The Town Meeting

04 August 2026 

1198

R. Linda:

New England! Known for its Town Hall Meetings, its Select Board meetings, its Presidential campaigns, its political signage that blights the highways and byways of small hamlets, etc., all of which can be extremely annoying to those of us who aren't used to these things. Mainly me.

Long ago, me little village was a mining town. The "Quarry" is now a swimming hole; it was a town of potato growers, known for its starch mill. Now it is a horsey town filled with the equestrian set who are reluctant to any kind of change, all very traditionally minded, so when something like cable TV was offered, they voted it down. It's a wonder we have electricity!

Now history has a way of repeating itself, and a mineral company bought up some extensive woodland and is ready to mine it. THAT has everyone in an uproar. How did this happen? Wool was pulled over eyes, somehow. So now the up-in-arms villagers are getting up petitions to stop THIS TRAVESTY, and meetings abound in old colonial homes, leading up to the Selectmen's meeting at the town hall. 

Now I could care less about this tragedy because the property in question is not near me nor would it inconvenience me in any way, shape, or form. However, me neighbours are all upset (yes, they are part of the horsey set) and being a good Joe, I said I'd support their efforts to have the mineral company stopped in its tracks, but this was merely lip service on my part.

Because I am a journalist, but more because of my Bigfoot story and the solving of several stupid town mysteries, I have gained some fame and, unfortunately, a voice. I really didn't want any part of this business but found meself in the centre of it anyway.

I'd never been to a town meeting of any kind, and I don't know too much about the selectmen, only that one is me neighbour and she's a woman, so selectwoman. In the past, she has told me these meetings were highly boring, or, in her words, "dull." Well, guess what? Lucky me got to attend one that turned into utter chaos. 

After a few subjects that had to do with a fund to rebuild the burnt-down cattle barn, and ploughing under the old cellar where Jack Mavens had his fall so that it would never happen again, well, that last erupted in a few folks saying they weren't paying for a backhoe, signs were just as good and they'd make them themselves if need be to keep town costs down. This last got so heated that a farmer stood up and shouted for everyone to shut up and sit down; he'd plough the old cellar and fill it in free with his backhoe. Well, ok then. That was that.

As I went to let out a breath of relief that THAT was over with, someone else stood up and said, "What about all these escaped barnyard animals lately? What ya gonna do bout THAT, ay-yuh."

"Jesse, the cows are all accounted for except for the Highland whatever you call it, and the goat is back in its pen, and I don't know of any other barn animals on the loose, so there's nothing to worry about there." One of the selectmen offered.

Well, Jesse wasn't having it. He wanted some kind of insurance that none of that would happen again, especially since THE goat ate all his garden veggies and the owner won't "get off his duff to pay fer all my hard work gone inside his goat's belly!"

"Jesse, that's between you and Al, and I think that's a court thing, not a town thing."

'A thing.' Okay, I thought. Good to know.

Jesse threw a "You'll be hearin' from me in court, Al Sheppard!" 

Al was sitting with his arms folded, but as soon as he was addressed by the angry Jesse, he smiled at him and waved, like ok do your darnedest. This body language brought old Jesse flying across the room at Al, and a shove out of the chair was had, with Al getting up to deliver a good left to Jesse's jaw. Every man in the vicinity scrambled to pull the two apart, and the women were holding heads or purses, screaming and running for the other side of the room. 

I tell ya!

Both were told to leave, but not together for obvious reasons. Al left first, and I guess they forgot about Jesse because he stayed, looking smug about it. 

It was, but ten minutes later, the door opened and in came the goat! The very goat that trampled Sam and me and ate Jesse's veggies. Jesse stood up, threw down his hat in anger, and started yelling, "I tole ya!" Once again, the ladies fled, and the men scrambled to catch the bletting goat. They had cornered it when Al walked in and said, "Oh, is that my goat? Someone let it out." He said it as innocently as if he were not the one.

Guess who

This got Jesse going again, and they nearly came to fisticuffs, but Al had the goat between them. 

Once Al left for the second time, this time with his goat, and Jesse's ruffled feathers were smoothed by sympathisers, the meeting continued. 

The next subject before the mineral company discussion was that one person got up to complain that two candidates in the prior election had the same name, and she voted for the wrong one. She wanted a better accounting of just who was who and to have her vote changed, which would make the one she didn't vote for the winner. She said, "I am the deciding vote, and here I am to do just that."

"Mrs. Alerton, that's not how things work." One of the selectmen said.

The argument was another heated thing, with people in the room shouting out their opinions for and against. I had a headache.

Finally, the mineral company fiasco was set to be discussed and was the final subject of the rather taxing evening. BUT and that's a big BUT, just as the horsey set representative took to the microphone, the power failed. Not only that, but then the fire alarm went off. 

"What is going on?" Someone shouted.

"Everyone out." Someone else shouted, and we all started to leave with the alarm ringing in our ears until we were almost deafened.

It seems Al Sheppard's goat leapt out of the back of Al's truck, causing Al to turn around in the driver's seat and drive his truck into a tree that not only smashed Al's truck's front end, but the tree came down on the power wires, and the whole village was thrown into darkness. The fire alarm was caused by sparks on the roof of town hall from one of the transformers that decided to burst afterwards. 

And that's how me first New England town meeting ended—not with democracy in action, but with a fistfight, a runaway goat, a power outage, and absolutely no discussion of the thing we'd all come there for. I left wondering how this village had survived long enough to become historic.

Gabe

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