Aon

 

Where every cow has a name

Musings about the backwoods of New England

    
  
 

PNikalas rolling hills
= a on either side

| of twisting

two lane

| roads, where
~~ big old barns
and farmhouses sit in every field, you get
the feeling that you’ve been catapulted
back to a simpler time and place. The cows
grazing in the grass seem happy, pressures
of big city and modern life melt away
like ice cream and the only thing pushing
against you is the breeze from the open car
window.

Then around the next comer, a sign
post appears and you’re now in a Norman
Rockwell painting.

Welcome to Mexico—that’s the
village of Mexico: Mexico, Maine. Just
beyond that, across the old bridge, lies
Rumford, a bustling town of 6,500. At 250
years of continuous settlement this town
boasts a history and landscape that seems
all too rare these days. With breathtaking
Edwardian and Victorian homes and a
beautiful historic downtown strip, this
city that relies on the paper mill for its
local economy is tucked away deep in
the Appalachians. It’s the kind of place
where people wave at fire trucks and the
Independence Day parade consists of the
Legion pipe band, a few tractors and the
high school football team.

I’m sort of a sucker for small towns
off the beaten track and when traveling I
prefer the “pick a side road and lets take it
mentality” to the main highways. By doing
so, it makes you feel a like an explorer or
like you’re on The Great (North) American
Road Trip. I realize that it may not be for
everyone. Lots of these little known places

i
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do throw hokey little events that might be
a big yawn for “sophisticated” city folk.
Rumford, for example offers its own “How
to Play Horseshoes” Clinic.

Therein lays the charm. If you
can forget any preconceived notions of
“backwardness” and simply do as the
Romans do, then you’ll find a wonderful
sense of community relatively unspoiled by
outside influences. Americans know how to
do small towns.

The distinguishing thing about these
types of communities in the U.S. is that
many of them, in New England especially,
have managed to avoid strip mall hell.
Walmart, for instance, in the very rural
Vermont, has only four locations. This is
incredible for a state with a population of
600,000. Consider Oklahoma, where the
mega-chain began. It has 101 Walmarts for
its 3.5 million people.

Often these small New England towns
sneak up on you. Before you know it,
you’re downtown.

We in Canada often see small town
America as full of hard right religious
kooks, the type who kept George W. in
power for eight agonizing years. New
England offers an incredible departure
from that mentality. Maine and Vermont
have been blue states since 1992.
Burlington, Vermont’s largest city, often
votes in proud social democrats for mayor
and state capital Montpelier— population
8 000—has an incredibly influential
beatnik community thanks to the Vermont
College of Fine Arts.

These New England farm towns make
up a great little region. There is always
something to uncover. Let’s hope it stays
that way.

 

Vancouver is greenest, but the

 

By Natalie Nathanson

recently went to Kingston, Ontario to

visit family and was taken aback by the

amount of green efforts put in place by
the city that we in the Lower Mainland do
not have.

For example, there is city-wide
collection of compost waste materials. Many
residents in Vancouver that have a backyard
and are environmentally conscious have
opted to compost themselves, but at a cost.
You could either build your own compost
bin, or purchase one from the city for $25.
However, in Kingston, not only are you
provided with a bin you can leave out by the
curb for pick-up, but you’re also provided
with a city issued bin to keep inside your
kitchen for collection at no cost. That means
you no longer have to use that old ice cream
bucket over and over again.

Since moving into an apartment
I’ve felt rather guilty for not being able
to compost, being so used to it in my last
place. It made me angry to learn that city-
wide composting is available even to some
apartment buildings in Kingston, while we
do not have this in Vancouver. When I told
the people I was staying with how we didn’t

competition is fierce

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have this out in Vancouver, they were as
shocked as I was. They thought that for sure
Vancouver would have been the first place
in Canada that would have started the whole
thing, but surprisingly, it’s not.

With a city-wide collection of compost
going on, you’re able to compost far more
than what we’re able in our backyards.
Things like napkins, bones, meats and
cheeses (which the bins we can buy from
the city suggest not to compost) are able to
go in these bins. Another green initiative
that Kingston has completed is by turning
its Wolfe Island, a free, 15 minute ferry ride
from the mainland, into the home of 86 wind
turbines, making it the second-largest wind
farm in Canada. The electricity it provides
is enough to light up this entire city of
115,000.

Don’t get me wrong, Vancouver is
still one of the greenest cities in the world.
90 per cent of Vancouver’s energy comes
from renewable resources, and that’s what
ranks Vancouver in the top ten of just about
any green city list you’ll find. Vancouver
is also looking into using wind and solar |
technology as other sources of energy. I just
think more can be done, and composting is a
great initiative the city could take on.