28 September 2017
Story #882
R. Linda:
I thought things were backwards in Ireland, but nah, living in New England be a similar experience. In Ireland, you wait for things to be done. Oh, for sure, you can tell the electrician you need something done, and six months later, he'll show up like you called yesterday. And so it goes with everything else. Here, in the sticks of New Hampshire, the pace of life is laid-back and slower than, say, Boston. How do I know this? Having lived in Boston for a few years, I grew accustomed to the faster pace and the convenience of being able to order or buy what I needed instantly. As a result, I was a bit spoiled. Then I moved to New Hampshire, where it all went pear-shaped. Yes, I could order fuel and be told it would be arriving in a few days, not the same day. Why not today? No, we can't do that. The truck is filled with just enough for the day's deliveries, and adding one more would require the driver to go back to the filling station and refill. It's best to wait. An electrician, just like in Ireland, but instead of a six-month wait, it might be three.
I think I told you the first time Jersey girl Tonya went to the Mall of New Hampshire; she had dressed to the nines, just like she did in New Jersey, going to say the Willowbrook Mall or the Livingston Mall. Yes, there she was, her hair done, wearing a nice outfit, jewellery, the whole nine yards, and everyone at the mall? Old jeans and flannel shirts. Makeup? What's that? And jewellery? None of that. She couldn't wait to get out of there. And since then, she's never done that again.
I think I told you weddings up here are rather different, to put it mildly. At our first wedding, I was in a suit, and Ton was in a gown (the invitation had said 'formal'), and everyone else was... The men wore khaki pants with blue shirts, and the women, capri pants and tank tops. We were mistaken for being part of the wedding party too many times to count. Every wedding we have attended up here has been this way. And I refuse to get the man's wedding uniform of khaki pants and a long-sleeved blue shirt!
One last dress code. Tonya and I met the kiddo's teachers after enrolling them in school. We met Guido's teacher, who stands out to us the most. There she was, dressed in a sparkly Harley Davidson tee with cut-offs and open-toed sandals. Me wife said to me on the side, "If she were teaching in New Jersey, she'd be fired for that mode of dress." That aside, I will say the woman's young charges love her, and she is one of the most popular teachers. Guido has done well under her guidance, so I can't complain; I'm just saying how different it is up here.
I should have known something was amiss when I first moved in. The Realtor leaned over to me at the closing and said, "At least you are on the town line; the town next to you has Internet, so you should be able to tap into that." That took a good few minutes to sink in. "What do you mean, tap in? Don't we have Internet in this town?" The answer was NO. No cable, no Internet. Notta. That we have flush toilets instead of outhouses, we can count ourselves lucky.
The story goes that the horse people of our little village refused free cable because they didn't want it to mess up their lives as they knew them. REALLY? I only found this out a few months AFTER I moved in. I've been here almost four years and I found out only three weeks ago, if you want to know, what is going on with this village, you have to sign onto Facebook and hope your satellite connection keeps you on long enough to get to the site and then stay on the site long enough for one to peruse the news.
No buried cable, but satellite dishes. Yup, which is more unsightly? So much for preserving the village's integrity. One bad rain, snow, or wind and ice storm, and there is no telly, no so-called Internet; there is nothing but one can go to the local library for a book. But that is an experience in itself.
I got tired of cloudy or foggy nights interrupting me telly service, so the next day I went to our local one-room library to get a card so I could take books out. I get down there, and right away, I walk into a bake sale in the small hallway. Right next to the door is a basket full of money. If this were Boston, that basket would have been out the door and long gone by now. I should stand there and guard the money so that it wouldn't happen. I got the attention of the lady arranging goodies on a small table and said as much, and was told it was just fine where it was. I felt like I needed to buy something, so I selected a cookie, but then found I needed change. The nice lady told me to make my change from the basket. I was flabbergasted and really didn't want to do that. So I dropped a fiver in and left it without change. I know I could have had a free cookie and a few twenty-dollar bills, but that's not me. So, I put the cookie in me pocket and went inside to the library desk. Right away, the bake table lady comes in behind the desk. I thought double duty, desk and bake sale. Ok.
She asked what she could help me with, and I told her I wanted to get a library card. She asked to see me license so she could take me info off it. So I am standing there, watching her, when it dawns on me: she is using a typewriter to type the information on a piece of paper. Carbon paper and all. I looked around and there was no computer. Well, why would there be? Duh, no Internet! So I asked her how she knew what books were outstanding, and she pointed to a long wooden file box and said everything was there. That's all the books. I asked her how she looked up overdue books, and she said she had to go through the NUMBERS one by one in the file box. OMG. The numbers are all from the Dewey Decimal System. I didn't know anyone used the DD System anymore, so I was really taken aback at that. But like I say, no computers, so figures.
Once outside and hoping I was in the real world again, I noticed a small sign over a hut. It said Police. There was a jeep parked there, so I decided to drop in to meet our local constabulary. That was also an eye-opener. There is one man, he is the police chief, and he is the only policeman. He has no police car, a little village like ours doesn't need one, he said. He told me if I needed any assistance day or night, I was to call 911, and the folks two towns over would respond. He'd get to me once they PAGED him. I was like, OK.
I am finding that America isn't all it's hyped up to be. Oh, sure, there are a lot of things and opportunities, but not all of them are like that. Where I live, the tourists think they are back in time and find it all quaint. What is quaint to them is inconvenient to me. Did I tell you we are somehow being absorbed into the backwoods lifestyle? Yup, we got some chickens. Not for eating for eggs only. We didn't intend to raise chickens, but the woman next door thought we should have some. I think I mentioned that to you. Anyway, we have what they call free-range animals, which are all over the place. I keep thinking some wild animal will spirit them off, and we have lost one. But they seem to know how to hide their eggs, and then we have more chickens. We started off with nine and are up to seventeen dirty birds. I whisper in Mam's ear that we should have a few for dinner, but she thinks the kiddos would find out our dirty deeds and we'd be persona non grata. When we reach thirty chickens, I will mail you a dozen to start your own egg farm in Denver.
Gabe
Copyright © 2017 All rights reserved
Story #882
R. Linda:
I thought things were backwards in Ireland, but nah, living in New England be a similar experience. In Ireland, you wait for things to be done. Oh, for sure, you can tell the electrician you need something done, and six months later, he'll show up like you called yesterday. And so it goes with everything else. Here, in the sticks of New Hampshire, the pace of life is laid-back and slower than, say, Boston. How do I know this? Having lived in Boston for a few years, I grew accustomed to the faster pace and the convenience of being able to order or buy what I needed instantly. As a result, I was a bit spoiled. Then I moved to New Hampshire, where it all went pear-shaped. Yes, I could order fuel and be told it would be arriving in a few days, not the same day. Why not today? No, we can't do that. The truck is filled with just enough for the day's deliveries, and adding one more would require the driver to go back to the filling station and refill. It's best to wait. An electrician, just like in Ireland, but instead of a six-month wait, it might be three.
I think I told you the first time Jersey girl Tonya went to the Mall of New Hampshire; she had dressed to the nines, just like she did in New Jersey, going to say the Willowbrook Mall or the Livingston Mall. Yes, there she was, her hair done, wearing a nice outfit, jewellery, the whole nine yards, and everyone at the mall? Old jeans and flannel shirts. Makeup? What's that? And jewellery? None of that. She couldn't wait to get out of there. And since then, she's never done that again.
I think I told you weddings up here are rather different, to put it mildly. At our first wedding, I was in a suit, and Ton was in a gown (the invitation had said 'formal'), and everyone else was... The men wore khaki pants with blue shirts, and the women, capri pants and tank tops. We were mistaken for being part of the wedding party too many times to count. Every wedding we have attended up here has been this way. And I refuse to get the man's wedding uniform of khaki pants and a long-sleeved blue shirt!
One last dress code. Tonya and I met the kiddo's teachers after enrolling them in school. We met Guido's teacher, who stands out to us the most. There she was, dressed in a sparkly Harley Davidson tee with cut-offs and open-toed sandals. Me wife said to me on the side, "If she were teaching in New Jersey, she'd be fired for that mode of dress." That aside, I will say the woman's young charges love her, and she is one of the most popular teachers. Guido has done well under her guidance, so I can't complain; I'm just saying how different it is up here.
I should have known something was amiss when I first moved in. The Realtor leaned over to me at the closing and said, "At least you are on the town line; the town next to you has Internet, so you should be able to tap into that." That took a good few minutes to sink in. "What do you mean, tap in? Don't we have Internet in this town?" The answer was NO. No cable, no Internet. Notta. That we have flush toilets instead of outhouses, we can count ourselves lucky.
The story goes that the horse people of our little village refused free cable because they didn't want it to mess up their lives as they knew them. REALLY? I only found this out a few months AFTER I moved in. I've been here almost four years and I found out only three weeks ago, if you want to know, what is going on with this village, you have to sign onto Facebook and hope your satellite connection keeps you on long enough to get to the site and then stay on the site long enough for one to peruse the news.
No buried cable, but satellite dishes. Yup, which is more unsightly? So much for preserving the village's integrity. One bad rain, snow, or wind and ice storm, and there is no telly, no so-called Internet; there is nothing but one can go to the local library for a book. But that is an experience in itself.
I got tired of cloudy or foggy nights interrupting me telly service, so the next day I went to our local one-room library to get a card so I could take books out. I get down there, and right away, I walk into a bake sale in the small hallway. Right next to the door is a basket full of money. If this were Boston, that basket would have been out the door and long gone by now. I should stand there and guard the money so that it wouldn't happen. I got the attention of the lady arranging goodies on a small table and said as much, and was told it was just fine where it was. I felt like I needed to buy something, so I selected a cookie, but then found I needed change. The nice lady told me to make my change from the basket. I was flabbergasted and really didn't want to do that. So I dropped a fiver in and left it without change. I know I could have had a free cookie and a few twenty-dollar bills, but that's not me. So, I put the cookie in me pocket and went inside to the library desk. Right away, the bake table lady comes in behind the desk. I thought double duty, desk and bake sale. Ok.
She asked what she could help me with, and I told her I wanted to get a library card. She asked to see me license so she could take me info off it. So I am standing there, watching her, when it dawns on me: she is using a typewriter to type the information on a piece of paper. Carbon paper and all. I looked around and there was no computer. Well, why would there be? Duh, no Internet! So I asked her how she knew what books were outstanding, and she pointed to a long wooden file box and said everything was there. That's all the books. I asked her how she looked up overdue books, and she said she had to go through the NUMBERS one by one in the file box. OMG. The numbers are all from the Dewey Decimal System. I didn't know anyone used the DD System anymore, so I was really taken aback at that. But like I say, no computers, so figures.
Once outside and hoping I was in the real world again, I noticed a small sign over a hut. It said Police. There was a jeep parked there, so I decided to drop in to meet our local constabulary. That was also an eye-opener. There is one man, he is the police chief, and he is the only policeman. He has no police car, a little village like ours doesn't need one, he said. He told me if I needed any assistance day or night, I was to call 911, and the folks two towns over would respond. He'd get to me once they PAGED him. I was like, OK.
I am finding that America isn't all it's hyped up to be. Oh, sure, there are a lot of things and opportunities, but not all of them are like that. Where I live, the tourists think they are back in time and find it all quaint. What is quaint to them is inconvenient to me. Did I tell you we are somehow being absorbed into the backwoods lifestyle? Yup, we got some chickens. Not for eating for eggs only. We didn't intend to raise chickens, but the woman next door thought we should have some. I think I mentioned that to you. Anyway, we have what they call free-range animals, which are all over the place. I keep thinking some wild animal will spirit them off, and we have lost one. But they seem to know how to hide their eggs, and then we have more chickens. We started off with nine and are up to seventeen dirty birds. I whisper in Mam's ear that we should have a few for dinner, but she thinks the kiddos would find out our dirty deeds and we'd be persona non grata. When we reach thirty chickens, I will mail you a dozen to start your own egg farm in Denver.
 |
| A few of our chickens -- BUCKAHHHK!!! |
Copyright © 2017 All rights reserved
you think you live in the boonies, you should live in the northern part of Saskatchewan, no cable, no library, no stores, no doctors, no nothing. moving from LA to canada was a huge culture shock. still not used to it.
ReplyDeleteLMAO NEVER even think of sending chickens! They stink! send me KFC! You are 1 step above rolling a boulder in front of the cave door
ReplyDeleteI lived in Devon England very laid back. NJ was shell shock with the rapid pace. . I am embarrassed to say I have become very impatient thanks to NJ. Not good. Be glad you're in a place to chill. You'll live a lot longer then me lol
ReplyDelete