Just Plain Folks

Diana and I drove over to Lewisburg for our 24^th anniversary.  We didn’t talk much on the way.  It wasn’t because we were upset or anything...just being together was enough.  A friend of ours told us that once a week he and his wife hike in silence until noon lunch before sharing their thoughts. Maybe it’s wearing off on us.

I especially enjoyed the brilliant green of the countryside.  It first caught my attention when we returned from the brown of Colorado a few weeks ago. Green burst into view everywhere I turned.  Vermont of course is known as the green state; but after having been there a couple of times, I don’t notice that it is any greener than the wild and wonderful state.   

Lewisburg claims to be the “coolest small town in America” with good reason.  It has a modern day Mayberry feel to it.  Shops, restaurants and historic buildings crowd around the open courtyard.  There in the center of town benches invite passersby to slow down for a conversation, and water works entice children to indulge on a hot summer day.  First Friday’s of the month give shop owners a chance to fling open the doors of hospitality with food samples and music.  The town has a character all its own or as one person at the health store put it “soul.”

We stopped in at a few of our favorite shops.  One was once an old hardware store.  I go in not so much for the merchandise but to hear the screech of the screen door, the clang of the bells and to listen to the creak of the wooden floors as we stroll through.  

The used bookstore is on our list of course.  I talked with the proprietor for a while.  He is a naturalist through and through and tells me he has been writing poetry since high school.  There’s a piano in this hole in the wall store that he occasionally plays as customers browse.  Later I return with a giant pine cone from Estes Park.  I’ve been waiting to give it to someone, and he seemed to be the most likely candidate to appreciate it.

The afternoon ends up at the Wild Bean Café for hummus wraps and herbal tea.  I’m reading as my book of choice Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard and for Diana The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien.  We get a coffee to go along with the enlarged chocolate chip cookie we split.  With mug in hand I give a try to the mud, house blend, Somali and southern pecan before settling on the Wild Bean house blend. 

We have a discussion on a book we purchased entitled Floral Art in the Church.  It says that “through careful attention to detail in arrangement flowers can be made to serve as vivid symbols of age-old…truths when used in altar arrangements.”  Diana tells me that in Victorian times everyone was expected to know the meanings behind flowers so bouquets were sent with messages behind them.  Eventually we get around to talking about living fully just where we find ourselves and in what we find ourselves doing. About seeing wonder in the midst of our ordinary routine lives.  About the work of God in just plain folks like us.