Selectboard Meeting Notes: A Dream

Hi all. It’s a selectboard meeting night and usually I’d willingly volunteer to sit through the 3-4 hour thing and type up everything everyone has to say. It’s a bit hard for me to do tonight, though. I’m tired, slightly injured, and would rather tell you about a dream I had about the selectboard. It’s a good one!

I’m tired because I just got back from a weekend in Buffalo, cleaning out the family home of 80+ years. It was built by my grandparents, was the first place I was taken after being born, the site of many a Christmas and visit,  as well as family weddings, births, Thanksgiving dinners and more.

After he retired, my Dad (who grew up in the house) moved back in and stayed for the last 30 years or so. Recently he’s decide to move out to Colorado to be closer to my sister and his grandkids.

That meant that my sisters and I, and other relatives, have to clean out the house, get things ready to move, and rescue items of personal interest. This last weekend was my turn to do a sweep through everything with one sister before we hand it over the estate sale folks and realtors.

It was four days of going through boxes, piles, file folders, shelves, and so on. It was my Dad’s stuff and his parents stuff (Grandma’s Kewpie doll), plus some things from great grandparents and even further back in time: an 1840 German bible, for example.

My dad was a social worker but he really is an artist posing as a social worker. We have boxes and boxes of his cartoons, sketches and drawings now. (Think Saul Steinberg as a rough approximate style.) Original Christmas cards, Valentines, napkin sketches, doodles on work notes, cartoons in little notebooks, and so on. An enormous supply of truly FABULOUS artwork that I have to figure out what to do with now.  There are cartoons commenting on world events and things on the news, overheard conversations, and more. There are little “how-to” books, such as how to drive fast (in your parents car).  If you know a serious agent for artists, get in touch. It is a gold mine of fun and funny visuals.

He also saved photos from his trips. He saved every piece of artwork we kids made, plus all the artwork kids he counseled made for him.  He saved maps,  and instructions books, and receipts and put notes and illustrations on all sorts of things.  There is one large box simply labelled “Mental Health Center Cartoons” and I haven’t even begun to look through it.

Long story short, it was quite a weekend for me and one sister to go through and decide what to keep, toss, or put up for sale.  Quite emotional in all sorts of ways. We we exhausted and were to head home Monday. And at 6 am or so on Monday, I thought I heard a tree fall down. Abbie thought the furnace might have broken. We looked all over but couldn’t see anything.  When we got outside, we smelled sewage and gas… an earthquake?

Yes, Buffalo had an earthquake on our final day. Technically it was in West Seneca. You know, the place where our family first built homes when they moved to the US; where they built a Lutheran Church and a cemetery, and where the first Grotkes are buried. That place!

A neighbor saw us leaving and thought that perhaps we had angered Grandma Rose by selling the home.  Probably.

….

A note for people who haven’t been to Buffalo for a few years… there are NO tollbooths on the Thruway anymore. It’s really weird. They just snap photos of you over and over as you drive, scanning for an E-Z Pass. If you don’t have one, you have to text a number to arrange for billing. If you don’t have a phone, well… you live in fear of what might happen.  All the rest areas are under construction, too, so there is very little food, restrooms, or gas at the moment.

…

Now the dream. I love this.

My dream was that I was in downtown Brattleboro and merchants were putting up paper over all of their windows, with signs along the lines of “going out of business” or “closing soon” etc.

They weren’t really closing, though. It was an elaborate protest led by Dick Degray and Greg Worden!

They were fed up with the selectboard and furious at inaction over crime and other issues, so they staged this downtown protest to shame the selectboard into action. They had worked with the downtown organization and other merchants to make it look like ALL of downtown was closed and dead for a few days.

It got on the national news.

Then I woke up.

…

My injury: not much but a slammed my finger with the top of the cast iron stove this morning, and it throbs. I’m taking break from typing tonight.

This is a shame, though because there are some GREAT things on the agenda. I hope others can fill everyone in this week. if not, in all my free time, I might be able to watch a replay of the video later this week for you.

Tell me what happens at the meeting!