The Brattleboro Women's Chorus presents its 16th fall concert, “Life's Little Lessons,” on Saturday and Sunday at the First Baptist Church at 190 Main St.
Lisa McCormick and Julian McBrowne will join the chorus as guest musicians as conductor Becky Graber leads more than 70 area women and girls in what organizers describe as “lively, soulful, and meaningful songs about life, love, and everything in between.”
Included will be “The Secret of Life” by James Taylor, “Give Yourself to Love by Kate Wolf,” and “Fruits of the Selfless Heart,” with words by Mother Teresa. They will also perform familiar and favorite pieces like “This Little Light of Mine” and “The Storm is Passing Over.”
The Saturday concert on Nov. 19 begins at 8 p.m., and the Sunday, Nov. 20 afternoon concert at 3 p.m. Tickets are available only at the door and cost $10 for adults ($15 for generous donors), and $8 for students and seniors.
Quite a few influential people, among them Winston Churchill, Harry S. Truman, and Pope John Paul II, have publicly noted that a society is measured by how it treats it weakest members. One of the things I love and admire about the state of Vermont is that, for the...
Nuclear power, and Vermont Yankee, are increasingly controversial topics. But no matter what side of the aisle you rest on, if you live in Vermont or New Hampshire, you'll be affected if Vermont Yankee closes. Do I know for sure what the future holds for Vermont? No, and certainly...
Peter Case has just about done it all. Case has gone being an early power-punker - he wrote “Hanging on the Telephone,” one of Blondie's biggest hits - to top-40 video tracks, to lovingly compiled tributes to the great acoustic bluesmen, to his path today teaching songwriting and touring solo. Along the way, he has battled personal and professional challenges, health issues, and transient trends in music to emerge where he is today - one of the great creative individuals...
Local and regional designers plan to blow out of the water the reputation that Vermonters are fashion-challenged with a major fundraiser for Brattleboro Area Hospice (BAH) on Saturday, Nov. 19. The “Wild Night on the Catwalk: Compassion for Fashion” runway show will feature designers' one-of-a-kind creations using repurposed fashions. The program will benefit Brattleboro Area Hospice and its Experienced Goods Thrift Shops. “The Runway Show will take the idea of 're-fashioning' to a whole new level,” said BAH executive director...
RE: Richard January's letter [“VY workers committed to safety, precision, detail, dedication, skill,” Nov. 9]. What value does safety hold if the regulator is unable to stop either a) the waste stream, thus leaving waste that needs monitoring for thousands of years, or b) the risk of environmental destruction, in the event of an accident, complete with years, decades, and generations of genetic mutations? So much for safety. If, god forbid, something else should go dreadfully wrong, if there should...
On Oct. 6, the Brattleboro Rotary Club welcomed nine local high school students to this year's Student Rotarian Program: Gia Casella and Eric Ginter of Leland & Gray Union High School; Alec Silver and Marissa Smith of Brattleboro Union High School; Theresa Glabach of the Windham Regional Career Center; Timothy Gringeri and Mitul Rathid of Hinsdale (N.H.) High School; and Cooper Johnson and Anthony Moodie of the Austine School. Offered to area high school juniors and seniors as part of...
An October nor'easter-turned-into-a-massive snowstorm struck New England on Oct. 29 and 30, leaving between 10 and 16 inches of snow in Windham County, according to the National Weather Service. The Berkshires in Massachusetts got more than 2 feet, as did the Monadnock region of New Hampshire. Plainfield, Mass., was the snow champ, as that little town received 31 inches. Leaves were still on the trees in many towns, and a couple of feet of wet, heavy snow on tree limbs...
The Vermont Agency of Transportation (AOT) closed its Dummerston Region Incident Command Center (ICC) on Nov. 9. It was the last of three temporary headquarters established following Tropical Storm Irene to coordinate emergency road and bridge repairs. The Dummerston command center, which covered 56 towns in the state's southeast region, was critical to restoring mobility along Vermont's storm-damaged state highway network. Leadership for all remaining Irene-related roadwork has been transitioned to the agency's main office in Montpelier. “It is impossible...
If you have a heart attack, you have a heart attack. If you have cancer, you have cancer. If you have diabetes, you have diabetes. These diseases, horrific as they may be, have names. In general, medical professionals know what is going on inside you - and which medicines or procedures might help. Or at least how they work…or why they might not. What we call “depression” has many names. And - despite all the talk of serotonin, norepinephrine, and...
I was raised on a 100-acre dairy farm in Ohio. I milked the cows before I walked two miles to school, and I milked the cows after I walked back again. Way back, I'm part Indian. Her name was Mary Silverheels, and it was a traveling Methodist minister on horseback who married her. There's been a Mary in every generation since. Frank was from Ohio, too. That's where we met. He was stationed here during the war, and he said...
Community groups from across southern Vermont are collaborating with the Vermont Department of Health to promote healthy options within local retail outlets. These groups are working with owners of independent grocery stores, convenience stores, and gas stations to create retail environments that encourage healthier food and beverage choices and discourage tobacco and alcohol use. Research conducted by the Vermont Department of Health found that small changes within retail outlets can have a big impact on consumer health. Positive changes the...
The alarm's buzzer is jarring, and I awake, unsettled. Mark is already up and out of bed; the coffee's on and fire's lit before I can truly roust myself. The coziness of the heavy down comforter keeps me in bed longer than it should. I was never good at night with sick children or nighttime feedings. Why would I choose to do this now? I pull on leggings and sweatpants and thick socks, too. I know I'd be more comfortable...
The Shumlin administration's signature “single-payer”-style health-care plan could save as much as $1.834 billion by 2020, according to a report released this month. That's the best-case scenario. Under more conservative estimates, the report from the Joint Fiscal Office and Department of Banking, Insurance, Securities. and Health Care Administration puts savings at $553 million by 2020. The report, produced with assistance from consultant Steve Kappel with Policy Integrity, LLC, builds on a study produced in February by Harvard Professor of Economics...
Obituaries Editor's note: The Commons will publish brief biographical information for citizens of Windham County and others, on request, as community news, free of charge. • Christie Lynn Archer, 35, of Wardsboro. Died Nov. 3 at her home. Wife of Mark Archer for 14 years. Mother of Kenneth William Archer. Sister of Adam and Donald Thomas, Jr. Born in Brattleboro, the daughter of Donald Thomas Sr. and Sandra (Adams) Thomas, she spent most of her childhood in Townshend and attended...
Cycling can be an integral part of the transportation mix for many Brattleboro residents, but then comes winter, and conventional wisdom says that “bike season” is finished. Or is it? More and more bicyclists are finding that with the right frame of mind, good clothing, and some preparation, winter biking is not only possible, but also practical and exhilarating. In cities and towns across the nation, there is a tremendous upsurge of year-round bicycle ridership, even in places like Minneapolis,
Grace Cottage celebrates new imaging suite TOWNSHEND – The public is invited to attend the grand opening of Grace Cottage Hospital's new Diagnostic Imaging Suite at 10 a.m. on Friday, Nov. 18. Refreshments will be served and tours will be given immediately following the ribbon cutting ceremony. Thanks to the generosity of more than 750 Grace Cottage supporters, $672,000 was donated during a 16-month Diagnostic Imaging Suite fundraising campaign that will continue until an additional $128,000 has been raised. These...
A love of quilting, artistic interests, and enjoying the camaraderie of friends were all motivating factors when six area women joined forces to create a unique quilt. The women - Carol Barber, Marianne Buttner, Maisie Crowther, Christina Gibbons, Sarah Page, and Ede Thomas - worked on what evolved into the Kipling Quilt, based on the 12 Just So Stories by Rudyard Kipling and true to his pen and ink illustrations. This locally-made treasure is being raffled by the Guilford Community...
What happens when a group of people of all ages come together to creatively express an abstract concept, an emotion called gratitude? A mythical, musical community expression flowers like an autumn crocus the weekend before Thanksgiving in wild, wonderful Brattleboro ... the annual Gathering in Gratitude. Gathering in Gratitude is an anchor event at Luz Elena Morey's Mahalo Art Center, an octagonal building near the corner of Bonnyvale Road and Route 9. Set back amid towering pines, the space's excellent...
Tropical Storm Irene wreaked havoc on rivers and streams in southern Vermont, leaving communities stranded, washing out roads and bridges, and destroying homes when waters rose to 100-year, and in some cases, even 500-year, flood levels. Thousands of tons of sand, gravel, and rock were washed out of roadbeds and deposited in streams and rivers, changing their characters forever. The state quickly gave towns and villages permission to use the fluvial debris to rebuild access roads immediately. Just as quickly,
The Rescue Project echoes some of the peace and healing initiatives of many organizations that are active in efforts to defuse conflict. But according to its proponents, the project, formed by Leora Kahn, a graduate of the SIT Graduate Institute, exists principally to honor those who have been rescuers when the danger is clear. The project also broadcasts far and wide the belief that everyone has the option to rescue, as well as measures one might take to choose that...
I was at the “Going to Bat for Vermont Farmers” fundraiser put by ESPN's baseball reporter Buster Olney at Vermont Technical College in Randolph Center on Saturday. There wasn't enough room in my news story that appears elsewhere in this issue about the baseball part of the evening and how, for one night in a little town in Vermont, you had Brian Cashman, Theo Epstein, and Neal Huntington talking baseball and taking questions from the audience for about 90 minutes.
Conflict Transformation Across Cultures (CONTACT) is a peacebuilding program at the SIT Graduate Institute in Brattleboro. It was founded by Paula Green, who also founded the Karuna Center for Peacebuilding in Amherst, Mass. Both endeavors are about 15 years old. Karuna is a nonprofit that has worked on peacebuilding in dozens of countries, and also works with CONTACT at SIT, a program of World Learning. The program offers a one-year graduate certificate in conflict transformation, as well as masters degrees...
In a state that's a well-established member of Red Sox Nation, New York Yankees general manager Brian Cashman might not be the most popular man in Vermont. But the architect of five championship teams really loves Vermont, and after seeing the scenes of devastation after Tropical Storm Irene struck Vermont on Aug. 28, he wanted to do something. Buster Olney may be best known as a baseball reporter for ESPN, but he is also an adopted Vermonter. He moved to...
Joseph Sebarenzi, 48, is a Rwandan Tutsi by birth who now lives in Washington, D.C., where he works for the U.S. Department of Justice on African and sub-Saharan human rights issues. He recently spoke to an audience of approximately 100 students, faculty, and visitors at the SIT Graduate Institute as part of the Rescue Project's ongoing awareness events. His talk was titled “Honoring Rescuers, Fostering Compassion.” And his presence in the room was compelling on several counts. He is tall...
When Susan Calabria, the education curator of the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center (BMAC), takes small groups through the new exhibit, VT Kids Design Glass, she poses three questions to the young students. First, she asks, “What is going on?” Calabria sets enough time aside for children to think about and then really address that deceptively simple query. Then she asks her second question: “What do you see in the piece to make you say that?” She wants each child...
Comedian-actor Rusty DeWees will visit Village Square Booksellers in The Square on Thursday Nov. 17 at 7 p.m. to read from his new book of essays, Scrawlins Too, and to (possibly) sing a couple of tunes. Best known for his role as “The Logger,” his one-man comedy show, DeWees grew up in Stowe and was active in theater throughout high school and college. As a young adult, he performed with the award-winning Vermont Actors' Repertory Theatre before moving to New...
Morningside is the only homeless shelter in southeastern Vermont to specialize in housing placement with ongoing staff support and life-skills development for both families and individuals. The Morningside Shelter board of directors is inviting members of the community to apply to join the Board and help the facility meet its mission to help eliminate the condition of homelessness by providing shelter, outreach, referral, intervention, and transitional housing services. The board meets monthly to review and approve budgetary, personnel, and mission-related...
“The reason we grieve is because we loved someone,” said Susan Parris, executive director of Brattleboro Area Hospice (BAH). But, adds the 16-year hospice veteran, “loss is a part of life.” When people experience losing someone dear, Parris said “it is valuable to talk out emotions.” Parris said part of the grieving process includes remembering how someone touched one's life and figuring out the emptiness in the realization that “they're gone and I'm here.” Grieving also involves learning how to...
Lawmakers came back to the Statehouse in force last Thursday for a daylong legislative “briefing.” The seats in the House Chamber were nearly full and a number of senators sat in the gallery to hear the Shumlin administration's updates on the state's recovery from Tropical Storm Irene, a summary of the revenue forecast, the budget gap analysis and an overview of the status of the governor's two main objectives – health care reform and the development of a comprehensive energy...
An award-winning documentary filmmaker will come to Putney this week for a special screening of his film that charts the history of a song that became an anthem for the civil rights movement. The Next Stage Arts Project will present a special screening of the film Strange Fruit on Thursday, Nov. 17, at 7:30 p.m. The film will be introduced and followed by a discussion with producer, director, and editor Joel Katz. Strange Fruit, released in 2002, explores the history...