I'm Down with Upstate

There are dozens of lists circling the globe via e-mail that tell you know you’re from such and such area if …
I’ve seen at least four variations of the Upstate New York list, and as much as I’d to climb on my high horse and object mightily… I think they’re funny!
More than that, I have to admit some of them are true.
You measure distance in hours. Well, as they say in Sullivan County – you can’t get there from here.
You make a switch in your car from heat to air-conditioning and back again in one day… OK, I did that last week.
On second thought, perhaps I should quit while I’m ahead.
I object to these stereotypical attempts at putting as all in boxes on grounds that they’re just too darn close to the truth!
Oh well, I tried.
But I’m a proud New Yorker from the “real” New York.
I can drive 65 miles per hour in 2 feet of snow without flinching.
I say “the city” without a second thought that someone might confuse my reference with the thousands of American cities besides Manhattan.
My Halloween costumes were indeed designed with winter weather in mind, and I certainly know more than one person who has hit more than one deer.
Come to think of it, I know someone who plowed his way through nine in one calendar year!
I’ve been to the hardware store and gotten offers of help from people who don’t work there, but I’d like to think that’s true anywhere.
Really, we can’t be that different, can we?
Come on, you can’t tell me that only folks living north of New York City have been known to think the first day of hunting season is a national holiday.
We used to get the day off from school!
And ours is definitely not the only corner of the globe where the mayor greets you on the street by your first name.
Although he does, and I wave, “Hey, Ed.”
But I just found my favorite on any “you know you’re from” list.
You know you’re from upstate New York, it says, when you recognize all four season: almost winter, winter, bitter cold and road construction.
Well folks, it’s here!
I sat on the viaduct in Callicoon with my neighbor last week, our kids snoozing in their carseats in the back and waited as hefty machinery chewed up the pavement and spit it back out to create a new roadway.
I sucked in a deep gulp of air and let it sit in my mouth – so long I could almost taste the macadam.
That’s how I know it’s summer in upstate New York – the hot, bitter scent of asphalt mingling with the diesel fumes of the engines, blown by a gentle wind off the river.

Homemaking down to an art

It took four years of home ownership to realize – this house will never be done.
Technically, we moved into a move-in-ready home in 2003.
Then we started over.
We ripped down wallpaper.
We painted.
We adjusted the house to fit our tastes.
We pounded nails to hang pictures and shelves and calendars.
Then our cats began smelling old cat smells.
We made some adjustments to suit their tastes.
Carpet was pulled up, laminate put down.
More paint.
Wires pulled here, spackle spread there.
Then the announcement – I’m pregnant.
A storage room became a baby’s room.
Insulation was added to keep an infant toasty warm.
Then we got cocky.
We can do a whole room. No problem.
We’ve got books. We’ve got ideas.
We ripped out half the bathroom and realized we were drowning.
We called for help and it came. Thank heavens for family and friends.
We learned fast.
We chipped out moldy old tile and put giant holes through crumbling sheetrock.
I got to know the nooks and crannies of Callicoon Supply, and they got to snicker at my often insane but totally earnest questions.
There’s a bathroom taking shape. There’s a shower, a sink, a toilet . . .
Sunday afternoon, I put the finishing touches on the last coat of paint.
I sat for a moment, the new bathroom exhaust fan whirring away the fumes to admire my handiwork when it hit me.
The pocket door is still a bit wonky, and there’s a closet to finish.
There are boxes of laminate waiting to become the floor of my bedroom and paint to be purchased for the living room walls.
Jillian’s playroom was overtaking my office, but we haven’t finished switching furniture out of the guestroom to make space for all of her toys.
The porch needs painting, and there’s a pile of Jillian’s photos that can’t be hung until they’re framed.
I climbed off the floor of my almost-there-but-not-quite bathroom and walked quickly out the door.
No time to glance in the mirror or worry over the drips of white ceiling paint on the blue walls.
I don’t own a house. I have a home, and I’d better get back to work.

Mergers and education

Ah, school vote day. Time to exercise my American birth right, protected by the taxes I pay each and every year.
Ain’t it grand?
I’ve read all the letters to the editor, brushed up on my candidates’ statements and studied the district report card.
Now I’m off to cast a ballot for the lesser of two evils and help decide what’s down the road for my daughter come 2010.
I can’t tell anyone else what to vote, who to vote for or why.
If you care, you vote. It’s that simple.
Instead I’ve turned my attention to a short sentence in a recent letter touting the virtues of a certain candidate.
The letter, the candidate – they’re for you to judge.
But the statement.
Ah, that was loaded with column-worthy fodder.
This candidate, it said, is the product of a successfully merged school district.
Guess what.
Most graduates of any school in Sullivan County in the last half a century are products of successfully merged districts!
When I yanked the tassel across my mortarboard, there were 10 school districts in Sullivan County – each with the word “central” in their monikers.
Want to know another word for centralized?
Merged.
Yes, Delaware Valley Central School, Narrowsburg Central School, Jeff-Youngsville Central School … all merged districts.
The same goes for Roscoe Central, Livingston Manor Central, Monticello Central, Eldred Central, Fallsburg Central, Tri-Valley Central, Liberty Central …
You’ve got the idea.
And you know what it means?
Me … yes, little ol’ me … is a product of a successfully merged school district – albeit one that no longer exists.
My grandfather graduated in one of the early classes of the Delaware Valley Central School District.
Come August, he’ll be 87.
My grandmother (who, by the way, can’t be nearly that age!) too graduated from a centralized school, traveling from her White Sulphur Springs home to Liberty High.
Seems the old merged districts have been churning ’em out for years – even those re-merged to create the now infamous Sullivan West.
Want to play a hand in the “central” game?
Vote.

Skating through the bad to the good

I still firmly believe that kids will be kids. I’ve seen it with my own eyes, heard it with my own ears, and not so-long-ago, done it with my own two hands and feet.
So I’m a tad reticent when handed an assignment that puts the establishment up against the kids.
The skateboarders in Callicoon story was no different.
Nestled in the bottom drawer of my dresser is a pile of shirts from so-called “skater” stores, and propped in the corner of my shed is Jonathan’s board.
But there were rumors going around Callicoon that the skateboarders had gone too far.
And I was put on the case.
So I made some calls.
I talked to business owners who were spitting mad. One was quite literally s--- upon by a skateboarding punk. Another reported dozens of complaints ranging from vandalism to menacing.
They want the skateboarders gone.
Then I talked to the folks who are trying to rebuild a place for the skateboarders to go, the head of the Delaware Youth Center.
She wants to bring it back – she just wants the kids to behave.
I wrote it up and handed it in.
Word traveled back that meetings have begun – face-to-face between the Youth Center, the business owners and the kids.
Our job is done. We wrote the particulars, and they’ll hash it out.
Then we received two letters from skateboarders, and both played to my deep-seated emotions.
“We’re not all bad,” they said. “Just give us a place to skate, and we’ll do it.”
They’re absolutely right. Not every skateboarder is bad. For that matter, not every teenager with too much time and an active imagination is up to no good.
And we can’t expect the good eggs to whip those bad apples into sauce.
But broad-brush assessment or not, bad things happen around good people.
What it calls for is an out-of-the-box idea.
Take away a skatepark, and what do you have? A bunch of good kids who have nowhere to skate, and a few bad seeds with more venom to spew.
Sounds like a plan for disaster.
Or you could bring it back, ignore the business owners and just give the kids what they want.
The well-behaved skateboarders who just want some good clean fun will be happy. The handful of bad apples will continue to vandalize and menace the community, and the frustrated business owners will eventually pull their support from a facility that’s vital to the community.
Doesn’t sound good either, huh?
So, what to do?
As a reporter, I couldn’t say. As a community member, I present one of a million ideas.
Take a page from the books of other communities with good kids and bad kids, good adults and bad.
Study successful skateparks (I know a few) with the means for ensuring safety and good behavior and the funds to pay for it all.
Maybe hire a park supervisor, paid for by small fees charged to the skateboarders for the privilege of using the park?
I can’t say what’s best.
But I can tell you where to start – ask the kids. They’ve got too much time and too much imagination.
If they want something bad enough, they’ll work for it. They’ll shape up.
Kids will be kids, but that’s the beauty of it.
Kids can surprise you.

One 'real' pageant

The word “pageant” makes me shiver. I’m sorry to all
of you moms out there who insist on calling them
“scholarship opportunities.”
Let’s face it – if you have to give your 6-year-old a
full set of fake nails or paint their face with
something that goes by the name “Barbarella” or
“Catfight,” I won’t be signing my daughter’s name to
the list.
In stark contrast, I’ve always thrown a big thumbs-up
to the Dairy Princess and her court here in Sullivan
County.
The requirements are simple – smile big, know your
cows, and be willing to serve up milk in all its
forms.
Even more encouraging is the growing “court” which now
includes male “ambassadors” and the younger “dairy
dudes” to prove that the American Dairy Association
and Dairy Council is an equal opportunity employer.
Guffaw all you want.
These kids are some of the last examples of wholesome,
small town, country values.
The farm girl princesses aren’t afraid to tell you if
they feel out of place in the required attire –
dresses are the one drawback to the job for them
They’re equally frank about their purpose.
The dairy industry needs help.
Milk prices are in the toilet, and Sullivan County
isn’t the farming capital it once was.
Kids drink soda, and parents sip skinny decaf nonfat
soy lattes.
But the dairy court is made up of honest-to-goodness,
real deal kids.
They’re farm kids who have a passion for keeping the
lifeblood of their families flowing.
So the girls – and guys – go out each summer with
3-A-Day magnets and cheese-shaped erasers.
They do taste tests.
They scoop out hundreds of bowls of fresh ice cream.
They ride in the parades and sit in rain or shine at
dozens of festivals.
They’re the old-school kind of royalty, the
aristocrats who believed they had to work for their
people.
Munching cheese and spooning up yogurt, there’s no
room to fight over who’s the skinniest.
Visiting farms and tromping over muddy fairgrounds,
there are no squeals when their skirts get a little
dirty.
Now that’s what a pageant ought to promote – reality,
hard work, passion.
And fun, of course. Ask any kid handing over their
crown to a new courtesan, and they’ll tell you a
hundred silly stories.
Because, after all, these are kids.
They’re young enough to care – and just young enough
to remind us it’s not all that serious.
Don’t take that away from them just yet.