We were up in Vermont a couple of years back and I fell in love with the state.  It was beautiful and so ridiculously quaint that you wanted to start whittling something the moment you crossed the state line.  We had a lovely time traveling the winding roads, ogling the beautiful fall foliage and sighing contentedly at the sight of sheep grazing next to country churches while little old ladies knitted socks right off the backs of the sheep.

Very quaint indeed.

We visited one little town that may have been the cutest damn place I have ever been.  The houses were all immaculate, the streets were all clean, and the leaves had been trained to change colors and then fall directly into neat piles.  While we were petting a baby lamb, a mother came outside of a nearby house, rang the dinner bell and the kids who had been playing on the playground all scattered off to enjoy their organic dinners.  It seemed like a little slice of heaven.

We literally looked at housing brochures on the way out of town and every few months, if I’m feeling a little depressed, I’ll look up the real estate page for the town and dream about how all of our problems would be solved if we just moved to this sweet little corner of Americana.

I’m not naïve though.  I know this would not be a perfect place.  It would have its downside.  For instance, it is my understanding that it gets very cold in Vermont.  Plus, the diversity of the area seems minimal.  On the state census form, the categories are “white and downhill skis” and “white and cross country skis.”  You’re not allowed to be both.  Very strict.

So, here’s my problem.  I have developed this dream of living in some kind of New England / Ohio / Small town America / Utopia.  Oddly enough, I think this dream mainly comes from Hollywood.  Growing, up I must have seen a dozen shows where everybody lived in these cute little towns with a central courthouse and giant oak trees and everybody knew your name (whoops, wrong show).

And all of these towns were full of quirky, interesting people.  You know, the kind of place where the barber stands outside the shop and waves to you, where you’re constantly running into friends while walking down the street and where you have to duck into the pie shop to hide from crazy old Mrs. Glowerstein who is trying to get you to head up the Church Christmas pageant.  Again!

I think the visual representation that most sticks in my mind is from a show I used to watch a few years ago called Ed.  It was about a big city lawyer who left the big life to return to his cutesy home town and pine after his high school crush.  (ok, now that I write that out, the premise sounds really really hokey.  But it was good!  I promise!)

The town was called Stuckeyville and the thing I loved about it was that it was very cute and old fashioned, but it was also very progressive.  It was friendly and smart and diverse and there was a coffee shop right on the town square that served good coffee, and half the scenes involved characters walking down the street with their half caff double whip no foam mochachinnos running into neighbors with fun interesting problems.

“Oh Ed, my husband has decided to run off and start a rock band with his old war buddies.  They want to play in the local battle of the bands, but I’m afraid they’ll just embarrass themselves.  Can you help me?”

“Sure Mrs. Johnson.  Let me see what I can do.”

And then Ed runs off and learns that Mr. Johnson is just sad because he had always wanted to be in a band as a teenager, but his Dad died, so they never had enough money to buy a guitar and Mr. Johnson had to work double shifts after school at the family soda shop just to make ends meet and this is his last chance to try to reclaim some of that lost youth, but the band needs a drummer becuase old Mr. Blackstein just fell and broke his hip and can’t play and now they’ll never be able to play “Runaround Sue” at the battle of the bands.

So Ed agrees to be the drummer and they all play at the concert and they don’t win first prize (this is reality after all) but they win a special prize for being the oldest band members in the competition and then Mr. Johnson sings a love song to his wife that was the very first song they had ever danced to back at the high school prom and she thought he had forgotten all about it, but how could he, because he loves her that much.  End scene.  Roll credits.

Wouldn’t that be a great place to live?  I would love to live there.  But here’s the catch, Stuckeyville doesn’t exist.  In fact they filmed it in (brace yourselves)  New Jersey.

Aaarrggh!  You don’t have to spit on my dreams, you can just tell me no!

So, intellectually I know that this vision of an American town isn’t real.  But I still harbor a secret dream and every once in a while I’ll pass a place that seems to remind me of this perfect little microcosm of all that is good and just in the world.  I’ve seen towns in Vermont, and Michigan and Massachusetts and New  York and West Virginia that all seem to evoke this bucolic wonderland, but when I investigate closer, I usually find that things aren’t as perfect as they seem. 

There’s a bunch of sketchy foreclosed houses on the back side of town, the old factory is leaking leather tanning chemicals into the river, the quirky people you meet on the street are usually just meth addicts, half the perky teens at the high school are pregnant, the local church only has 6 old bitter regular attendees, most of the town’s adorable homes are just summer cottages for unpleasant people in Manhattan, the klan used to be very active in the area but no one likes to talk about that, the nearest available job is 20 minutes away at the saw mill with “Stubby” Jenkins and there’s an annual average of 14 feet of snow and a median winter temperature of -67.

So once again my dreams are crushed.  There is no local candy shop, the only coffee available is Sanka and old Mr. Wilkins, the barber, has been bought out by the Hair Cuttery. 

I have learned to keep my dreams in check, to experience those magical New England towns with a grain of salt and to be happy with the perfectly lovely place that I live now. 

That doesn’t mean that I don’t keep an eye out for my own little Stuckeyville.  I know one day I’ll find it.  And maybe I’ll even be asked to be in a band. 

 A boy can dream can’t he?

P.S.   Today (11-14)  is Customer appreciation day at Haagen Dazs.  Everything is half off.  I recommend the Bailey’s shake