A grand total of zero people asked me to write this column, so here we go…in no particular order, 15 things I love about Norwich. (Why 15? Our ZIP code of course.)

I remember when the trails of Parcel 5 were relatively unknown. Now users find biking, hiking, walking, running, dog exercising, and snowshoeing. The part that always impresses and keeps me coming back is that no matter the number of cars in the lot, once you’re in the woods, you’re all alone.

Anyone seeking to understand our town’s magic should go to the Farmers Market. On Saturday mornings, it’s a great way to celebrate community, nature, hard work, tradition, music, and delicious local food. Of course, I make it a point to stop at the farm stand on Saturdays…and every other day of the week, too. It’s like two diamond rings for the price of one.

The two-mile loop that includes Beaver Meadow, Moore Lane, Turnpike, and Main (“the Block”) is one of our unheralded treasures. It’s a manageable distance for runners of all skill levels. It gives us a chance to appreciate the different neighborhoods throughout our town (a dip down Huntley or around Hazen is a good call). Without fail, a walk around the Block will get you more smiles, waves, honks, and headlight flashes from your fellow Norwichians than any other route I know.

When the populace congregates around the bandstand, good things are happening. Concerts, Turkey Trots, picnics, celebrations…the vibe is always good.

While helping us see the world through the eyes of a child, the Montshire Museum also surprises when it hosts grown-ups. I’ve been to weddings, pizza parties, and galas in the space, and sipping an IPA amongst the turtles, bubbles, and microscopes feels like you’re getting away with something.

There are many wonderful roads in our hamlet, but Bragg Hill is near the top of my list. Walk, run, or drive, you can feel your blood pressure come down as you soak in the views, tree-lined driveways, and meadows bursting with birdsong and other wildlife.

If action is more what you seek, the wall-to-wall costumed glory that is Carpenter Street on Halloween must be one of the top five spots to trick or treat in the nation. Safe, friendly community at its best.

Find me a better baguette, croissant, or free samples within ten miles of King Arthur and I’ll get you a box of their scone mix.

Watching our children conquer the different challenges of the Norwich Fair is one of parenthood’s great joys. Starting with the flying bees and giant slide, we watch as they graduate to the Sizzler and the Zipper, building memories along the way that will always be from “home.”

What have I done at Huntley Meadow? Won. Lost. Celebrated. Ate. Laughed. Connected. Played. Run. Biked. Skied. Sledded. Coached. Learned. Communed!

What do you get when you mix good lighting with good people, tremendous smarts with down-to-earth-ness, laughter with guidance, omnivorousness with expertise, variety with specialties? The Norwich Bookstore of course.

Our youngest will complete sixth grade at the Marion Cross School in a few months. I will feel sad that I will never have children at the school again. Even as faculty and staff changed over the decades, the school never stopped creating an environment of kindness, trust, learning, and excellence. It’s a jewel of the educational landscape in Vermont and beyond. Next gen, please take care of it.

Naturally, many aspects of our town are worthless without the human element. We cry, laugh, celebrate, mourn, debate, play, work, and live together in remarkable harmony. Against a backdrop of uncertainty beyond our borders, remembering the inherent love and acceptance that we have right here at home can be a soothing balm for our souls.

Oh, one last thing. I’m told we have a pretty good general store. Even if it closes earlier than it did in the past.

Sometimes, Norwich residents need a little help in the conversation department. In our house, we use “chatting topics” to beat away boredom or silence – Heaven forfend there should be a lull in the conversation! – and to steer us onto common ground. Our boys particularly like food, travel, and sports-based discussions. It usually goes something like this: “Chatting topic: Where is the best ice cream in the Upper Valley? Youngest to oldest. Go.” When the topic is a winner, 20-30 minutes pass unnoticed as we debate the pros and cons of soft serve, whipped cream, sprinkles, and cake cones.

As the end of the year approaches, and darkness envelops more of our waking hours than we’d care to acknowledge, it occurred to me that some chatting topics might aid your efforts to counter the winter doldrums. All of them are based on life here in Norwich, where, to the observant eye, Mother Nature and humankind have created an infinite number of subjects to explore. Use them liberally, stash away a couple for when that intimate dîner à deux shows signs of conversational stress, and bring them out when you meet someone new who also resides in our hamlet. Most of all, have fun. No one wants a chatting topic à la Festivus, where we take turns airing our grievances. The best part about a chatting topic – as opposed to a “power round”, which has definite winners and losers – is that there are no right or wrong answers. It’s just for fun, a way to concentrate and flex your intellectual muscles. Best of all, chatting topics serve as a launch pad, helping build friendships, love, and bonds across generations and neighborhoods throughout our town.

Ready?

Let us start with the mundane. Nature calls. Which public restroom would you choose in our town? What is the best parking spot in all of 05055? Have you ever noticed the names of the different houses in the village…not to mention the tenants in those spaces? List all the activities one can engage in at Huntley Meadows. What is the most interesting car or license plate you see on our roads?

Now, let’s go inside for a spell. What’s the story with the moose head in the Norwich Inn? What is interesting about the electric doors at Dan and Whit’s? If you were to procure an entire meal at one of our 24/7 farm stands, what would you pick and from where? What is your preferred entrance to the Norwich Bookstore, King Arthur Baking Company, Crossroads Farm Stand, or Tracy Hall?

Speaking of Tracy Hall, it’s our civic center. What do you think the procedure is for changing the fire hazard warning sign in front of the building? How many people can you name on the Wall of Olympians located in the stairwell? How many annual events can you name that take place in Tracy Hall?

If you’re more of an explorer, it might be fun to spend a winter afternoon driving to the end of dead-end roads just to see what’s there. Where would you start? It just snowed. How many places can you name where the sledding is good in Norwich? Which is the creakiest: Dan and Whit’s back-room floors, the Norwich Public Library original building floor, the white Church steps to the balcony, or somewhere else? If you had to pick your favorite sign or historical marker in town, what would you choose? Where is the best view in Norwich that is fully open to the public? Quick: name five hiking trails in Norwich. What is your favorite dirt road in town and why? How many different ways can you find your way from the Norwich Farmers’ Market to Union Village? Where can you take a 10-, 15-, or 30-minute walk and not see a car?

How about we examine some of our traditions. If you could bottle and sell a Norwich tradition, which one would you choose and why? What are your favorite periodic events in town (public or private) where more than 50 people congregate? Which events feature the gazebo on the town green in a normal year? Who do you think should be the Citizen of the Year?

The possibilities for discussion are endless. What is your favorite food or beverage at one of our restaurants/stores? What is the most dangerous curve in town? Which house do you love but would never want to live in? Who is your favorite Norwich-based musician? How many of your children’s teachers have become your friends? Which specific tree is your favorite during foliage season? If you had to advise a flatlander on the best place to kill a half hour, where would you steer them? Whose landscaping do you most admire? How many books written by Norwich residents have you read or do you know about? Who is, ahem, the most attractive person in town? (You can navigate this one however you want, but I have found that this one is usually best attempted with the disclaimer, “Present company excluded.”). Of the many reasons I believe Norwich is superior to Hanover, I particularly like __________.

There may be too many good reasons to live here to count. One surefire way to discover another’s reasons is to go to the best chatting topic of all:

What do you like most about living here?

I’ll start. The people, of course, and the love they bring to our 45 square miles in the brave little state of Vermont.

A side effect of the world being upside down for a year is the unexpected beauty and wit that the universe continues to throw at us. My oldest son, 10, has blossomed into an avid collector of ski trail maps, the origami squares you kept jammed in your parka to look at on the lift before smartphones changed our world. Occasionally, I look up a resort and see if it is easy to contact customer service or the ticket window. Most times, corporate America thwarts my efforts. (Calling Vail and hoping for a quick answer instead of getting trapped in an endless labyrinth of “press 1” options is a little like standing in front of the White House thinking Joe is going to come out and say hello just to you.) At one area in Colorado, however, I found an easy fill form and asked for a map.

One sends these types of messages with the thought that one will be able to tell spouse, child, parents, in-laws, and friends that AT LEAST one has tried, but that one must never expect a response from such an anonymous platform, most likely dominated by “bots.”

When the return message came into my email from “Snow Reporter,” I expected one of two responses: a canned “no” or something approaching a begrudging “yes.” The universe had other plans.

Norwichians, it is worth reminding ourselves that Colorado has a certain reputation that jibes pretty well with our own. Beautiful scenery. Population enthused by outdoor activities. A certain permissiveness about THC and craft beer. People who have left elsewhere searching for happiness who end up staying.

“I’ll get a map in the mail to you first thing Monday morning!,” the message read. “We hope to see you!”

Two exclamation points were enough to convince me I had done good. But what floored me was that the kind person at the other end of the interwebs had a name – avian in theme – that is revered in the 05055. Nay, not Partridge – can you imagine? Neither was it Hawk, Falcon, or Eagle.

“Ms. Sparrow,” I wrote back, “In our family, we talk about the concept of a ‘universe wink.’ It’s when you dare to ask for something or try something new or take a little bit of a risk (no matter how small or inconsequential) and the universe just kind of winks back at you, letting you know that you are doing alright. Well, the universe wink in this story is that a very popular café in our  little Vermont town is the Blue SPARROW Kitchen. Amazing. Thank you so much; our son will be thrilled.”

She wrote back, “I love that! Thanks for sharing the universe wink!” It’s a silly thing, but in these times, it seems to me that if we can no longer thrill at the silly things, then history will write that the virus won.

 It turns out that ski maps weren’t the only sextant for my soul, pointing the way towards a memory. Recently, after completing a task that can only be described as “essential” in New Hampshire, I took my normal route down the hill towards my hometown. At an intersection, on the best sign in Hanover (VERMONT ->), there was something new.

 Of all the 50 states, how many feature residents who would premeditate the need for spray paint, cross state lines out of their own state against the governor’s pandemic orders, locate a highway sign indicating the direction of their own home state, withdraw the aforementioned paint, and draw a couple of hearts to indicate to the wayward traveller who had forsaken their homeland that not all was lost, that their people were but a short distance across a green bridge and a black river?

My answer?

One.

These last 12 months, it has been hard to find the music in the world, like we all have a little water in our ears that no amount of jumping up and down can drain. The chaos comes at us like snowflakes in a blizzard, toying with our equilibrium. Anxiety and distress lurk behind every curtain and around every corner. And yet, somehow, strangers take a chance that maybe, just maybe, a little vandalism-turned-poetry will make others smile. They help pop the bubble and return your audio to normal. The person or people who painted those two hearts on the Vermont sign make my world sing… and our universe wink.

We’re Vermonters, the gentleman standing outside the Norwich Inn said. “We’ll survive.”

True, his words made my inner Deadhead do a little twirl (I know you don’t need help for such an obvious one but…“Touch of Grey” people, “Touch of Grey”). More than that, his confidence was – like this virus – infectious. Suddenly, I had a little spring in my step, like a man headed to the golf course when it was a workday for everyone else.

It wasn’t the only example of hope out there in our town. In conversation with a neighbor, he pointed out that when Vermonters say “Hi, Neighbor” it actually signifies something, with due respect to Narragansett beer’s official motto. It means, he explained, that there is something to the relationship we have with and to each other, a shared sense of community that may be more elusive in other parts of the country.

[UNNAMED SOURCES] told me of a last-gasp, not-quite-but-almost-clandestine gathering around a firepit in [UNDISCLOSED LOCATION IN NORWICH], where [AN INDETERMINATE NUMBER] of families talked about what they were going to miss when Governor Scott’s latest guidance of no multi-family gatherings went into effect. While the laments were genuine, they paled in comparison to the group’s willingness to sacrifice to keep school open.

For those of you without school-aged children, please know that those of us with younger kiddos notice your commitment to and sacrifices for us. Thank you!

When school is open, we are all of us more connected to each other. Parents, educators, children, bus drivers, youth coaches, local businesses – McWhit artisans! Blue Sparrow latte crafters! – and town employees all operate in sync when the little engine of Marion Cross School is running at normal speed. Plus, when school is open, we all get to pretend that we are beautiful enough to stop traffic: simply signal to Norman or Demo that you would like to cross the street and vehicles will wait for you.

After school one day, I stood behind a fourth-grade boy in line at the local grocery store. He was with some friends, all of them masked up and playing by the rules, just in for a snack. At the post in between the freezers and the bread aisle, there is a rack with postcards featuring images of all that makes the Green Mountain State beautiful. The boy pointed at one photo of our famous fall foliage, the word “Vermont” blazing across the crimson leaves.

Each autumn since I can remember, when leaves were at their peak, my brother and I endured our mother stopping the car, pausing a hike, or interrupting one of our stories to force us to look, to notice Mother Nature’s display. “People come from all over the world to see this,” she would say.

Of course, we never listened or paid her any heed. Yet, when the boy pointed at that postcard, saying, “Hey! That’s where we live!,” you can bet her words echoed in my ears, and I cried just a little bit, so hopeful for the next generation of Vermonters.

So, when we pass each other out and about, try to see each other. Gradually, with time, patience, love, and some modern medicine, our masks will start to come off. The vaccinated will hug you, bridging chasms that a single malady has dug in just a few months. Dreams and plans will come back into your daily discussions. Travel – TRAVEL! – will be all the rage once more. We will adjust to a new world. During that adjustment, that return to “normal,” let us try to pause and reflect. Of all the places on planet earth where we could have been during this most crazy of years, we were here. Together, we rode out this storm, finding silver linings (and, yes, touches of grey), taking walks, trusting each other to do right. Make sure to say “Hi, Neighbor” when you’re out and about. It’s just our little code here in Vermont, a sign that we understand how we rise and fall and struggle and succeed together.

After all, we’re Vermonters.

While perusing the pears at the farm stand, I heard a voice say, “Next week, we start impeachment.” I looked at the back of a head, and thought, “There’s an educator ready to walk his students through a constitutional complexity.” Then I remembered I lived in Norwich, and it clicked: that’s no social studies teacher; that’s our congressman. Over a couple of minutes, the farm stand employee, the congressman, and I chuckled, queried, and opined.

For a political nerd like me, those 100+ seconds were a unique gift: impossible to steal, replicate, or purchase. The experience got me thinking, in this season of gift-giving, how many presents we give each other in our community that simply cannot be wrapped.

In our neighborhood in the village, the woman in the house behind ours ignores my objections and spoons strawberry ice cream into dishes for my children, to their delight. The man next door found a basketball in some brush behind his shed. Instead of just chucking it back onto our driveway, he walked the ball up to our door and delivered it in person. One couple beams at my boys – calling them by the correct names – and tells them of an upcoming hunting trip to the Midwest. At the end of the road, no fewer than four adults have kept an unsolicited eye on our sons. Toward town, neighbors practically lay out a red carpet as invitation for us to use their property as a shortcut. Taken collectively,
it’s like having an advent calendar where each day one opens the little paper door to find a gift that is the glue of our town: goodwill, kindness, generosity, thoughtfulness, grace, selflessness, laughter.

At a Dartmouth football game, my sons lined up by the field house doors to greet the players as they emerged from Leverone. “Dad,” my youngest said, “if I got a high-five from Tom Brady, I would probably never forget it. But getting a high five from a college student is pretty awesome, too.” My oldest added, “Yeah, and there are not a lot of places in the world where you get to do what we just did.”

#mycuprunnethover
Not surprisingly, when I began to pay attention, Dan & Whit’s offered a gift, though you will never find it on the shelves. I saw the Book of Scottish Cookery over by the coffee. It seemed like a step into a Bizzarro-Norwich. I grew up in the 05055, and never – never – have I heard a fellow citizen express a craving for Scottish food.

As luck would have it, one Mr. Fraser – veteran, husband, brother, father, person who calls my sons “the helpers” and tells current cashiers that I used to ballroom dance with my fellow cashiers when I ran the register in the 1990s – was rearranging cardboard boxes by the shopping carts. “Now, Mr. Fraser,” I said, in direct defiance of his repeated efforts to get me to call him George, which I always did when I was a kid, but no longer do (except when I do), “this cannot possibly be a hot item.”

The proprietor of the general store that is the very definition of Norwich considered me with something in between amusement and pity. As usual, his pace was not rushed. “Actually, that book is selling quite well. We sold out of the first batch, and we have a whole bunch that customers have reserved in the office. There was a piece in the newspaper about it.”

Unconvinced, I thumbed through the pages and found a recipe. “George, get real. There is no chance you are going home today to make vegetarian haggis nachos.” Unsolicited, the young fellow manning the back register chimed in, “People are buying the book.”

My eyes were rolling more than a bowling ball when a gentleman walked briskly up the ramp into the store, marched directly to the display over which I was presiding, selected a copy of the cookbook in question, and proceeded to the front register. He had not overheard a syllable of our conversation. As Mr. Fraser, the young fellow, and I looked on, he purchased his copy and made his way down the ramp.

If you could package and sell the gleam in Mr. Fraser’s eye at that moment, your financial worries would be over.

You cannot, of course.

You can, however, celebrate all the wonderful gifts we give each other across this little town nestled in eastern Vermont.

One treasure of Norwich that you will never find in a real estate listing, a guide book, or a town report is “the Block.” It is the two-mile loop comprised of Main Street, Turnpike Road, Moore Lane, and Beaver Meadow Road. It has about as much in common with a city block as a crow has with a flamingo: some similar features, but radically different.

From a distance perspective, the Block is a beaut. Little Legs can handle it, especially if Big Legs remembers to bring a couple bribery snacks. For Schnauzers, poodles, beagles, and the people they manage, the Block is ideal for the daily constitutional. The Block offers a perfect way for workers on lunch break, friends, and couples to squeeze a 30 or 40 minute walk into their schedule. The 10,000+ feet are enough to wipe away stresses, energize the mind and body, and remind one of the benefits of good old fashioned fresh air. In inclement weather, circumnavigating the Block is just serious enough of an undertaking to make you tough without risking hypothermia. Runners use it as a quick cruiser or as an add-on to longer treks. The blind, sidewalk-less curve by Bragg Hill brings an element of danger. You can extend it with a jaunt down Huntley or around Hazen. It is, simply, a route for every age at every time of the year.

As substantial as the cardiovascular benefits of the Block are, its finest role is as glue in our community. No matter where you begin your trip, you encounter a smattering of positive points of the 05055. Start out from the bridge on Moore Lane and Mother Nature’s melodies soothe you as Bloody Brook babbles underfoot. On Beaver Meadow, as you pass the Lyman F. Pell American Legion, it is only natural to give a little nod of appreciation to the veterans of Norwich who have served our country and our community so well. Sometimes, there are people gathered around the pizza oven as you stroll by. Ascending the gentle slope by the cemetery, every car within a country mile stops to let you cross the street, a small but remarkable courtesy. The pace of activity picks up: small businesses, started and run by Upper Valley entrepreneurs, populate the buildings, a testament to our professional independence. The Inn, home of wedding parties, family dinners, reunions, and community events, stands witness as thousands of residents make their daily pilgrimage to the universe’s finest general store at the halfway point of your journey.

You recall pancake breakfasts at the Grange as you amble past, mindful of the new building going up to house police and firefighters. Kids are playing in front of the library, burning off some steam post-Cross School before they go inside and crawl into another book.

Houses on Main Street, a series of New England postcards, are older, their history almost palpable. There’s a famous Democrat’s house. A fire chief used to live in that one. Right before Turnpike, you try to puzzle out if residents of Main Street are required by the town to keep their front lawns immaculate. On your last stretch, traffic slows, and you get a break from initiating or returning the waves and smiles that seem to be the primary currencies of the town.

You’ve gone far enough to feel limber, revitalized, good. As you finish your loop around the Block, you gaze down on Mink Farm/Huntley Meadows. Constellations of little people chase balls under the watchful, supportive eyes of parents and coaches. Dogs zig and zag across the terrain. And you know it’s a bubble, and you know there’s big bad stuff out there, and you know you have responsibilities. But sometimes, it’s nice to forget all that and just take a walk around the Block.