State of Cape Cod

DEMOLITION DERBY?

It doesn't have to be. It’s summer. Time to assess driving on Cape Cod. It’s a whole different experience on our narrow, winding roads this time of year than when the invaders finally leave and we can enjoy our lovely peninsula in peace.

Not that transients are necessarily bad drivers but their sheer numbers are daunting. Driving in a resort area in season can be a very troubling experience for residents and non-residents alike.

The visitors, euphemistically referred to as ‘guests’ by those who profit from them, which is really pretty much all of us, are on vacation. They don’t have to deal with everyday life as the rest of us do. They can forget work, shopping, doctor’s appointments, car repairs, household chores, and the other mundane aspects of daily existence with which the rest of us must contend.

They meander leisurely along, enjoying sights which we take for granted. It’s why they’re here. Their unfamiliarity with the area exacerbates the slow vehicular progress and infuriates those who live on The Cape. The worst of the invading horde appear to feel that, for the cost of an overpriced hotel room or cottage, they’ve purchased sole proprietorship of Cape Cod.

Some of us who don’t own restaurants or lodging facilities forget that we, too, benefit from the tourist industry. They contribute a great deal to our economy while requiring little in the way of services such as schools and other resources. Courtesy and consideration by both sides would go a long way toward making our motoring lives more pleasant.

There are remedies which can alleviate the situation. Year rounders can adjust their driving habits and times to suit the seasonal circumstances. Leaving a little earlier will often help and, you ‘guests’, remember that the guy in the pickup truck behind you banging his head on the steering wheel might have a job to get to, or a doctor to see. If you must stop to watch, say, a harbor full of picturesque marine activity, pull over and let him by.

Outlanders should research their routes before starting out. Nothing infuriates a Caper like having someone stop in the middle of an intersection and unfold a map. It often evokes some very colorful language so, to protect your children from words they don’t teach in school, don’t do it.

Cape residents have learned that errands are best tended to in the middle of beautiful beach days. Give our visitors time to have breakfast and get out on the sand, boat, or golf course before you head for the supermarket or drug store. As for dining out, save it for the off season. Prices are lower, restaurants are uncrowded and the real tourist traps, which you probably don’t want to patronize anyway, are closed.

There are also traffic regulations which make a bad situation worse. My favorite is giving pedestrians the right of way in crosswalks. Drivers unfamiliar with the practice come upon those little signs in the middle of the road and freeze. Some stop, others slow to a crawl. In a few cases they are completely ignored. Each of those options can cause an accident.

Some foolish pedestrians take the signs at their word. Whatever the state of the traffic, they have the right of way and by golly, they’re crossing NOW! They just stride off the curb and into the street, daring cars to hit them. After all, they have the law on their side. As the old poem goes:
   
    Here lies Jane Doe who died today
    Killed defending her right of way.
    She was right, dead right, as she crossed along
    But she’s just as dead as if she were wrong.

Need we mention rotaries? Apparently many out of state drivers are unfamiliar with the concept. They work just fine for those who know how to negotiate them. It takes just the right blend of caution and aggression. There’s nothing as disconcerting as having the car in front of you wavering indecisively in the middle of a busy rotary.

Overly polite drivers can be more hazardous than any other. If you’re moving along with the flow and the car in front of you stops suddenly to let another vehicle enter the road, whose fault is the mishap that might result? Do we not have the right to expect traffic to keep moving absent any impediment? Just because some dimwit wants to feel noble, he should learn that excessive courtesy can also cause accidents.

It’s really not difficult to drive safely through the summer months on Cape Cod. Choose your times carefully, use the back roads if you can, obey the law, be courteous and have some patience. Winter will be here before you know it and you’ll have to cope with a new dynamic. Snow.

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LET THE TEACHERS TEACH

I hold teachers in the highest esteem. Having been one for thirty years, and having worked “on the outside” for more than a decade before that, I know them to be the most dedicated of professionals. They are absolutely devoted to their work and their students, but too many of them are terribly misguided.

Administrators, including School Committees are, unfortunately, unduly influenced by political considerations. They should be guiding those who serve under them but, when caught between doing what’s right and that which is politically expedient, they often make the wrong choice. This is  evident in three recent incidents which took place in our own back yard.

An eight year old Rhode Island boy was prohibited from displaying a project in class. He had chosen a patriotic theme and glued toy soldiers onto a camouflage hat. It seems the tiny plastic GIs carried even tinier make believe guns, which some numb nut decided violated the schools no tolerance policy against weapons.

It took an intervention by Lt. Gen. Reginald Centracchio, the retired head of the Rhode Island National Guard, and objections from all sides, to set the alleged educators straight. The general presented the boy with a medal for his patriotism. The policy is now being reconsidered, but common sense should have let the situation remain the non-issue it ought to have been.

Then there were the two teachers at Dennis-Yarmouth Regional who took advantage of an assembly held, in part, to honor graduating seniors who had enlisted in the military. These “educators” selfishly decided to use it as a forum to proclaim their anti war views. Holding up their “End the War” signs, in the opinion of some, came very near to meriting a charge of disturbing the peace. At the very least, they should be severely disciplined, if not fired, for violating their professional ethics and hijacking a moment of triumph from students whose welfare they are supposed to promote.

The defense, of course, is that they have a right to free speech. And they do. Just not there. Not then. Freedom of speech is not an absolute right and does not grant any individual license to disrupt a public meeting or other solemn occasion, such as military funerals, as the notorious Westboro Baptist Church discovered. It may also be restricted by one’s employers which, it would seem, gives school administrators the right to punish teachers who step out of line, if they can muster the cojones.

The most glaring of these educational gaffes was the decision by the Provincetown School Committee and its benighted superintendent to give condoms to any student in the elementary and high school who might request them. Further, no parental permission would be necessary, parents would not be notified, and no child, from first graders on up, could be refused. At the intervention of Governor Patrick the proposed policy is being revisited, but the fact remains some alleged “educators” thought, and still believe, this would be a good practice.

Americans often wonder why our young people lag behind so many other nations in academic areas, such as math and science. It’s not hard to understand for anyone except the so-called educators. Kids can’t learn math and science, nor much else, if the schools are wasting time promoting what many consider politically correct nonsense instead of solid academics.

If a teacher has to be concerned with toy soldiers sewn onto a child’s hat; if teachers are permitted to disrupt a school function by flaunting their political views; if valuable learning time is instead devoted to passing out condoms and instructing children in the proper use thereof; then things like math and science, as well as English, History and everything else, will be neglected. It ain’t, as they say, brain surgery.

Let the teachers teach a solid established curriculum. If they don’t want to, replace them. Let the students learn without regard to political correctness, race, creed or background. Forget the notion that all students are created equal. They’re not. Let the brighter ones soar. Don’t neglect the intellectually challenged, of course, but don’t hold back the gifted either. To do otherwise helps no one, nor does it serve society or the country.

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ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

Circumstances have cast me in the role of grocery shopper. It’s something I had not done, except as designated cart pusher, until recently. It was an eye opening experience. Where once I was merely a  fetch and carry guy, now the decisions as to what to fetch, carry, pay for, bring home, and ultimately consume, are upon my shoulders as well.

It used to be simple. You needed stuff, you made a list, went to the market, snatched the items off the shelves, checked them out, and took them home. No decisions except, perhaps, brand and price, but even that was a no brainer. You wanted milk, you went to the dairy section, grabbed a bottle of milk, and on to the next item.

No more. Now you have to make a decision over nearly everything you’re looking to purchase. For milk, you need to decide among whole milk, skim milk, 2% milk, 1% milk, lactose free milk, even soy milk, which isn’t milk at all, thereby complicating things even further.

Orange juice was a snap. You bought a container of the liquid that came out of oranges when they were squeezed. Now the offerings are almost endless. Not from concentrate. From concentrate. No pulp, some pulp or most pulp. With or without calcium. Or some combination of all those choices. The man happened to be stocking the OJ the last time I bought some. I remarked on the confusion caused by so many options but got no sympathy. Instead he said that it was even tougher on him. He had to carefully sort and stock each of these varieties where once he just shoved the stuff in the case and that was it.

Coffee is an absolute joke. At one time there was just coffee. Then along came caffeine-free coffee. The flavor was less than appetizing but some people needed it, or thought they did. Then different roasts were incorporated into the coffee buying mystique. Dark, light, medium, strong, whatever. As if that didn’t sufficiently complicate matters some marketing genius decided that perhaps we should have our coffee flavored. So now you can’t just grab a can of coffee. You must seek, say, dark roast, half decaf, French hazelnut flavored coffee. With chicory if, for some benighted reason you might want that.

Nearly all packaged food comes in regular, low fat, no fat, no trans fat, lite, lo cal, organic, or some other allegedly more healthful but less flavorful variation of the real thing. It has become increasingly difficult to find soda and other soft drinks made with real sugar. Diet rules the day with a variety of artificial sweeteners, most of which leave a strange aftertaste, although they vehemently protest that they don’t. All of this is purportedly designed to keep us healthy and thin, and yet we are told that our society has a serious obesity problem leading to terrifying health issues.

In many cases the size of the containers has been adjusted downward in an attempt to surreptitiously raise prices by decreasing the quantity. You once were able to buy a pound of something for, say, three bucks. Now the container appears to be the same size, the price is the same, but it only weighs thirteen ounces or less. A very underhanded way to raise the price without telling you they’ve done so. They think shoppers are stupid. A valid assumption because they keep doing it and we keep buying.

The reason for this tampering with traditional ingredients is simple. Money. Why does it work? The brainwashing foisted upon a gullible public by the health nazis. People have been frightened into believing that they’re going to get sick and die unless they drastically alter their diets. Overlooked, perhaps deliberately, are two important facts – real facts, not claims.

One, everybody is going to die of something. If you suspect a health problem tell your doctor and let him take care of it, not your grocer. The second ignored fact is that our life expectancy is higher than it ever has been. 78.4 years is the latest figure I could find. A few countries are a bit higher. A heterogenous population with fewer immigrants than we have might help account for that. Could another reason be because they aren’t being constantly nagged to change their eating habits?

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'Tis the Season - Whichever Season It Is!

Contrary to popular opinion Cape Cod has four delightful seasons, each in its own way. Spring, which will soon be upon us, has a bad rap but it isn’t as terrible as most people claim. Sure, it can be raw, rainy, and decidedly unpleasant weatherwise but in spring the air smells different and things do begin to pop. The crowds aren’t here yet but winter is fading fast, the snow is gone, school is winding down, and summer homes are getting their annual facelift. Before you know it, Easter’s here and then it’s Patriots Day. Businesses are getting their seasonal freshening up and the anticipation of summer, the Cape’s raison d’etre, is everywhere. It’s a time of expectation with here and there a day or two that give us a tempting preview of fine weather to come.

Then summer itself bursts upon us, perhaps a little later than we’d like, with all its activities and great climate. The beach, golf, boating, fishing, trips to the islands, concerts, Cape Cod League baseball, summer shows, just lazing around and, of course, shopping and antiquing, are the order of the day for most people. There are the obvious drawbacks. The price we pay for all the splendor of the summer season is – the visitors.

Crowds are everywhere. On the roads, which is reflected in the high gasoline prices. In the restaurants, where summer rates are also in effect. On the beaches, still basically free except for parking, and golf courses with their summer greens fees. Wherever one goes, wall to wall people and higher prices. But the temporary change from the sleepy Olde Cape Cod we all love is worth the inconvenience. It lasts, after all, only about ten short weeks and it’s over. A burst of excitement in our otherwise placid lifestyle and we edge back to normal.   

Fall is a gem. The weather is pleasant and there are still some beach days. The crowds have diminished with the opening of school but bus trips abound and the shoulder season keeps things humming. The roads are less congested but by no means free flowing and we’re starting to get our Cape back. Whereas spring is a season of promise, fall is a time of decline in many respects. Daylight is diminishing, temperatures are inching downward and soon the leaves will be falling. Many establishments are closing. The population begins to dwindle which is, perhaps, along with football season and uncrowded golf courses, the only plus, but it’s a big one.

Except for the an occasional storm and a relatively brief cold snap or two, winter is a delight. Many of us, present company included, consider it the best time of all. Forget the calendar: winter begins on Thanksgiving and the kickoff of the holiday season, with everything that wonderful time has to offer. The climax, of course, is Christmas week. Whatever your religion, or lack of same, and in spite of what the politically correct Grinches and anti-joy nazis try to force upon us, Christmas belongs to everyone. It may have begun as a Christian holiday but it’s not simply that any longer. Those who decry the commercialism of Christmas are free to keep it as the exclusively religious holiday it once was. Christmas today is a state of mind in which everyone can share. Thankfully, to their credit, most people do partake undeterred by the ACLU and other Scrooges.

Soon after the holidays those snowbirds who are still here take off for sunnier climes and the Cape once again belongs to the real year-rounders; those of us who stay the winter. Despite what the weather may have in store, and perhaps a power outage or two, winter is a time of quiet, low pressure relaxation.

Prices drop. Restaurants and other establishments run specials. We become reacquainted with our true neighbors. Traffic is sparse and roads are easy to navigate. There’s some snow, sometimes a lot, and wind, and it gets dark early, but by and large winters on the Cape are not the most terrible things in the world. Usually we fare better than the rest of New England. How often do we hear the forecasters, amid dire predictions for the rest of the state, utter those welcome words, “Rain on the Cape?”

Then, all too soon for some of us, another year has gone full circle, the days get longer, and the cycle begins anew. Would anyone have it any other way?

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Cape Codyssey

A little retrospective. I first came to the Cape in the summer of 1951 to visit my friend Richard who had gotten a summer job at the Highland House in Truro. I was eighteen. Four of us set out from New Jersey to see what our buddy was up to on Cape Cod, wherever that was. Richie had praised it so highly we thought we’d take a look.

The trip seemed interminable. There were no interstates most of the way. We left at around 5:00 P.M. and didn’t get to the Lower Cape until well after midnight. At a guess, we were on the road some nine hours.

We slept, sort of, in the car the rest of that night and looked up our friend the next morning. We lazed around on the beach with Richie until he had to go to work. Then we did some sightseeing and returned to the sand after dinner. The plan was to save money and sleep out. Not the best of ideas.

The beach, soft, warm and inviting during the day, was most inhospitable. As the sun sank the sand became lumpy, damp and chilly. Hordes of unpleasant insects materialized. They flew, crawled, hopped, swarmed, stung, and itched. Some, all but invisible, clogging our nostrils; a veritable plague. We were in a motel before dark.

The contrast to the Jersey Shore was profound. Cape Cod was appealing for the things it didn’t have. It had no overcrowded beaches or boardwalks with their raucous arcades. No games, rides, and noise. No garish lights. What it did have was peace and quiet and space. Certainly there were fun spots. Provincetown is the most notable in that area but one had to leave the beach to go to it, if one so chose. In New Jersey the boardwalk, crowds and amusements were right at the back of every teeming beach. There was no escape, day or night. Cape Cod had hooked me.

Another visit to Richard the following summer set the hook. I knew that some day I wanted to live here. I knew not when, nor how, nor if it would ever be possible: just that I would really like to make the move. This time we stayed a little longer and had a great time. We did more, toured some, and the attraction became stronger.

Then, in 1953, it all fell apart. Richie was now working at Scott’s Chowder House in Truro. Another visit was planned but the Korean War draft had taken away most of our group. Only two of us remained but a third acquaintance decided to join us. We came on a late summer weekend, perhaps Labor Day, intending to stay from Friday evening until Monday afternoon.

Discord developed among us so the stay was cut short. We left on Sunday morning. Between our departure and our arrival in New Jersey, some six hours, word had preceded us that Richard had been involved in a swimming or diving accident, had broken his neck and had not survived. It would be a long time before any return to Cape Cod was even thinkable.

Years passed before my wife and I, with another couple, came to the Cape on vacation. We visited all the old haunts but things had changed. The places where Richie had worked were no longer there. The buildings existed, of course, but different owners, different environments entirely, made inquiries futile. The Cape, I believed, was out of my life for good. Then the famous fickle finger of fate took a hand.

Fast forward another ten or so years. My wife’s sister moved to the Cape. Her husband’s employer relocated here and they came along. My mother-in-law soon followed. A move for us was now not only feasible, it was all but inevitable. In 1974 a teaching job materialized and we moved to Olde Cape Cod. It was all we had hoped. Beaches, golf, and a leisurely life style.

But Richie’s ghost wouldn’t go away. I had to try and find out exactly what had happened. I never did. His mother, if she knew, would never speak of it. Miles of microfilm at the Cape Cod Times were of no avail. I don’t think the Times was in existence in 1953. If there was a Provincetown paper from that time, I couldn’t find it.  It was suggested the New Bedford paper might help but I never tried it, nor did I contact the lower Cape police departments or the hospital. Now time is running out and I still don’t know.

Ater all this time do I expect someone reading this to pop up and reveal all? No. Perhaps a suggestion or two might materialize but it’s unlikely. This is more a catharsis than anything else. Still, long shots do pay off once in a while…

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