up past Mole's Hill Farm I then went down over the hill, and grabbed a shot of some of the belties down on one of the Miele Farms, next to the Ten Mile. It was a pleasant spring morning, and those few minutes out and about were very enjoyable. Need to do that sort of thing more often!

"That's Incredible"

~I think I am going to go into forecasting the future. In my last blog, the one about the great "knocking down the wires caper" which happened in Sharon on Thursday last, I said perhaps we'd soon have a new pole to replace the rather weak and rather aged one currently there. I got to work Friday morning and "poof", the new pole was in place! Now that's service! In less than 18 hours! But today I learned an interesting story on how that pole, or any new pole comes to get installed. The utility company first calls our town designate, (in our case our first selectman is the man!) and basically asks for his ok. Do you know they called Malcom at 9pm Thursday night, he gave his blessing (on our behalf--Thank's Malcom) and it was planted sometime after that and before 8:30 Friday morning, when I got to work. Don't you find that interesting? They have to ask permission to change an old pole to a new one. I was just really surprised by that. Just one of the things we (or at least I) take for granted I guess.

ps.think that old pole is leaning? you should have seen it before they used the rope and brought it up straighter!

Sunset and Moonrise...Maundy Thursday...Sharon 04/09/09

It's a bird- It's a plane- It's Chicken-Man!! (remember WKBW?)

I feel like a news man the last two days!!! Not sure if you were around the shopping center today around 2:15 or so, but boy did we have excitement! A north-bound 18-wheeler on Gay Street with a big air foil on top of its cab, cleaned out at least two lines over to Amy's Law office building( they looked liked cable tv lines). When it did, it gave the already leaning pole across the street a bit more of a pull, so more wires, (power and telephone) were hanging low just ready to get grabbed by the next tall vehicle. So Sharon's own Dave Wilbur jumped out of his van and directed traffic till the fire department showed up after about fifteen minutes. About an hour or so later the power company showed up and raised some wires and threw a temporary guide-wire in and took some tension off the leaning pole. The pole looks pretty aged, so perhaps coming weeks will bring a new stronger pole to replace the existing one. Excitement in the town. Whoa! (thankfully, no one got hurt!)

Runnin'...runnin'....running for First Selectman

Now here's some news. Bob Louck's (life-long Sharon resident) I have been told has thrown his "hat into the ring" for the office of First Selectman here in Sharon!  Holy smokes! And didn't he just retire from working 40 hours a week? I wonder if Malcom B. is running again for the Democrats? 

Well, knowing Bob as I do, he'd be a good guy for a job at a tough time to get into it. Bob I know has been head of the school board in past years and I think also head of the tax board. If not chair, I know he has served on it for quite some time now. I first served with Bob on the building committee when the school did its last update. I know he really cared very much about that project. Many know Bob for his leadership each year of the memorial service conducted by the Legion at the War Memorial on Memorial Day. I think of Bob as a very financially prudent person yet does things right when they need to be done right. Judging by the shape of some of our town roads and bridges (have you been up Fairchild lately?), we better start fixing some things the right way. Those who have skimped and made do in the past to hold down our taxes I am afraid are going to now make us pay all the more. Didn't I learn in Econ. 101 that its better to pay now, if able, than to pay more later?

Frankly, I think Tina should just run. She does and knows how to do most everything already, because she has been doing it since Wild Bill Wilbur days....

8:30PM ESPN™

Forget Dancing With The Stars or American Idol tonight. Tune in ESPN and lets all cheer on The UConn Girls Basketball Team. Tonight they are playing Louisville for the national championship. Go Huskies! Let's add another banner to the wall!

imagine this.....!

~so I am checking Yahoo™ news this morning and up jumps this story about this new vehicle that GM™ and Segway™ are jointly working on. The PUMA carries up to two people, 35 miles and up to 35 mph. Can you imagine going up Smith Hill from Canaan in this? And better yet, where do I put a 2x4 in it?

24 hours to go!

Come this time tomorrow, just about every TV in Connecticut will be tuned to ESPN to watch as they battle for the national championship. Our UConn Lady Huskies will be playing the Cardinals from The University of Louisville. So tonight will be my next to last time for this year to say     "Go Huskies"

The pic above is from the 1902 UConn Ladies team. And you thought Geno was their only coach...

PS.. do you know the Savage's from Sharon? They are supposed to be out there in St. Louis for the tourney, so if you see a familiar face, it just may be them!

hats off!!

~ the game just ended, Jim Nance and Clark Kellogg are talking to the Michigan State coach and one of the stars of the game, and guess what? We're still breathing! Connecticut just lost, and we're still breathing. Today we got out-played, and the better team today won, and congrats to them. But we had a great year, we gave our state something to cheer for, and now we turn our hopes to the girls team, and their game tomorrow night. So one more time I say   

 "Go Huskies!"

Spring is really here...wanna know how I know?

Big Tom and his brothers are all about "struttin their stuff"!   

(the ladies I see seem unimpressed!)

Sharon at work...

I was just walking to the post office to drop off my mail and there was John. I've known John most of my life, and he's a guy who many of us should emulate. Steady, reliable, trustworthy, caring, friendly, kind....on and on. He must have been a Boy Scout. He's got those traits all down pat! John L. Thanks for being one of Sharon's good guys! (Go Pirate's)