This column originally appeared on Sunday, Feb. 24, 2008
Friday morning brought just enough snow to make you think there wasn’t really a need to rush to work, so you might as well stop in at Penn’s Table for some breakfast.
When I walked in from the cold it was clear I wasn’t the only one with that idea, but there was still space at the counter. I sat down a few stools away from a middle-aged man and his granddaughter, who was having the pancakes that vaguely resemble Mickey Mouse without the copyright symbol. She looked me over to make sure I wasn’t trying to swipe the syrup, and flashed me a friendly smile after I waved hello.
After a few minutes, Anthony came over to say hello to her and banter with her grandfather. Anthony and his wife Jenn own the place, have for years, and treat the people who come in on a regular basis pretty much like you would if one of your neighbors was sitting at your kitchen table, wondering if he could get extra chips and pickles with his BLT.
Anthony went about teasing the young girl, maybe 5 years old, maybe 6, about how much she’d eaten and how fast and I suddenly remembered another snowy day when I sat at a coffee shop counter and listened to the owner tease a young kid as he topped off a cup of hot chocolate with a spray of whipped cream.
The kid was me, of course, and the owner was a Greek guy named Nick, inconceivably, and the coffee shop was the one my father stopped off at to read the paper on his way to the University of Cincinnati, where he taught chemistry. On some Saturday mornings he would take my sisters and I there for a breakfast treat, and Nick and the grey-haired haired waitress who ran the counter would make us feel at home.
It is among the treasures of childhood to have an adult in a position of such high authority – owner of a coffee shop -- recognize that you are important enough to come over and gently suggest that your haircut looks a trifle silly and maybe you just ought to keep your wool cap on all day. It is even better, though, to have the waitress let you come around behind the counter and grab a new spoon since you dropped the other on the floor and have concerns about the germs.
But this column isn’t just about coffee shop owners named Anthony or Nick. It’s about the misgiving that nestles in your stomach when you see a franchise eatery open its doors down the street from the family-owned place you always go to. It’s about how those glittery national chains slowly erode the ability of the local joints to compete, and how little by little we end up all getting the same food at the same price in the same space served by people wearing the same clothes, whether we like it or not.
You might have seen some of those places open up recently in West Chester. I am not suggesting in any way that what they’re offering isn’t tasty, well presented, and sometimes more comestible than a cup of two-day-old chili at the local diner. But I think it bears noting that when Serbian crowds in Belgrade last week decided to attack the evils they associated with America, they chose a McDonalds.
And I’ll have a little more whipped cream with my cocoa, Anthony. Thanks.
Monday, February 25, 2008
Monday, February 18, 2008
Goodbye, Sugar
This column originally appeared on Sunday, Feb. 17, 2008
All that was left on Friday night of the tree that towered across from my home on South Church Street in West Chester is a stump and a plastic sign with the name of the tree service that took it down and chipped most of it into oblivion. The sign flapped in the breeze, illuminated by a waxing moon and looking something like a tombstone.
That tree came down in a rush last week. Its absence leaves me profoundly ill at ease. I find my home diminished. I would like to have it back again. Do not ask me to explain myself, but in my heart I expect people to die and trees to survive.
The tree was sick. It did not look sick, it did not act sick. Its leaves were still full and lush and brilliant when they emerged last spring. But anyone who saw the hollow spaces in its thick trunk as it lay in the yard after being sawed apart would readily acknowledge that it was suffering from a disease that would ultimately have caused its collapse.
Last summer that tree shaded me from the afternoon sun as I enjoyed a glass of wine on my front stoop. Last fall that tree gave me a slide-show of color as its leaves turned from green to gold to brown. This winter the snow clung to it for an evening and outlined its branches in the shimmering blue of the night’s glow. This spring it will not be there at all.
I have photos of the tree taken from some years back. One view is upwards through its branches towards the sky, and makes me feel like standing at the feet of a giant. I once painted a watercolor of its trunk and its branches and sent that watercolor to a friend whose father had died. “Deep roots grow strong boughs,” I wrote. My friend thanked me for the card, thanked me for the sentiment. I am sure he still has it, and that it and my photographs will keep the memory of that tree alive.
I stopped by the home that the tree stood in front of Thursday night when I noticed that it had vanished. Melissa, my neighbor, told me that there was nothing to do to save it. The borough – which in West Chester is in charge of the trees that dot the sidewalks and rights of way and which give rise to its designation of “Tree City U.S.A.” – had tried to prop it up, but it was increasingly apparent that sometime in the future a strong wind would cause its limbs to crack like a weak sheet of ice and fall.
Fall on what? Perhaps only the sidewalk; perhaps only on a car’s roof. But perhaps, too, on a stroller that a pair of new parents wheeled past it on an evening stroll. The danger, Melissa – whose baby daughter came home last summer when that tree was in full bloom – and I knew, was too large to leave to chance.
Melissa and her husband Dennis are caretakers to the other tree in which I delight, the dawn redwood planted so many years ago. It still stands in the side yard of their home, where Buffalo Bill Cody stayed when he wintered his horses on the King Ranch in East Fallowfield. I would like to imagine that the tree was a sapling when Cody walked out of the house to go perform in his Wild West Show, but I honestly don’t know how old it was.
After talking with Melissa I sat outside awhile, long enough for another neighbor to walk by.
“See what’s missing?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said. “It’s sad. Trees are coming down all over.”
All that was left on Friday night of the tree that towered across from my home on South Church Street in West Chester is a stump and a plastic sign with the name of the tree service that took it down and chipped most of it into oblivion. The sign flapped in the breeze, illuminated by a waxing moon and looking something like a tombstone.
That tree came down in a rush last week. Its absence leaves me profoundly ill at ease. I find my home diminished. I would like to have it back again. Do not ask me to explain myself, but in my heart I expect people to die and trees to survive.
The tree was sick. It did not look sick, it did not act sick. Its leaves were still full and lush and brilliant when they emerged last spring. But anyone who saw the hollow spaces in its thick trunk as it lay in the yard after being sawed apart would readily acknowledge that it was suffering from a disease that would ultimately have caused its collapse.
Last summer that tree shaded me from the afternoon sun as I enjoyed a glass of wine on my front stoop. Last fall that tree gave me a slide-show of color as its leaves turned from green to gold to brown. This winter the snow clung to it for an evening and outlined its branches in the shimmering blue of the night’s glow. This spring it will not be there at all.
I have photos of the tree taken from some years back. One view is upwards through its branches towards the sky, and makes me feel like standing at the feet of a giant. I once painted a watercolor of its trunk and its branches and sent that watercolor to a friend whose father had died. “Deep roots grow strong boughs,” I wrote. My friend thanked me for the card, thanked me for the sentiment. I am sure he still has it, and that it and my photographs will keep the memory of that tree alive.
I stopped by the home that the tree stood in front of Thursday night when I noticed that it had vanished. Melissa, my neighbor, told me that there was nothing to do to save it. The borough – which in West Chester is in charge of the trees that dot the sidewalks and rights of way and which give rise to its designation of “Tree City U.S.A.” – had tried to prop it up, but it was increasingly apparent that sometime in the future a strong wind would cause its limbs to crack like a weak sheet of ice and fall.
Fall on what? Perhaps only the sidewalk; perhaps only on a car’s roof. But perhaps, too, on a stroller that a pair of new parents wheeled past it on an evening stroll. The danger, Melissa – whose baby daughter came home last summer when that tree was in full bloom – and I knew, was too large to leave to chance.
Melissa and her husband Dennis are caretakers to the other tree in which I delight, the dawn redwood planted so many years ago. It still stands in the side yard of their home, where Buffalo Bill Cody stayed when he wintered his horses on the King Ranch in East Fallowfield. I would like to imagine that the tree was a sapling when Cody walked out of the house to go perform in his Wild West Show, but I honestly don’t know how old it was.
After talking with Melissa I sat outside awhile, long enough for another neighbor to walk by.
“See what’s missing?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said. “It’s sad. Trees are coming down all over.”
Neither Plastic Nor Paper
This column originally appeared on Sunday, Feb. 10, 2008
When it comes to movements, social or political, I’m more of a leader than a follower.
That is why when I was in college, for example, I didn’t join in the popular “Don’t Eat Grapes” movement. (For those of you who have forgotten, or never knew, there was a time when grape pickers were trying to organize a union and the way you showed your allegiance to them was to swear off grapes. I can’t remember if the effort was successful or not.) At the time, I didn’t like eating grapes but just on principle I used to munch a few when I had a chance just to declare my non-conformity.
No, when it comes to movements, I like to create them on my own rather than fall in line with the crowd.
That’s why I formed the “Move Chadds Ford to Chester County” movement and the “Illuminate the Twin Bridges of Creek Road” movement and the “Build a Public Swimming Pool in My Neighborhood in West Chester” movement. These were movements that I could hold complete sway over with little effort, largely because the movements were made up of me and no one else.
But lately I’ve been drawn to a movement that seems to be gathering steam across not just the country, but the globe: a rejection of the plastic grocery bag.
You know, the so-called “undershirt bag” that looks like a man’s athletic t-shirt. The ubiquitous carry all shopping bag routinely dispensed in stores of all manner and stripe.
They are an environmental nuisance. Made of fossil-fuel based polymers, the bags are non-biodegradable and virtually indestructible. They remain for centuries in landfills, and clog the waterways. Ducks and fish presumably die from trying to ingest them.
Lately, local governments in New York City and San Francisco have enacted legislation to seeks t o reduce their use. In Ireland, they are taxed. In China, the world's fastest-growing economy, they are banned and shoppers are encouraged people to use cloth ones instead."This issue is not going away,”said Allen Hershkowitz, director of the solid waste program at the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group. (He’s my presumptive choice for leader of the movement, mostly because his last name sounds so unbelievably impressive.)
I was introduced to the situation when reading pieces in The New Yorker by Ian Frazier, a wonderful writer, who discussed his growing hatred of seeing bags in trees. He even invented a device for removing them, called and patented as the “bag snagger.” He wrote: “To me, a bag in a tree is like a flag of chaos, and when I remove it I'm capturing the flag of the other side. In the end it doesn't matter how ironic or serious or even effective on a larger scale bag snagging may be. Doing it demonstrates that even in the odd little overlooked wilderness the bags inhabit, people still can use their eyes and hands and brains, and still have dominion over the chaos of bags in trees.”
Now, when I see a bag in a tree I wish them ill, and vow never to carry another one out into the wild. I have a growing collection of cloth bags from a variety of stores, and my biggest worry seems to be using one franchise’s bag in another’s check out lane.
From now on, all my eggs will go in a non-plastic basket so to speak. Ditto the grapes.
When it comes to movements, social or political, I’m more of a leader than a follower.
That is why when I was in college, for example, I didn’t join in the popular “Don’t Eat Grapes” movement. (For those of you who have forgotten, or never knew, there was a time when grape pickers were trying to organize a union and the way you showed your allegiance to them was to swear off grapes. I can’t remember if the effort was successful or not.) At the time, I didn’t like eating grapes but just on principle I used to munch a few when I had a chance just to declare my non-conformity.
No, when it comes to movements, I like to create them on my own rather than fall in line with the crowd.
That’s why I formed the “Move Chadds Ford to Chester County” movement and the “Illuminate the Twin Bridges of Creek Road” movement and the “Build a Public Swimming Pool in My Neighborhood in West Chester” movement. These were movements that I could hold complete sway over with little effort, largely because the movements were made up of me and no one else.
But lately I’ve been drawn to a movement that seems to be gathering steam across not just the country, but the globe: a rejection of the plastic grocery bag.
You know, the so-called “undershirt bag” that looks like a man’s athletic t-shirt. The ubiquitous carry all shopping bag routinely dispensed in stores of all manner and stripe.
They are an environmental nuisance. Made of fossil-fuel based polymers, the bags are non-biodegradable and virtually indestructible. They remain for centuries in landfills, and clog the waterways. Ducks and fish presumably die from trying to ingest them.
Lately, local governments in New York City and San Francisco have enacted legislation to seeks t o reduce their use. In Ireland, they are taxed. In China, the world's fastest-growing economy, they are banned and shoppers are encouraged people to use cloth ones instead."This issue is not going away,”said Allen Hershkowitz, director of the solid waste program at the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group. (He’s my presumptive choice for leader of the movement, mostly because his last name sounds so unbelievably impressive.)
I was introduced to the situation when reading pieces in The New Yorker by Ian Frazier, a wonderful writer, who discussed his growing hatred of seeing bags in trees. He even invented a device for removing them, called and patented as the “bag snagger.” He wrote: “To me, a bag in a tree is like a flag of chaos, and when I remove it I'm capturing the flag of the other side. In the end it doesn't matter how ironic or serious or even effective on a larger scale bag snagging may be. Doing it demonstrates that even in the odd little overlooked wilderness the bags inhabit, people still can use their eyes and hands and brains, and still have dominion over the chaos of bags in trees.”
Now, when I see a bag in a tree I wish them ill, and vow never to carry another one out into the wild. I have a growing collection of cloth bags from a variety of stores, and my biggest worry seems to be using one franchise’s bag in another’s check out lane.
From now on, all my eggs will go in a non-plastic basket so to speak. Ditto the grapes.
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
Love! In The Name Of Stop (Signs)
This column originally appeared on Sunday, Feb. 3, 2008
You will please excuse us if we seem a little giddy here in West Chester. We’ve been celebrating the arrival of a new little bundle of joy that came last month, to our surprise and delight. And not just one bundle, but twins!
That’s right, folks. We have two, count ’em, two new stop signs in the borough. Right there at the corner of West Gay and North Darlington streets, right there in front of the best darn “five star restaurant” you’d ever want to chug down a beer tower in. We are so, as they say, blessed.
You know how we love our street signs here in West Chester. We are proud of them, as proud of them as any parent who has ever seen his or her son or daughter appear on “American Idol,” or “The Apprentice,” or “Cops!” or any other avenue to the world of fame and renown.
We make sure they are kept company with other signs, and even take them down now and then and clean them up a bit if they look too shopworn. When it gets too cold or icy, we have been known to bring them to our homes for an extra bit of warmth. We ask after their health on rainy days, and always remember them on national holidays.
We try not to play favorites among our signs, as any good parent would. We know that our “No Parking Anytime, Anywhere, Anyhow” signs are just as important and special and unique as our “Welcome to West Chester, Not East Coatesville” signs are. (We’re not going to talk about our “Route 842” signs. We understand that they are trying to find their own “special place” in the world, but sometimes things just don’t work out. We wish them well.) But, just as any good parent would, we can’t help but feel a little bit fonder of our stop signs than the others.
Maybe it’s because they’ve been around so much longer. Can you even imagine West Chester without stop signs? We can’t. We even took a drive the other day just to spend some time with our stop signs. In a 10-minute spin around the borough, we counted no fewer than 45 stop signs. That’s 4.5 stop signs every minute, sometimes four to a corner! Did we say how blessed we are?
We have noticed that outsiders coming into the borough jump right into the spirit of things when it comes to our stop signs. Sometimes drivers with out-of-state plates will even stop at a corner where there is no stop sign. We think they may be trying to tell us something, like: “What? You guys run out of octagons?”
Our new signs have taken some getting used to, however. Manys the time we see drivers blow past them like they were not even there. We were hoping that the folks at the Borough Hall would have put up a few signs notifying people about the new stop signs, but they were apparently too busy reneging on parking garage contracts to bother.
Oh well. We suppose that like all good children our new stop signs will learn to assert themselves, stand up and be noticed. When they do, we will be here for them.
You will please excuse us if we seem a little giddy here in West Chester. We’ve been celebrating the arrival of a new little bundle of joy that came last month, to our surprise and delight. And not just one bundle, but twins!
That’s right, folks. We have two, count ’em, two new stop signs in the borough. Right there at the corner of West Gay and North Darlington streets, right there in front of the best darn “five star restaurant” you’d ever want to chug down a beer tower in. We are so, as they say, blessed.
You know how we love our street signs here in West Chester. We are proud of them, as proud of them as any parent who has ever seen his or her son or daughter appear on “American Idol,” or “The Apprentice,” or “Cops!” or any other avenue to the world of fame and renown.
We make sure they are kept company with other signs, and even take them down now and then and clean them up a bit if they look too shopworn. When it gets too cold or icy, we have been known to bring them to our homes for an extra bit of warmth. We ask after their health on rainy days, and always remember them on national holidays.
We try not to play favorites among our signs, as any good parent would. We know that our “No Parking Anytime, Anywhere, Anyhow” signs are just as important and special and unique as our “Welcome to West Chester, Not East Coatesville” signs are. (We’re not going to talk about our “Route 842” signs. We understand that they are trying to find their own “special place” in the world, but sometimes things just don’t work out. We wish them well.) But, just as any good parent would, we can’t help but feel a little bit fonder of our stop signs than the others.
Maybe it’s because they’ve been around so much longer. Can you even imagine West Chester without stop signs? We can’t. We even took a drive the other day just to spend some time with our stop signs. In a 10-minute spin around the borough, we counted no fewer than 45 stop signs. That’s 4.5 stop signs every minute, sometimes four to a corner! Did we say how blessed we are?
We have noticed that outsiders coming into the borough jump right into the spirit of things when it comes to our stop signs. Sometimes drivers with out-of-state plates will even stop at a corner where there is no stop sign. We think they may be trying to tell us something, like: “What? You guys run out of octagons?”
Our new signs have taken some getting used to, however. Manys the time we see drivers blow past them like they were not even there. We were hoping that the folks at the Borough Hall would have put up a few signs notifying people about the new stop signs, but they were apparently too busy reneging on parking garage contracts to bother.
Oh well. We suppose that like all good children our new stop signs will learn to assert themselves, stand up and be noticed. When they do, we will be here for them.
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